Hi all,

After much procrastinating I collected a Superb 280 Sportline Estate at the end of January. I was toying with getting a new Skoda Superb and found the posts on this forum really valuable.  I've been on here quite regularly as a guest, reading your experiences, hints and tips and am very thankful for all the useful info.

 

I've only just registered an account so by way of giving something back here are some details of a 2-channel dashcam I've just fitted to my Superb.  Hope this helps anyone considering a similar install.

 

I decided I wanted a good quality but discrete 2-channel dashcam system recording front and rear simultaneously and ideally one which would do a little stealth recording whilst parked and switched off.  I wasn't worried about a built-in screen as I'd take videos off with a smartphone or simply pull the memory card out when necessary.  I've tinkered with car audio in the past and am not afraid of a little wiring if required, but I wouldn't call myself an expert by any means.  Enthusiastic amateur if you will...

 

I first looked at the Nextbase Duo (https://www.nextbase.co.uk/dashcams/in-car-cam-duo/) which has a screen, but decided against it due to the fact the Superb estate is such a long beastie, I doubt it would see much out of the rear window.  In addition the front and rear cameras do not pivot up and down so once you've set the front angle best to see the road ahead, some people had found the rear camera recording more of the headlining or interior.  It was quite a sizable thing and the inclusion of screen made me think I'd feel nervous about leaving it in the car.  I decided against.

 

Blackvue models looked good, in particular the DR650S (http://blackvuehd.co.uk/product/blackvue-dr650gw-hd-2ch-2) however for "parking-mode" recording it needed an additional "Power magic" adaptor thing, or a very expensive battery pack which added additional cost and complexity.  Definitely looked the best in terms of aftersales support though.

 

After much research I settled on one from Lukas/Qvia. A relatively unknown company I found initally, with very few reviews on the web, but with most of these things being made in China, Taiwan, South Korea etc, being from the latter didn't particularly concern me if there was a knowledgeable UK distributor.  TTW were the guys and I found the one I wanted here: https://lukashd.co.uk/product/qvia-ar790-wd-2ch-dash-camera/

 

I chose the snappily named Qvia AR790-WD.  It looked very similar to the Blackvue above, being quite small and with no screen included.  It came with a very small front and rear camera and the inclusion of a super-capacitor (rather than a battery) meant it would last better in hot sun / cold weather and because all the power "smarts" were built in, no additional battery packs or adaptors were required.  Once fitted, the super-cap charges up and holds some current and the camera has a built-in fail-safe setting to shut down if it detects the car's battery voltage drops below a certain level.

 

The cameras can then be set to record when motion is detected front or rear, or to continually record on a kind of timelapse mode.  So far I've opted for the former and it's worked well.  Fortunately the only thing it's picked up so far are cars coming and going and the odd late-night wheelie bin deployment by myself and the neighbours.

 

Anyway, on to the install.  You can see enough pics of the camera itself at the lukashd link above, so here's how it went for me:

 

First of all, the installation instructions provided are not that great.  Enough to give you an idea, but given the breadth of cars out there, clearly not enough for your average novice in a specific vehicle.  Proceed with caution and if you're not comfortable pulling bits of trim off your shiny car, get a friend to help or professional to do it for you.  

The instructions said to mount the front camera first and run the wires behind the headlining.  This dashcam has two wires - one to supply power and one to connect the rear dashcam.  Both cables would be run across the headlining to the passenger side of the car.  The power cable would run down the A-pillar to the fuse box behind the glove compartment and the rear-camera cable would stay at the headlining level, running to the rear of the car.

 

 

 

Fortunately the front lip of the Superb's headlining had a nice recess into which cables can be easily tucked (it's like the expect them all to be used as taxis...)

 

What you see behind the rear view mirror - i.e. not very much:  (and the eagle-eyed of you will see I took this picture after I'd finished as you can see the rear camera in the mirror)

 

Next task was the remove the front left A-pillar trim.  Not complicated, I had some cheap trim removal tools but this one was easy enough to prise away with fingers.  Pull outwards away from the pillar at the top edge and continue pulling away from the pillar down the windscreen side.  Eventually you can pull upwards slightly away from the dash and it should come free.

