Camera stopped turning on with ignition (ACC) power. Works fine after manuallly powered up.

[lefizzet]

Hello all, I installed this camera hardwired into an ACC fuse about a week ago and everything was working perfectly fine. I noticed today that the camera no longer turns on when I turn on the ignition.

When I power up the camera manually by holding down the power button, the camera operates normally with no problems. After I turn off the ignition, the camera powers down like it should.

Nothing on the car has changed over the past week, and I haven't changed any settings in the camera since setting it up.

Here is the hardwire tap I'm using https://www.amazon.com/gp/B07G9WTWB9
Here is a video of what I'm talking about- I turn on the ACC power and the SG briefly lights up, but then powers down. When I manually power on the camera, it operates as normal. When I turn off the ignition, it turns off as normal.

https://streamable.com/sqxcg

Any ideas? Thanks.

 

[kamkar]

I dont think that Vantrue PSU give enough power, you should use the one provided with the camera, if you want to hard wire and have your cigarette plug free you can just cut off the plug from the Street Guardian PSU.
Thats why they have changed to the PSU on wire solution, this way you can hard wire with the original kit you just need the correct add a fuse for your fuse box.

 

[kamkar]

You could also try and reload the firmware, but use a wall Phone charger or something USB charger, or at least the original SG power supply.

I had one of my test samples act weird on be some months ago, re flashing the firmware did the trick then.

 

[jokiin]

try using the supplied power cable

check that you have the PowerInput menu set to 2 wire

 

[lefizzet]

Thanks for the quick responses.

So I have been using 2 wire setting this whole time. Just now, I switched to the 3 wire setting, and the camera was eliciting the same behavior whether I used the tapped fuse or the cigarette lighter via the SG provided cable as seen here https://streamable.com/8c6av

When I switched the power input back to 2 wire, everything seems to work as normal now. The camera turns on with ACC power using both cigarette lighter and tapped fuse.

Not sure what happened, maybe just a software glitch?

Either way, should I be using the 2 wire setting with my tapped fuse if I do not intend on using any sort of parking mode features? Or does it not even matter? Thanks.

 

[jokiin]

you should only be using the 2 wire setting, I wouldn't use that Vantrue power supply though

 

[lefizzet]

you should only be using the 2 wire setting, I wouldn't use that Vantrue power supply though

Any specific reason why?

 

[jokiin]

Any specific reason why?

because those types of power supplies don't have stable output, it's a generic Chinese solution they use that is used in a lot of those power supplies, we've tested a lot of them and they are very inconsistent, can work ok for a camera that has an internal battery but not great for one that uses capacitors

 

[lefizzet]

because those types of power supplies don't have stable output, it's a generic Chinese solution they use that is used in a lot of those power supplies, we've tested a lot of them and they are very inconsistent, can work ok for a camera that has an internal battery but not great for one that uses capacitors

I see, thanks. So I assume the ones listed for sale on the SG website have been vetted by testing and should be more reliable?

Any major differences between these two besides the low voltage safety cutoff, since I'm not using parking mode either way.

https://streetguardian.cam/product/hard-wire-mini-usb-power-supply-kit

https://streetguardian.cam/product/cellpower-power-supply-cpusb01

 

[jokiin]

yes they will both be fine, there's a third type as well but that's for parking mode

if you only want to hardwire to an acc switched circuit you don't even need to buy one, as @kamkar1 mentioned above remove the cig plug from your included power supply and you can hardwire it, the power supply is in the box on the cable not in the plug, we do it that so that it can be used for hardwiring

 

[Deacon]

Yep. Cut the plug off and strip it back and wire it in. Works great.

 

[Deacon]

PS One of these days someone will explain to me why not just design cams to run at 12V instead, no step down required...

 

[jokiin]

PS One of these days someone will explain to me why not just design cams to run at 12V instead, no step down required...

space, heat, electrical noise are three reasons

 

[Deacon]

space, heat, electrical noise are three reasons

I know almost nothing about electrical engineering, so I’ll take your word for it!