Dashcam shuts off when Battery Pack is at 60%

[dave91]

I recently installed my VIOFO A229 Pro together with a Cellink Neo 8+S and a Cellink Neo EXT7.

Everything is working fine except parking mode ending when the Cellink Batteries are still at 60%.

The voltage cut off on the HK4 is set to the lowest setting.

Is there anything I can do so the full potential of the battery pack gets used?

 

[Panzer Platform]

Welcome to the club.
The first thing that comes to mind in the parking mode timer setting is enabled.
Please check, and make sure it’s set to OFF.
See page 18 of the user manual for clarification;

https://viofo.com/download/manual/A229%20Pro/A229%20Pro%20English%20Manual.pdf

If you don’t get it figured out, you may need to submit a ticket for support from Viofo here;

Submit a ticket

support.viofo.com

If you need further help on the DCT forum please include a screenshot of the current firmware in the Front & Rear cameras, (just take a screenshot of the APP on your phone).
Also, please tell us what configuration you are using the camera, (1-CH, 2-CH, 3-CH).
-Chuck

 

[Nigel]

Everything is working fine except parking mode ending when the Cellink Batteries are still at 60%.

• Output Voltage / Current :
  – Dashcam port: 11V – 14.2 V / 2A (max) – USB Chargeport : 5V Max 2A

Should get most of the power out with that specification.
Check that all the connections are properly made, including the ones to the extension.
Are you using a long, or low specification cable between the battery and hardwire kit?

Viofo did develop a version of the hardwire kit with an "Off" setting for the low voltage cutout, which should solve the problem. I'm not sure what has happened to that, maybe ask @VIOFO-Support ...

Seems like there is something wrong somewhere though, so maybe better to sort the problem. Can you check the voltage you are recieving at the hardwire kit, is it turning off early, or is the voltage lower than the battery specification above, or is PP correct that you have a parking mode duration set?

 

[dave91]

Welcome to the club.
The first thing that comes to mind in the parking mode timer setting is enabled.
Please check, and make sure it’s set to OFF.
See page 18 of the user manual for clarification;

https://viofo.com/download/manual/A229%20Pro/A229%20Pro%20English%20Manual.pdf

If you don’t get it figured out, you may need to submit a ticket for support from Viofo here;

Submit a ticket

support.viofo.com

If you need further help on the DCT forum please include a screenshot of the current firmware in the Front & Rear cameras, (just take a screenshot of the APP on your phone).
Also, please tell us what configuration you are using the camera, (1-CH, 2-CH, 3-CH).
-Chuck

Thank you for the reply. The Timer is off and I am using the Camera in a 2-CH configuration. It is drawing 0.4A consistently.

I will provide a screenshot when I’m back at my car.

 

[dave91]

Should get most of the power out with that specification.
Check that all the connections are properly made, including the ones to the extension.
Are you using a long, or low specification cable between the battery and hardwire kit?

Viofo did develop a version of the hardwire kit with an "Off" setting for the low voltage cutout, which should solve the problem. I'm not sure what has happened to that, maybe ask @VIOFO-Support ...

Seems like there is something wrong somewhere though, so maybe better to sort the problem. Can you check the voltage you are recieving at the hardwire kit, is it turning off early, or is the voltage lower than the battery specification above, or is PP correct that you have a parking mode duration set?

Thank you. I am not quite sure what you mean by low specification cable, does that mean short? I am using the the full length of the HK4 cable spliced to the 3 wire output cable from the Cellink Neo.

I will try and the voltage later and will report back.

 

[Nigel]

I am using the the full length of the HK4 cable spliced to the 3 wire output cable from the Cellink Neo.

That should be fine.
Must be your splicing that is the problem! If you want an opinion then maybe post a photo, but for all I know, you may be a professional splicer.

With the standard HK4, set on minimum, it can be expected to turn off at 11.8V, +/-0.1V. There should only be a few % of power left in the battery at that point, enough for 20-40 minutes IIRC, somebody may correct me on that, but it is not a lot left.