 

Behind you can see the airbag and some other wiring.  I chose to run the power cable above all this keeping well away from the airbag:

 

 

Power cable secured with some cable-ties:  (I wanted to avoid anything rattling around after all the trim was back in place.)

Cable tucked down through the same hole through the foam insulation.

 

 

Next, open the passenger door and remove the side dashboard trim.  No screws, just find a leading edge you can get a trim removal tool under and prise outwards.  Note: the trailing cable is still laying ready to be tucked down through the foam insulation at this point (previous pic).

 

 

 

Close up of the side panel removed.  Get your hand in there and fish out that power cable poking through the foam insulation:

 

 

Again, once fished through I decided to cable tie to something solid in order to prevent rattles:

 

At this point I removed the glove box, which the manual explains fairly well and I see others have covered in other articles.

 

What comes next depends upon your specific vehicle and the fuse you have.  This dashcam requires a permanent 12v supply and a ignition or "accessory" fed supply, along with an earth connection.  The dashcam came ready for hardwiring, but I understand a cigarette lighter kit was an option.

 

I opted to use 19x19mm piggy back fuses: https://lukashd.co.uk/product/fuse-holder-adapter-ato-19-x19-mm/

but you might prefer using the mini 11x16mm fuses https://lukashd.co.uk/product/fuse-holder-adapter-mini-111-x16-mm/

 

The idea with these is that they're a simple way to extend an existing circuit. They come with two slots for fuses - one for the original circuit and one for your new added dashcam circuit.  You remove an existing fuse, place the removed fuse into the unoccupied piggy-back holder fuse slot, ensure your 10A dashcam fuse is seated in the other slot and then press the adaptor into the position you removed your vehicle fuse from.

 

I used a tester to find the 12v and accessory feeds, with a little trial and error turning the ignition on and off.

 

Fuse 38 (Trailer electrical socket) was live with the ignition on and Fuse 48 (Blind Spot detection) was a permanent 12v.

 

This is what I ended up with:  (Fuse 38 is the top piggy back and Fuse 48 the bottom one)

In my case both fuse positions were empty - no fuses present as I have neither of those options on my car.  So I had to buy another couple of 10A fuses to complete the circuits.

 

The ground wire was easy to attach, but I didn't take a picture of it.  There's a convenient earth screw position just under the glove box to the left hand side.  Easy to find.

 

With wires in place it was on to running the cable to the rear camera; by far the most time consuming part of the job.  I didn't bother taking pictures of tucking the cable into the headlining across the front left passenger door and rear left passenger door, as it was fairly trivial to feed the cable behind.  Just remove a little of the headlining tuck the cable behind and replace.  It's very tight around the b-pillar, but again with a bit of help from the trim removal tool, it wasn't too hard.

 

Once you get the cable to the C-pillar that's where the fun starts.  In a saloon I guess you have it easy and run straight across the rear headlining.  However in the estate (and hatchbacks as well I guess) you get the quandary of how to get the cable through to the rear window properly.  Ideally you don't want a loose cable spanning the gap between the headlining and the boot, especially when the hatch opens and closes.  

 

This is the cable tucked just into the headlining, optimistically thinking there'd be some easy way to go from here to the boot lid.  Nope.  The only way to go is through the c-pillar, out through the connecting boot grommets and up into the tailgate.  So C-pillar trim needs to come off and cable threaded through into where that top grommet meets the left side of the car.

 

 

Here's the C-pillar with the trim removed (comes off much like the A-pillar one).  The cable needs to come down from the headlining into here:

 

Enter stubby oaf-like finger to tell you where to run the cable.

 

 

I chose the C-pillar to hold all the surplus cable.  Don't do what I did and thread it all through to the tailgate, only to find you there's no room for all the surplus up there.  Don't pull it all through to the tailgate like I did, only to have to pull most of it back through again...

 

 

This was not fun.  With one hand poking the cable up through the c-pillar, somehow you have to feed it to the hole where that rubber grommet was.  I opted for cable ties and insulating tape.  If you can get the cable ties through to your cable, tape the insulating tape to the cable (carefully protecting the metal plug on the end) and pull it carefully through the hole:

 

 

Now we're on one side of the grommet ducting thing.  The cable needs to go through that and there isn't much room in there.  Enter the cable-ties again to pull the wire through:

 

Note: those grey plastic bits hold the rubber grommet ends tight to the body panels.  They are easy to get off and a right pain to get back on again - especially if you have chubby fingers like me.  Deploy the missus or someone with small fingers to help.

