Skoda Kodiaq Dash Camera Installation Guide

[silver1011]

Sharing my experiences after fitting a Garmin Dash Cam 30 to my 2018 Skoda Kodiaq Scout...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

About £80 off Amazon including a 64Gb micro-SD card.

 

Edited 23 July, 2018 by silver1011

[silver1011]

The hardest part is accessing the fuse box, Skoda's instructions in the owners manual aren't the clearest.

 

Sat in the passenger seat (right hand drive cars) the glovebox damping arm is located to the right side. Opening the glovebox reveals a small aperture to access the damper arm.

 

Push the damping arm diagonally down towards your feet / bulk head. Once it clicks, pull it over to the right (towards the drivers side).

 

 

There are two sprung loaded retainers, one on each side. These need to be pushed in to allow a securing lug to pass. This then frees the glovebox so that it can be lowered down into the footwell. This was the hardest part as I found it difficult to push both lugs at the same time whilst pulling the glovebox lid past them...

 

 

 

 

 

Edited 23 July, 2018 by silver1011

[silver1011]

Just for interest, here is the pollen filter, behind the honeycombed grill, the blower fan is the cylindrical shape below the pollen filter...

 

[silver1011]

I attached the mounting bracket the day before, it needs 24 hours to bond to the windscreen. I like a discreet fitment so located it as close the rear view mirror as possible, being careful to ensure once attached the camera could be adjusted to miss the black dots on the top part of the screen...

 

 

 

 

[silver1011]

 

 

 

 

 

Unfortunately Garmin have an annoying feature that prevents you from using any non-genuine power cables, as a result the 90 degree adapter I wanted to use put the camera into USB storage device mode and required manual intervention each time it's turned on to set the camera recording, so this couldn't be used.

[silver1011]

If your camera has a large plug on the end (like mine) remember to feed the power cable to the camera by starting from the glovebox. If you start from the camera you'll get all the way down to the footwell and realise that the plug is too big to squeeze into the fusebox.

 

I fed the larger ended plug up from the footwell into the back of the glovebox, there are plenty of gaps...

 

 

The remaining cable is then temporarily sat on the dash waiting to be routed and hidden behind the trim.

 

Plug the power cable into the camera and plan your route along the top of the windscreen.

 

The headlining on the Kodiaq is glued in place, but there is just enough space to wedge the power cable between the headlining and the roof using the tips of your fingers...

 

[silver1011]

Run the cab;e all the way along the top of the windscreen under the headlining until you reach the hard plastic A-pillar trim.

 

This trim is clipped in place, but once you peel the door seal away there is plenty of flex to allow you to temporarily feed the cable behind it.

 

WARNING! There is an airbag behind this trim. When fiddling around do not disturb the airbag, also be sure to ensure the cable is routed and secured underneath the airbag to ensure it's performance is not adversely affected in the event of a deployment...

 

[silver1011]

 

 

 

[silver1011]

A teaspoon makes the perfect levering tool to avoid scratched or scuffed trim and keeps any sweaty / grubby fingers away from the light coloured headlining...

 

 

[silver1011]

Here is the airbag...

 

 

 

Take your time.

[silver1011]

Once you reach the bottom of the A-pillar trim you have a couple of choices.

 

 

The easiest is to run the cable inside the door seal, I chose to remove the dash end panel. It pulls off easily enough as it's a push fit. Once you can get your finger tips or spoon under the lower edge the clips just pop off...

 

 

Edited 23 July, 2018 by silver1011

[silver1011]

The dash end panel houses the passenger airbag deactivation switch. The wire that feeds the switch has enough slack in it to allow the panel enough movement to work around it. The electrical connector to the back of the switch can be unplugged but I left it connected for fear of triggering a fault...

 

 

 

 

 

[silver1011]

With the panel removed it is easier to find a good route for the cable down the end of the dash, and also allows the cable to be fed into the glovebox, rather than dropping it down and looping it up into the underside of the glovebox.

 

 

[silver1011]

You are now fully routed from the camera into the glovebox adjacent to the fusebox...

 

 

Edited 23 July, 2018 by silver1011

[silver1011]

Now to the bench in the garage.

 

I bought myself a female 12V cigarette plug and a piggyback fuse holder...

 

 

 

 

The red (live) wire from the cigarette lighter socket is attached to the red wire on the piggyback fuse holder.

 

The black (earth) wire from the cigarette lighter is earthed to the car, shown later.

 

Edited 23 July, 2018 by silver1011

[silver1011]

The piggyback fuse holder I bought came supplied with a bullet connector, similar to this...

 

 

The piggyback fuseholder wire already has the female connector, so after attaching the bullet connector to the red wire from the cigarette lighter socket it connected firmly without the need to solder.

 

 

 

[silver1011]

I then crimped a ring / spade connector to the black earth wire ready to be secured to the car...

 

 

 

I removed the yellow insulating plastic sheath as it was impeding the fit, shown later.

 

Edited 23 July, 2018 by silver1011

[silver1011]

Now I took the complete loom back to the car. Here is the fusebox in my Kodiaq...

 

 

This is where I hit a snag. My Kodiaq is equipped with heated and electrically adjustable seats, which results in a couple of hefty fuses located either side of the favoured fuse to tap into (blue 15A rear wiper located in the middle of the bottom row). These impede the fitment of the relatively bulky piggyback fuseholder. So I had to find an alternative.

 

Annoyingly, all other options were not switched live, they were all permanent live (I wanted a switched live so that the camera turns on and off with the ignition), even those you'd expect to be switched live were permanent, such as the heated rear screen, weird.

 

This meant I had to use a mini-fuse location instead. This resulted in me having to source a mini-blade piggyback fuse holder instead, and rewired my loom accordingly.

 

I ended up using fuse number 34...

 

 

 

 

Edited 23 July, 2018 by silver1011

[silver1011]

All that is left is to earth the black wire.

 

Immediately underneath the fuse box is a T30 (Torx) mounting screw that secures the fusebox to the bulkhead...

 

 

 

 

 

Edited 12 December, 2018 by silver1011

[silver1011]

Once it is removed the spade connector is positioned over the thread and the bolt is screwed back into place...

 

 

 

[silver1011]

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited 23 July, 2018 by silver1011

[mattjames1980]

Great work silver... Sure to help out loads of people!

[abaday789]

Need to make a choice on my dash cam and will be following in your steps shortly 

[robdav]

excellent post Silver!! I am thinking of getting a dash cam at some point soon and was going to get it "professionally" installed. However seeing how easy it is I may well just do it myself.

 

Any thoughts on how to wire a rear cam too?

[Tezaman]

can i ask something stupid?

This mod is required in order the dash cam not to be battery charged while the car is off ?