Powering Dashcam from Rearview Mirror

Bhavpreet

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Hi all,

Planning on picking up a Garmin 55 tomorrow. I just have a few questions about powering the device.

I've browsed around the forum and it's clear that the device cannot be powered without an official Garmin cable. I plan on hardwiring the dashcam to either my rearview mirror power supply or alternatively the fusebox. Problem is, I can't seem to find a hardwire kit anywhere and frankly the kit won't work if I'm trying to hardwire to my rearview mirror.

So my question is: can I take apart the included cigarette lighter charger and use that to power the dashcam from my rearview mirror? Since it's an official Garmin cable shouldn't it work? (it'll have the resistor between pins 4 and 5 as mentioned elsewhere on this forum).

Also, the rearview power supplies 12v. Will I need a transformer or will the dashcam be able to regulate the power by itself?

TIA, and please let me know if I'm missing something or way off the mark here. Excited for some responses.
 
I did exactly that using the Garmin cigarette lighter adapter, it works great. Note I unsnapped the lighter adapter, plugged the Garmin adapter in, then zip tied the entire thing behind the plastic panel so loading groceries wouldn't knock it adapter loose. This left a hole where the adapter once was.

 
I did exactly that using the Garmin cigarette lighter adapter, it works great. Note I unsnapped the lighter adapter, plugged the Garmin adapter in, then zip tied the entire thing behind the plastic panel so loading groceries wouldn't knock it adapter loose. This left a hole where the adapter once was.

Hey, thanks for the reply. I'm planning on tapping mine into the rearview mirror power supply. This would mean actually cutting off the cigarette adapter and using the wires inside the cable to power it. Do you know if this will work?
 
My understanding is the Garmin needs 5V power, and the Garmin adapter (and nearly every other dashcam adapter) converts standard car 12V to 5V. Your rearview mirror is powered by 12V, so this would not work. In my front facing dashcam in my Honda Odyssey I popped out the Odyssey cigarette power plug, inserted my Viofo dashcam, and zip tied the assembly under the dash so nobody could accidentally or deliberately unplug it, and lastly ran the cable up to my rearview mirror. I've always assumed this is how everyone else does it.
 
So my question is: can I take apart the included cigarette lighter charger and use that to power the dashcam from my rearview mirror? Since it's an official Garmin cable shouldn't it work? (it'll have the resistor between pins 4 and 5 as mentioned elsewhere on this forum).

Also, the rearview power supplies 12v. Will I need a transformer or will the dashcam be able to regulate the power by itself?
Yes, you can connect, there are 12 Volts. You need to disassemble the adapter and connect the corresponding wires in it to power from the 12 Volt chain of the rearview mirror.

A DC-DC 12 Volt to 5 Volt converter is installed inside the adapter, which is necessary to power the Garmin 55.

There is only one question that you need to clarify - probably, the power to the rearview mirror disappears after a while, if you close the car for parking, this means that Garmin 55 will be de-energized and will not work during parking/
Garmin 55 power cable.jpg

And of course, everything needs to be well insulated so that the adapter module board, which you remove from the power adapter housing and the wires in the connections, cannot be shorted to each other or to Ground
 
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Yes, you can connect, there are 12 Volts. You need to disassemble the adapter and connect the corresponding wires in it to power from the 12 Volt chain of the rearview mirror.

A DC-DC 12 Volt to 5 Volt converter is installed inside the adapter, which is necessary to power the Garmin 55.

There is only one question that you need to clarify - probably, the power to the rearview mirror disappears after a while, if you close the car for parking, this means that Garmin 55 will be de-energized and will not work during parking/
View attachment 51557

And of course, everything needs to be well insulated so that the adapter module board, which you remove from the power adapter housing and the wires in the connections, cannot be shorted to each other or to Ground
Yes, this is exactly what I was thinking!! So I'm (as of now) not interested in using parking mode and only want to use the dashcam when the ignition is on. However there is a tap in the rearview mirror that's always on (for the garage door openers) so I can always run it using one of those.

