Newcomer trying to setup car security cam

[babossa 0]

Hello all,

 

I did a quick search around the forum and could not find a post related to installing a cam into a vehicle.

Now I wonder whether I'm off-topicbecause I don't know if this is strictly CCTV ?

 

What I would like is to build a simple system with a deported cam and capturing the video on an embedded DVR that can be powered off the car battery (maybe through cig lighter or car radio).

 

Now my constraints are I'd like it to be hidden and able to work for a whole week (record + power) so use low res or low frame rate, auto-loop and and with decent night image quality.

Ideally it would be programmable (to record only on certain hours, I'm focusing on car vandalism). I'd only check the video after vandalism happens.

 

If this is not off topic, would you please knidly point me to related resources ? Or advise a suited DVR (I hope to be able to manage the cam part) ?

 

Thank you in advance.

[Billy_ICU 0]

First of all that is going to run the car battery down to the point where the car will not start. Just leaving a car radio on for a couple of hours is enough to wear down weaker car batteries to where a car will not start.

 

Look at trucks for camping which have 2 batteries. That is just for this sort of problem - one battery is reserved for starting and running the vehicle only.

 

Also with a camera mounted inside the vehicle, you are going to need at least 4 cameras to cover all sides of the car. If you have a cell phone with a video recorder built in, set it up inside your car to record and see how little of the outside of the car it actually covers (and why you would need multiple cameras).

 

Better would be a camera or two mounted on a building nearby looking at the car (better coverage).

 

And you would need a battery charger plugged into a power outlet to keep the car battery charged. So might as well just use a non-automotive camera system plugged into an electrical outlet and forget about anything to do with using the car battery (if installing in the car).