Fitting a Dashcam

It's not too difficult to fit. It's best to hard-wire it. If using Nextbase, use one their hard wiring kits. That has the necessary cable plus a pick-a-back fuse holder which enables you to share an existing fuse slot on the car's fuse panel. You need to pull back bits of trim on the A-post and along the top of the windscreen to tuck the cable in so that it doesn't show. If you have to cross any air-bags, make sure that the cable goes *behind* them. You'll probably find a YouTube video giving precise instructions for your make and model. I did for mine.

If you have second thoughts about DIY Google cashcam installation near me to find a choice of installers, including Halfords. There are mobile installers, too.

I see that Nextbase will do it for £139, including the £25 fixing kit.

Front only or front & rear?

I had mine done at home by Halfords. No complaints at all, apart from them taking the power off the diagnostic socket, and *all three* places I've since had other work done on the car unplugged it, and didn't plug it back in afterwards. Hands and knees and torch job.

That seems to be SOP for any car service/repair place - though fortunately for me they just unplug the USB lead at the front camera. It takes me a day or so to notice & reconnect it.

(Note to self: Check they haven't done the same at the rear camera.)

In message <UgX1R.211$s snipped-for-privacy@fx15.ams, at 18:47:14 on Sun, 21 Dec

That's if they are unplugging it to disable the camera so you can't see their hi-jinx on a test-drive or whatever.

But my tale of woe is people unplugging in order to use their read-out gadget. The first time was RAC mobile servicing, and they wanted £75 to come back and rectify it. But they eventually backed down after I'd got their Press Office involved, and did it for free. Once I'd discovered that was how the fault had arisen, I can now plug it back in myself (hands kness, and a torch, required).

The Nextbase rear camera needs the front camera to be powered up, to operate.

My Skoda Scala has a USB power socket in the rear view mirror assembly specifically for powering a dashcam. John

• 2.

I fitted a Z-Edge Z1 dashcam to my Jazz in September 2016. It's still working, and so is the micro SD card I fitted at installation. It doesn't have GPS and the clock soon becomes inaccurate, but its night vision and definition is pretty good for that date (1920 x 1080@25fps). Z-Edge dashcams haven't been made for a few years.

It was easy to install with a USB lead from the underdash socket just in front of the gear lever, running it behind the switches array and steering wheel to the door edge, and then pushing it behind the rubber seal all the way up to the sun visor fitting. It fits to the window behind the visor with a suction cup, which is generally ok until the car is parked facing the sun on a very hot day, when it can come loose! It's soon refitted.

If it ever required replacement I would check independent reviews very carefully before choosing one.

By the way, some MOT testers seem to object to it fitted where it is as it technically obscures the view through the windscreen, so I remove it before the test.

In message <10i9hs0$2kat5$ snipped-for-privacy@dont-email.me, at 19:30:08 on Sun, 21 Dec

It's in a sense surprising that more cars don't have that. The rest of the vehicle being flooded with USB and cigar-lighter power sockets.

My assumption is that it's because the manufacturer wants to sell an expensive own-brand dashcam, rather than have people fit their own third-party ones.

In message <10i9jbs$2j8vb$ snipped-for-privacy@dont-email.me, at 19:55:40 on Sun, 21 Dec

It should only fail on that basis if looking through the wiper-swept part of the windscreen. On the other hand you might want it fitted exactly there to get a clear view ahead in the rain.

Mine is in the top-lefthand corner of the windscreen, where it doesn't obscure any conceivable view of the road ahead from the drivers' seat. But that's not actually what the law-is-an-ass says.

I've fitted my (Nextbase) behind the rear view mirror. The passenger can see the camera and the screen but from my driving position it's completely hidden from my view. The camera in no way obscures my view of the road and has passed many MOTs.

I have a fuse panel behind the passenger side glove box and replaced a fuse with one that acts as a fuse and a 12V take-off. I then wired this take-off to a 12V to 5V USB adapter. The wire between the glovebox and camera is taken up the side of the windscreen and in the headliner to the mirror position. I removed no trim as the wire was just pushed in at the edge of the trim.

Roland Perry snipped-for-privacy@perry.co.uk> wrote:

Halfords at the time I purchased from them didn’t make it clear that if you purchase online then the fitting service is done at home from a mobile technician and you cannot normally get it done at a branch. That caused complications for my install as the main unit was online but the rear was out of stock on line but I found one in a store ,initially the store would not fit the main unit and the mobile installer would not fit the shop purchased unit. Eventually persistence with some phone calls got some sense and they agreed a store technician could install both, then the store I bought the rear camera from did not have a technician who felt competent enough to run the rear cable in our car, citing that he wasn’t sure if he could clear the curtain airbags safely. At least that was preferable to bodging it , Halfords did ring back and had found a branch not too far away where the technician was confident as he had done one before. To be fair it was the week before Christmas 4 years ago so they were a bit busy but I got the hard wired installation done on Christmas Eve about 2PM and it has worked without fault since with one caveat. The Nextbase 622 cooks its battery easily , that is nothing to do with Halfords but Nextbase who do not include the battery in the warranty which is pretty short anyway. I replaced mine with the help of a you tube video but you need good spudgers and a delicate touch, there is a short ribbon cable that is a sod to reinsert and could easily be damaged.

Another quirk of that model is the so called Parking Mode or rather the terminology , in Parking Mode it only springs fully into life after something jolts the car and records from then so you may get a recording of the perpetuator driving or walking away but not the initial approach and incident .That arrangement suits those who haven’t installed using a permanent live feed as the unit uses the installed battery which can only run the camera for a short time. If you are on a permanent live feed then turning the parking mode OFF will mean the camera stays recording which if you are parked in an area where it may be desirable to record all the time could be useful . Obviously that can strain the cars battery but if the proper install kit has been used it should shut the camera down if the car battery voltage shows signs of dropping too far,but I would not risk it unless the car battery is in good condition. Normally I have Parking Mode set to ON but turn it to OFF if I feel there is a higher risk of damage or vandalism or to observe for fly tipping from an empty car.* Permanent on and Standby Modes would be a better description

• Never involved the Council or the Police, just put pictures of the bastard fly tipping in his van which carried the name of his tree surgeon business on the notice board of the village where he lived a few miles away, I heard his wife went spare as the local school kids started telling his children “Your Dad is a dirty fly tipper”.

He never did it in that spot again and I know he lost one good customer who was disgusted. .

GH

Same for the Viofo A229 Duo, but I can't discount the possibility that a mechanic might disconnect the cable at the rear camera, as well as the front camera.

That's what I did with a somewhat older dashcam on my second car.

There is some controversy about whether the driver can see the screen whilst driving. Mine is in front of the rear view mirror & it's been through 5 MOTs however it's not been put through the test of an awkward policeman.

I don't know about Halfords, but I've had twice had the experience where it appears that the physical shop and the on-line business trading as the same brand have nothing to do with each other - two different companies(??). This applies to buying on-line and electing to collect from the physical store trading under the same name. When something has gone wrong the physical store cannot check the "computer" of the on-line business and visa-versa etc.