 

Now the cable's ready to be threaded into the boot lid.  My worst fears - the whole boot interior trim has to come off.  Lower section has to come off first, then the upper section around the glass.

First of all, pop out the electric boot release button (if you have one) and the two interior lights.  Remove the plugs from all three of them and poke the wiring back into the holes inside the boot lid. The lower interior trim section just pulls free now - again like before pop out one section (I started near the very bottom of the boot lid) and work your way carefully around, popping out the trim panel with a trim removal tool.  The clips are much harder than the interior trim and I was quite worried about damaging the panels.  Everything went OK for me, but go careful! 

 

Bottom panel removed:

 

 

One the lower panel is removed, you can start on the upper panel around the glass.  This time I started around the sides near the gas struts.  Again, level and pop them out carefully working your way up each side first, then across the top.  Once free the whole lot pulls downwards away from the raised boot lid.

 

The upper panel removed and laying in the boot:  (just so you can see all the clips)

 

With both trim panels removed, the top edge of the boot lid looked like this:

 

You can see the cable hanging out from the rubber grommet.  Use the cable-ties again, threading one through from the left hole in the boot lid above to the grommet hole.  Tape the camera cable to the cable tie again and pull through.

 

This whole part took me a couple of hours to do tidily and safely but it was worth it.  The camera can then be mounted where you choose on the rear window and the cables will be tucked safely out of harm's way.  I wrapped the cable in a little extra insulating tape to protect it where it passes under the rear trim.  Up to you.

 

Test the camera, make sure everything works OK then refit all your trim panels.

 

Here's the rear cam.  There's a little raising of the interior boot lid panel, which I guess could be solved by cutting a small notch into it.  However it doesn't bother me that much.  The rear camera cable would've been better with a right-angle plug in my opinion, but again, not the end of the world.

 

 

 

Hope this helps.  Any questions, feel free!

 

Roy.

Edited 10 April, 20179 yr by RoyF280

Nice write up Roy. 

Great write up, thanks.

 

A couple of tips for people thinking of doing similar work;

 

Never try and remove plastic trim in the cold, the hotter the better as the plastic will be much less brittle.

 

when passing wires through grommets, trim etc. spray some silicone lube spray on the wire it will glide through much easier

Really good write up I might come back to this and give it a go once I get the car, Thursday.

 

One question did you consider taking the dealer stick off to get the camera close to the edge of the glass? That and a right angle connector would make it look much more discrete.

  

Hi Bud,

I did consider removing the dealer sticker, but it's one of those nasty ones that is a real pain to remove. I started peeling the corner and it was very brittle. I may still remove it and use some sticky stuff remover when i have more time.

 

Thoughtfully the dash cam kit comes with spare sticky pads for both front and back cameras so I should be able to reposition with minimal fuss.

 

I might buy a small right angle Mini-USB plug adapter at some point to tidy up the look. Good idea, didn't think of that.

Edited 11 April, 20179 yr by RoyF280

1 hour ago, RoyF280 said:

Hi Bud,

I did consider removing the dealer sticker, but it's one of those nasty ones that is a real pain to remove. I started peeling the corner and it was very brittle. I may still remove it and use some sticky stuff remover when i have more time.

 

 

Gentle warmth from a hair dryer will soften it and the backing glue. Makes it a bit easier to remove.

Edited 11 April, 20179 yr by Devonshiredave

Update:

I wanted to try and tidy that rear camera cable a little.  The straight cable entry/exit looked a little clumsy so I started searching for a right angle connector of some sort.  Incredibly hard to find in the right size and orientation, but eventually found one by German company DeLock.  Only available via a couple of online retailers in Germany (with poor reviews) I ended up sourcing from Ebay.

 

I also wasn't happy with the tailgate trim sitting up over the cable and thought if I could file a small notch in it, it might sit flush once more.  Enter the adaptor and a £7 pack of needle files from Screwfix:

 

 

A little bit of filing to create a small notch gave the following:

 

Looks a little awkward like this with the tailgate up, but looks better when looking through the rear-view mirror now.

