Not sure if this is the best forum but......

Has anyone got an in car camera fitted that records their journey?

I am seeing an increasing amount of shockingly bad driving and zero consideration for other road users and I would like to give myself a little more protection and peace of mind by installing a camera that will record my journey.

There seems to be a fair amount of products on the market from cheap and cheerful £20 units up to the more expensive professional units at £400+

Ideally I would like something that will play back on my columbus unit if thats at all possible?

Does any one have an first hand recommendations?

Thanks.

Hi Mark,

This is a pet topic of mine. A simple £20 camera would probably be better than nothing, but what you really want is a gps camera like the roadhawk dc-1. These sell for £199 but Briskoda members get 10% off.

I'd like one of these but can't justify the cost atm unless insurers start giving discounts for fitting them, as they do in the US. Unfortunately UK insurers are (mostly) looking for ways to justify premium increases rather than give discount.

I'm in no way associated with Roadhawk BTW.

We tend to use these in the trucks (for the exact same reasons you state) as insurers give a discount if there used. Not sure of the name but there about £199 and come with a USB stick to download onto whenever you need to (they run on both 24v and 12v). I'm off this week but when I'm back I'll try and find the details out for you.

They do advertise in truck & driver if there's a newsagent near that you can flick through a copy

Thanks for that Martin

Ive looked at the Roadhawk and it does seem expensive. However you have all the software and the gps element so I suppose it's a case of you get what you pay for. I dont think it will play back on my columbus either, but need to ask them. The £400 unit with in car and passenger camera does have play back facilities.

I'm assuming you dont have any option to turn off recording speed and location? The reason I ask is sometimes I would just like to use the video and put together some kind of montage. I will of course post on youtube for the fine people of brisky to see.

We tend to use these in the trucks (for the exact same reasons you state) as insurers give a discount if there used. Not sure of the name but there about £199 and come with a USB stick to download onto whenever you need to (they run on both 24v and 12v). I'm off this week but when I'm back I'll try and find the details out for you.

They do advertise in truck & driver if there's a newsagent near that you can flick through a copy

If it's insurance approved i'm pretty sure it will be the roadhawk system but any extra info would be great. Thanks

Here's some links for anyone interested: (I will update as I find more)

http://www.roadhawk.co.uk/?gclid=CKiS-YXKv6sCFcWFDgod-U3FsA

http://www.videovbox.co.uk/?gclid=CNWMlPjJv6sCFYOCDgod5ySbrg

AV In Internface: http://media-in-motion.co.uk/control-logic-lite-%E2%80%93-av-interface-for-skoda-%E2%80%98columbus%E2%80%99-vw-%E2%80%98rns-510%E2%80%99-models/

http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_kw=av&_kw=RNS510

For my fleet I trialled the Blackvue 300 and the Roadhawk. They are very similar.

I have to say that the Roadhawk is good, but the Blackvue is more convenient.

It's design means it's less visable and it's easier to pop out of the vehicle if you park somewhere dodgy and are worried about it being stolen.

But the Roadhawk takes a full size SD car where the Blackvue takes a micro one wich I find fiddly. You have to attach it to the PC with a cable because if you keep popping the micro SD card in and out all the time they start to play up in my experience. They are not as hardwearing as the full size HD cards.

So purely for accident purposes I'd go for the Blackvue.

But for ease of use if you want to be making clips often I'd go for the Roadhawk.

Also worth noting that a new generation of these devices are due soon (3 months or so) so there will then be better products available... and prices of these will come down or they'll be available 2nd hand as people upgrade. The next generation ones will be HD for better picture quality.

Edit: Seen your link for videobox. Looked at these... expensive! (£1000ish)

I'm assuming you dont have any option to turn off recording speed and location? The reason I ask is sometimes I would just like to use the video and put together some kind of montage. I will of course post on youtube for the fine people of brisky to see.

You can turn it off, because it saves as a movie file with extra info.

So you can view/copy/use it as a movie file with no extra info or view it through the Roadhawk software which also then shows you speed and google maps info.

Thanks BossFox thats really helpfull

Doesn't have GPS and does fall into the realms of being expensive, but GoPro seems to be good

If it gets a public showing then, presumably as long as you ask the people you are filming their permission and they say yes its all legal and kocher.

Nick

Edited 28 September, 201114 yr by Clunkclick

Doesn't have GPS and does fall into the realms of being expensive, but GoPro seems to be good

It's no good as a drive recorder (on all the time you drive) instead of a dedicated product though. More for track days when you know you'll be recording in better quality for a short time. Fantasic picture quality in HD.

It doesn't come with a 12v power lead, it's an extra. So you only have a few hours battery with recharge via USB.

Also the memory card doesn't rewrite when it's full, so once it's full that's it. It stops.

The Blackvue and Roadhawk save in short clips, rather than one constant file. Then they overwrite the old files as the SD card fills up which gives you constant recording indefinately.

Any events with high G force are saved to a seperate folder so they don't get overwritten.

I have the GoPro too. (and a HD bullet cam from DogCamSport)

Did a fair bit of comparison testing myself... purely for business purposes of course.

Here is the GoPro in the back of my Greenline II: Greenline II on A12 (this has full 1080 HD available as an option)

Unfortunately YouTube can't support the fantasic quality though by the looks of it. But on a HD TV it's like watching a DVD and very smooth.

If it gets a public showing then, presumably as long as you ask the people you are filming their permission and they say yes its all legal and kocher.

Nick

I'm not going to get that involved in the technicalities. I assume if insurance companies can use the footage in legal cases to help settle claims there wont be any issues for the everday person filming in a public place

I'm not going to get that involved in the technicalities. I assume if insurance companies can use the footage in legal cases to help settle claims there wont be any issues for the everday person filming in a public place

If you are bored, watch this.

Looking at some of these are there any which have an infra-red/ nightviion type function?

I occassionally go for little drives in the countryside looking for badgers/ foxes and deers and I would quite like to get a video.

Also I encountered a black panther not too far from where i live. So getting some video evidence of that would be amazing