Here's a schematic for my rearview mirror. I plan on tapping pin 6 for ignition only power, and pin 8 for ground. Does this seem like it will work? Any other tips you could recommend?

Sorry I'm being overly anal about clarifying everything. I just want to make sure this has a chance of working before I rip apart the adapter and lose my ability to return the product.
 

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Once for a tom tom NAV unit i took apart the plug to get to the PCB inside so i could hard wire it, the PCB was pretty small so i put in inside a matchbox sized plastic container so it would not short out on something.
As long as it can provide enough power you could use any 12V USB charger, and tear that apart and not the original Garmin one, but if you go that route i would test it for a day or so to make sure it got enough power before you tear it apart.
But of course, most of the USB charger adapters are just the plug with no wire, but then you can add any length USB cable so you dont have a surplus lying around.
 
Once for a tom tom NAV unit i took apart the plug to get to the PCB inside so i could hard wire it, the PCB was pretty small so i put in inside a matchbox sized plastic container so it would not short out on something.
As long as it can provide enough power you could use any 12V USB charger, and tear that apart and not the original Garmin one, but if you go that route i would test it for a day or so to make sure it got enough power before you tear it apart.
But of course, most of the USB charger adapters are just the plug with no wire, but then you can add any length USB cable so you dont have a surplus lying around.
That's a good idea, I'll give that a try before the official Garmin one. Only problem is I don't think it'll run with a generic usb charger. Garmin requires it to be an official Garmin cable otherwise it doesn't act nice. Still worth a shot though.
 
yeah, using a generic charger can cause problems, for the most due to it not being able to supply as much power as it might claim.
As a tester i have a huge power grid in my glove box, i have 6 X 2.1 A USB and 2 X 2 A USB and 2 X 1 A USB outlets, and all the +2 A ports have been able to run any dashcam i have tested so far.
But other have been unlucky with what ever generic charger they had in advance to power all their gadgets in the car, and also people using the build in USB ports in newer cars.
Those people could maybe also be bugged down due to a cheap CCA ( Copper Clad Aluminum ) USB wire, for any longer USB wires with a dashcam you will want to use good quality copper wire USB cables.
Not doing so myself meant when i got rear ended a few years back my rear camera did not record, it was flaky in starting up on a 4 M long cheap USB wire.
So dont go too cheap on the USB charger, you will want one with least 2.1 A, and if you can find more that's fine too, the camera only draw what it need to work.
And since you tab into power up there, you can make do with just about any 1-2 foot USB wire i would think.

I also have 2 X 3 12V ports in the glove box, cuz as a tester i must of course first and foremost test the supplied power source, but often after a year or so the cameras often get moved to one of the USB charger ports.
Too bad you are not over here in "European Canada", or i would have something you could play with.
 
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yeah, using a generic charger can cause problems, for the most due to it not being able to supply as much power as it might claim.
As a tester i have a huge power grid in my glove box, i have 6 X 2.1 A USB and 2 X 2 A USB and 2 X 1 A USB outlets, and all the +2 A ports have been able to run any dashcam i have tested so far.
But other have been unlucky with what ever generic charger they had in advance to power all their gadgets in the car, and also people using the build in USB ports in newer cars.
Those people could maybe also be bugged down due to a cheap CCA ( Copper Clad Aluminum ) USB wire, for any longer USB wires with a dashcam you will want to use good quality copper wire USB cables.
Not doing so myself meant when i got rear ended a few years back my rear camera did not record, it was flaky in starting up on a 4 M long cheap USB wire.
So dont go too cheap on the USB charger, you will want one with least 2.1 A, and if you can find more that's fine too, the camera only draw what it need to work.
And since you tab into power up there, you can make do with just about any 1-2 foot USB wire i would think.