 

Before:

 

After:

 

The trim panel still isn't sitting flush and due to a metal lip underneath that the cable is running over, I'm not sure it will do.  However I might have another go with the files to take a bit more material out and see how it sits then.

Thank you, this helped massively with the fitting of front and rear cameras today.

 

My only additions would be that my upper boot lining was screwed in as well, one bolt each side, but easy enough.

 

I used the nextbase hardwire kit which is 4m long and that's only just long enough to reach from the camera mounted in the middle of the screen to the fuse box via the passenger side rubber tube bit.  The drivers side is much emptier and easier to run cables through but you'd need at least another metre or 2 of cable.

 

I also haven't found the right fuse for camera2 yet.  Number 1 is plugged into fuse 35 but I ran out of time today to sort the second.

 

Andy

L&K 150 estate

Really helpful thank you. I’ll re read this when I come to install my Blackvue DR490L-2CH in my Sportline which will be arriving very soon with any luck. 

You're welcome guys.  Glad it was of use :-)

 

Roy.

Hi Roy.

Are you still happy with your choice of QVIA AR790 WD – 2CH DASH CAMERA? I'm looking at buying it, and was wondering how you got on with it over your six months of use- any likes/dislikes or faults?

It's showing up as being over £329.99 to £469.99 if im on the right website. Was it worth that? 

Thanks for the detailed post. Perfect.

Benny

Hi Benny,

Yes, on the whole very happy with it.  Images are clear and very good quality.  Thankfully I've not actually had the need to depend on any of them in anger yet, as I've had no accidents, near-misses or witnessed any others on the road, but it does give some comfort that such mishaps are going to be recorded for potential use.

 

The camera takes standard micro SD cards, but Lukas UK recommends quite expensive SD cards made by Delkin:  https://lukashd.co.uk/product/alphahatity/

They state normal cards don't fare well with the constant recording and overwriting and many fall short of the performance requirements of saving two lots of full HD video at the same time.  It sounds reasonable and I've certainly had no issues with the card supplied so far.  Video overwrites the card on a cycle, so when the card is full the camera deletes the oldest recordings and starts again. I guess you could go with cheaper cards and just replace them if they start to give errors, but I figured it's a bit like a smoke-detector; you want it working reliably, all the time, without fail for that one occasion you may need to call upon it.  So I'll stick with the expensive cards for the extra assurance they bring.

 

The camera is also set to format the card every 2 months, to keep it in good working order and performing at its best.  It prompts you first, so you can delay it if you want to, but if you press the required button and let it do its thing, it only takes about 20 to 30 secs anyway, so hardly an issue unless you're in an enormous rush to get going somewhere.

 

I've had a couple of occasions when on starting the car the camera has voiced it's usual startup sequence; "recording started" - followed by a little jingle, but then it pauses and reboots.  It doesn't happen very often and it always sorts itself out after about 4 retries.  I just figure its tidying up some video files and rebooting, but again not a big issue, 

 

The night-vision feature doesn't seem to do a great deal in my experience so far, but that could be due to our street having a street-lamp immediately opposite and this could be causing the camera to record in day-mode, rather than night mode when it needs to.  I need to record some footage from being parked somewhere else to make sure this works properly, but just haven't got around to that yet.  I do have it set for constant recording whilst driving and motion-detection whilst parked.  (You can have "event" detection for driving rather than constant - where it records after detecting an impact and in this case it also records a number of seconds before the impact, so in-fact it's always recording a few seconds worth in this mode; just not always saving it)

 

It also has customisable voltage thresholds so even the car's parked and say it's raining (so the camera picks up a lot of constant movement) the camera will shutdown before it drains the car battery too low to cause an issue on the next engine start.

 

I'd recommend it, yes.

 

Roy

...and yes, the price sounds about right.  I bought it from here: https://lukashd.co.uk/product/qvia-ar790-wd-2ch-dash-camera/

 

Very helpful if you need any advice over the phone.  I bought the 64GB version.

Thanks @RoyF280 for posting this how to, i used it yesterday to install a NextWave Duo HD dashcam.

