Rear view camera/camping surveillance

[mightyart]

I started a bunch of upgrades several months ago, but lost heart for awhile.
I was in the process of getting a devorce, and working on the family camper was a bit depressing.
All is better now, and I'm slowing getting back to cramming in more toys.
Here's the rear camera I put in it's an Audiovox Model RVMPKG4
http://mobile.audiovox.com/search/?sku=RVMPKG4
I put it in and got it working I just have to clean it up some.
It's supposed to turn on when you put the vehical in reverse, but I cheated and put a switch on the dash to turn it on.

I mounted the rear camera inside on the back shelf, I can close the rear curtains and leave a small enough opening so the camera can "see" out with them closed.

It also had a aux input for something like a dvd player.
Since I didn't want to watch movies on my rearveiw mirror, I added a second camera for the front.

I need to aim the cameras a little better and blacken out some of the stuff holding in the front camera, but really it's pretty much all in.
Now I have better rear visability when backing, and I can "see" out of the front and back of the van with all the curtains in place.
More to come....

[SpudlyHotPotato]

This is so awesome. I love it!!

[Ahwahnee]

[1621]

Looks good Art. A couple questions for you...

How's the visibility at night? Does it pick up enough light to make it useful after dark?

Any glare/reflection from the rear glass where you have it mounted? If so, any suggestions for minimizing this?

Looks like you replaced the rearview mirror with the Audiovox unit, did it fit right on to the OEM stalk?

Thanks.
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'85 Westy

[mightyart]

The lux on these cameras is pretty low, I was surprised at night, in the city, where I live I can see better with the camera then looking out the window. so they work really well.

No, actually I don't get any glare from the window, the only way you can tell that the window is there, are the lines of the defroster.
Before I installed it, I hooked it all up and clamped the camera back there and tested it, I worked a little better then I thought it would, so I went ahead and installed it.

The Audiovox unit clamps over the existing mirror with a couple of straps.
you can't tell from the front, because I cut down the straps and glued them, I didn't glue the unit to the mirror, I just made sure it wasn't coming loose, so no mods were done to the mirror, I always try to do as little hacking as possible, very little was done here.

The Audiovox mirror is wider then the stock one, covers the old one well as you can see , but it wouldn't let the drivers sun visor lower it hit the mirror, which was unexceptable, I need my visors.
So I got an extra used one, took off and saved my oem one, and cut the extra one down a little bit, that was really the most modding I had to do.

[FNGRUVN]

You might want to cover that front lens while you're driving to protect it from bugs and rocks, but you probably already thought of this.
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"Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote." - Benjamin Franklin

[r39o]

Another option is to use a (USB?) camera to feed the carputer and display on any connected device.

One of my many projects is to complete a 7 inch touch screen install for such things as this and GPS.

Currently we have too much fun just using netbooks to deal with the carputer much, though....
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[Volksaholic]

Sorry to hear about the divorce. Even when it's the best decision it still takes its toll... I hope you're doing okay. When I went through my divorce is when I lost motivation to work on my '73 Weekender, '58 Westy, '65 Kombi, and '64 & '67 Bug projects and sold them all. Granted, I had bitten off more than I had time to chew, so all the projects were progressing too slowly, but I hear you about losing motivation on the "family camper" (the '73 Weekender) when the family situation is changing. I did have one good Goblin Valley (Utah) trip in the weekender with just my kids after my wife and I split.

With both front and back cameras I think your next step is to rig up some of the Mythbuster-like remote controls so that you can drive the thing from the back seat while you're cooking dinner. That would be a great time saver on road trips!

Paul
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1988 Wolfsburg Edition, 2001 Subaru EJ251