I also have 2 X 3 12V ports in the glove box, cuz as a tester i must of course first and foremost test the supplied power source, but often after a year or so the cameras often get moved to one of the USB charger ports.
Too bad you are not over here in "European Canada", or i would have something you could play with.
Gotcha. I have quite a few official samsung micro usb cables laying around and official samsung fast charging adapters. I'll test it out with a pair of these with a wall outlet and see what it says. If it doesn't give me any error then I assume I should be good to go?

The Samsung adapter I plan to use outputs 5v 2.0 A. However since it's a wall plug will it work with an input of only 12v?

I could always buy a cigarette charging adapter and use that if a wall adapter won't work.
 

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Yeah i also use a range of USB wall adapters when playing with camera on my computer table, the oldest one are the factory one from my samsung galaxy 2, the newer chargers i use are a UMI one / a ASUS one from a tablet and the one for my new Xiaomi MI9 phone.
Not sure what their output are, but they all powered cameras for firmware updates ASO
 
No you can not use the Samsung charger for more than testing on the table at home, it must have a 230 or 110 V AC input to do its thing.
Something like this should do fine for stripping down to hard wire, and it even have 2 outputs

61hVeuYpIHL._AC_SX425_.jpg
 
I want to replace my 6 port charger in the glove box with something like this.
f9fb54b924ab7b21b5d0e242b373fe32.jpg


So that i can get Quick charge on my phone and maybe other things in the car.
It claim to be
"QC 3.0 96W 6 Ports USB Fast Car Charger, 4 Quick Charge Ports 2 Intelligent Output "

My 7" tablet used for navigation with google maps, on a 1A charge with a full battery it slowly deplete and in spite of charging over 8 hours or so it will be empty, on a 2 A charge port it do fine.
 
No you can not use the Samsung charger for more than testing on the table at home, it must have a 230 or 110 V AC input to do its thing.
Something like this should do fine for stripping down to hard wire, and it even have 2 outputs

61hVeuYpIHL._AC_SX425_.jpg
Gotcha. I will pickup a car charger along with the dashcam today so I can play with that instead of the official Garmin cable. Better to spend $15-20 on an extra charger than destroy the Garmin one and not be able to return it if need be.
 
Here's a schematic for my rearview mirror. I plan on tapping pin 6 for ignition only power, and pin 8 for ground. Does this seem like it will work? Any other tips you could recommend?
Yes, everything is correct, pins 6 and 8
 
I want to replace my 6 port charger in the glove box with something like this.
f9fb54b924ab7b21b5d0e242b373fe32.jpg


So that i can get Quick charge on my phone and maybe other things in the car.
It claim to be
"QC 3.0 96W 6 Ports USB Fast Car Charger, 4 Quick Charge Ports 2 Intelligent Output "

My 7" tablet used for navigation with google maps, on a 1A charge with a full battery it slowly deplete and in spite of charging over 8 hours or so it will be empty, on a 2 A charge port it do fine.
Yea you'll need something with quickcharge. I actually think you should look into something with power delivery as I feel that's becoming the new charging standard (usb-c) and is backwards compatible with quickcharge. A quick look on Amazon and I cant find any with more than 2 ports though.
 
Well with just 2.1 A charge rate on the phone in the car, and it being the one place where i charge my phone, it have been working out fine though i dont drive much, not even every day.
But after i have started using a VPN on the phone it just gobble up power, so now i also have to charge it at home some times.
And i also dont use the phone much, my average screen time are 10 minutes or so daily, some days i dont even use it at all, so my so called digital well begin are thru the roof.

Still quick charge are nice, so i would like to have that for my phone in the car, and a spare port for something else.

Do love the USB C on my phone, its some good stuff, and the new USB standards and HDMI / display port over USB are cool.
 
I ended up purchasing the 56. Completed the install, a few hiccups but otherwise everything went smoothly. Was able to use a car charger I had laying around with 5v 2.4A output and the included Garmin 90 degree cable. Everythings working fine so far. Pic is attached!
 

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