 

Works a charm, I have blind spot (fuse 48) also and piggy backed this fuse , I tried fuse 38 which is the trailer but I was worried a permanent live might drain my battery despite claims of a limiter.

 

For anyone looking at the NextWave dashcam, it has a parking mode which will only switch on when it's G sensors are activated. You may miss the initial hit when parked, it will record as soon as it detects the hit.

 

This runs off NextWave battery and doesn't require a permanent live fuse connection.

 

Edited 7 January, 20188 yr by Sw1

Well my camera is all Plummed in now. Oddly my parking mode isn’t working so need to suss that out. 

 

i used the same empty empty fuse slots so thanks for sharing the guide. 

Sussed it.

 

Ignition cable didn’t like 15 amp fuse, wanted 10 amp. Trial and error on my part. Didn’t think 5 amps would make a difference! 

Great guide @RoyF280, used it to install my front cam easily without any issues.

Nice one @RoyF280. Just used your guide to help with installing my NextBase 512GW. Thanks for the detailed writeup.

Glad this is proving useful for people. 

@RoyF280 I've got myself into a bit of a pickle when installing the rear cam. I struggled to get the cable around the headlining on the B pillar, but I was able to run it down to the bottom of the cloth area of the pillar, under the seatbelt, and back up the other side. Or so I thought... turns out that getting that panel back on is more tricky than it should be. I hadn't completely removed the panel, just popped away the bottom bit to squeeze the cable under. Any idea how I can go about putting it back? I subsequently removed the cable from under the pillar lining, just to make sure it wasn't in the way of any clips. Didn't help. I found some  reference about the Superb II that said you have to remove the Airbag logo clip and undo a screw. I tried, but couldn't prise it off easily, so assumed it's not removable. Any ideas?

 

Pics attached - passenger side showing my problem, and driver's side for reference.

 

I considered buying this manual, but I'm not entirely convinced it will go into detail about removing B-Pillar trim: https://www.emanualonline.com/product_info.php?products_id=16320{3}2

Hi,

First of all, I would remove the cable you've just run around the base of the seatbelt and try to reseat the b-pillar trim panel without it there.  You never know, you could have trapped the cable in between the panel and the bodywork somehow and it'll never go back...

 

If you can then get the panel to fit normally again, you'll at least have some sanity that you haven't damaged anything.

 

I found this Superb B pillar, which is from a 2009 model, and it does show the airbag cap, but no screw behind.  I'd still prise this out to see if there is a screw/bolt back there.

 

Also note no.9 on the picture.  It's not exactly clear where this clip goes from the diagram, but if you've dislodged it somehow, that could be what's stopping the panel from going back cleanly.  Best try to remove it completely, see if you can route the cable tidily with it removed, then try to refit when you've sussed out exactly how it should go back.

Sorry if this isn't particularly helpful, but it's what I'd do.  I didn't run the cable down and under as you have, I simply tucked it just inside the top edge of the b-pillar and it seemed to sit well out of sight.

 

Good luck!

 

Roy.

Thanks for the detailed answer @RoyF280. Yes, I did remove the cable, but it didn't help. I think something is slightly off-centre and not seating properly in its hole. I'll have a fiddle later and see if I can get it to go back.

@RoyF280 (and anyone else interested) - I just purchased the workshop manual for the Superb III and it is bloody fantastic. I bought it from: https://www.easymanuals.co.uk/product/skoda-superb-workshop-service-repair-manual/

 

For £14.99, I think it's worth any Superb owner having a copy. Every little detail about the car is covered, including removal and refitting of every nut, bolt, trim panel etc. It's the original workshop manual direct from Skoda. Example attached for the B-pillar. Not tried it yet, but I'm hopeful!

Looks great! 

 

And looks like clip no.6 is probably your problem?

@RoyF280 done it! Inside the trim, there's a guide for the seat belt adjuster to slide up and down. It had popped out of its guide rails, which is all that was causing my problem. Ironically, the hardest part of all was removing the sodding Airbag logo. That thing wasn't budging. Ended up using a blunt knife to do it, as it was breaking my plastic pry tools. All good now! That manual is a godsend. Thanks for all your help.