Dash Camera or Similar, Anyone Got One?

impr0v

Due to a very near miss in the recent past, and witnessing other incidents, I've been thinking about how useful it would be to have in-car camera footage to rely on in the event of an accident.

I'd imagine however, that rigging something up would be less than straightforward. Buying a handycam or similar and sitting it on my dash pointed forwards isn't a very permanent solution, as I'd have to take it out of the car with me every time I left to avoid theft.

Does anyone know of suppliers/installers of integrated cameras, ideally with a speed display and date/time stamp? I know some taxis now have very discrete rear-facing cameras, and I saw some footage today from an american car which had a forward pointing camera and one focused on the driver, allegedly a pilot program instigated by insurance companies over there.

glynf

Perhaps something like this? Looks a bit odd though, could try fitting a security surveilance camera in the front grille, and hook it up to some kind of HDD recorder?

Edit:

dogcamsport

Redrocket

i was also thinking along the same lines,
is that 80pounds sterling the final price for the dogcam? it doesnt appear to include recording system

KeRbDoG

Don't some insurance companies in the US insist of such systems for some public buses/taxis?

franksm

Looked into this myself a while ago (every time I go near the M50 roundabout from Liffey Valley wanting to go onto the M50 south, someone cuts me up from the left lane).

This is a good site: www.rfconcepts.co.uk and while they do cameras and the like, the don't sell recorders (although you could hook one of their cameras up to a camcorder).

I have seen in the US a hard-disk-based system with two cameras - one watching the driver, and one out the front of the car. Continually records in a loop, and driver can hit a "save" button mounted on the rear-view-mirror to permanently record the last 30 seconds of footage.

Dunno where to buy that, though.

Closest I have seen here are for taxidrivers, but have no URLs for you. Have a search for "taxicam" or something like that...

J_R

Hi,

Some driving schools in the UK have a video system fitted. But it is quite expensive. £400 or £500 (Sterling) One I knew seems to have gone, its web site is "suspended" was called Videodrive Systems

However found a neat system In-car Wireless recording system

He had trouble with frequency drifting. Maybe that was just his camera ??
He did purchase off Ebay.

And the home page of his recorder Video recorder

Also thinking of installing a video recording system sometime.

Conar

kerbdog wrote:

Don't some insurance companies in the US insist of such systems for some public buses/taxis?

I saw a report on TV about that recently.
Aparently they're asking a lot of private users to install them now too.
They record a 5 minute loop and if there is an impact it saves 2.5 minutes either side or sopmething to that effect.
Not a bad idea.

_Kaiser_

I've thought about this myself occasionally and with the standard of driving out there, coupled with people chancing their arm in the event of an accident, it's a very good idea - a "black box" recorder for cars if you will.

What you want I'd assume would be the same sort of system they use in the US/UK (as shown on those "Police Stop" shows on Sky One) - anyone here a US/UK cop?