Possibly, you need a few charge/discharge cycles on the battery for it to learn what its capacity is, the 60% may not be accurate. I've not heard of that being necessary, but some batteries do learn their capacity over a few cycles, especially if capacity gets changed by the addition of an extension.

 

[dave91]

That should be fine.
Must be your splicing that is the problem! If you want an opinion then maybe post a photo, but for all I know, you may be a professional splicer.

With the standard HK4, set on minimum, it can be expected to turn off at 11.8V, +/-0.1V. There should only be a few % of power left in the battery at that point, enough for 20-40 minutes IIRC, somebody may correct me on that, but it is not a lot left.

Possibly, you need a few charge/discharge cycles on the battery for it to learn what its capacity is, the 60% may not be accurate. I've not heard of that being necessary, but some batteries do learn their capacity over a few cycles, especially if capacity gets changed by the addition of an extension.

Definitely not a professional! I simply crimped the wires together. Was my first time doing something like that.

I will check the voltages and if needed redo the crimps and maybe insulate them a bit better.

Thanks for the advice so far!

 

[rcg530]

As @Panzer Platform has already mentioned, make sure the parking mode timer is turned off since that will turn off the dash camera after a specific amount of time operating in parking mode.

To really know which item is causing the premature shutdown of the dash camera, you need to know the voltage value of the power output from the battery pack when the shutdown occurs. Using a multimeter, you could monitor the voltage on the battery pack's output power cable's constant battery power wire. Connect the multimeter leads to the constant battery power wire and the ground wire in the battery pack's output power cable. You would have to know the general time frame when the shutdown will occur so you can limit your monitoring time to a small enough time window to watch the voltage level as the dash camera turns off.

Pics showing the output power cable connecting pins on EGEN produced battery packs:

The other caution is that the wire colors for the power wires in the battery pack output cables are reversed from the VIOFO HK4 hardwire kit wire colors. The battery pack output power cable has a yellow wire for the constant battery power, a red wire for the accessory power wire and black for ground. The HK4's power wire colors are just the reverse of that. Make sure the HK4 wires are spliced together correctly with the battery pack's output power cable. If they were spliced incorrectly, you would likely see other issues, but still worth checking.

If the voltage is around 11.8V when the dash camera turns off, then the hardwire kit is likely doing its job correctly. That would make the battery pack's 60% charge level to become suspect at that point since it should likely still be producing well over 12 volts at that battery charge level. If the voltage reading is well above 11.8V volts when the dash camera turns off, then the hardwire kit is suspect at that point since it should be turning off power to the dash camera when the input constant battery power voltage to the HK4 is around 11.8V +/- 0.1 or 0.2 volts (varies from unit to unit).

 

[dave91]

First of all, thank you all for the detailed answers. @Panzer Platform I finally got to my car and took the screenshot you asked for.

When I first installed the dashcam I stuffed all the excess wiring below my seat. Since the HK4 had a lot of excess I shortened it so the cabling is not as long anymore.

The dashcam is working fine again, however when I restarted the dashcam after I was done, the state of charge of the Cellink dropped from 100% to 0% (I had just finished a long drive) and is now showing charging again

@rcg530 I guess I will have to do some more testing to find out what causes the shutdown. In the second photo you can see my wiring, I accounted for the wire color change between the battery and the HK4.

I will keep an eye on how consistent this problem appears, if there is fluctuation on when the dashcam shuts down, etc. and report back as soon as I can.

 

[dave91]

Small Update:

just received an email from VIOFO Support offering to send me a hardwire-kit without the voltage cutoff for $10 shipping from china.

I accepted and will see if this helps with the issue.

 

[Panzer Platform]

just received an email from VIOFO Support offering to send me a hardwire-kit without the voltage cutoff for $10 shipping from china.

Viofo sent me, and @rcg530 one of these units with the ability to disable the low voltage cut off.
I found they can extend parking mode operation from 30 minutes to 1.5 hours based on camera, and camera configuration.
The testing results are in my A229 Pro test & review thread.