Hardwired kit drained my car battery.

My sisters car ( a Hyundai I30 she got in April last year ) it ran out of juice too after standing still for a couple of weeks following her surgery in December.
No dashcam in her car though, nothing added to it at all just a plain brand new car.

I must admit this is a bit of a let down, both to her and me.
 
Quite often dealers don't fully charge the battery, far from it. When I got my new one last year I put it straight on CTEK trickle charge and it was nowhere near charged .
 
When i handled new cars, even before dealers got them, the main problem was most often gasoline in the tank, and then detecting and registering the dents and scratches the truckers made in the cars.
I was also pretty hands on moving those cars until one winter i put a brand new Daimler double six sideways towards a sign,,,,, thankfully nothing happened, but it scared the hell out of me, and after that i was more respectful handling other peoples cars.
 
I feel totally let down, I'm very unconfident with manual things and after my (new to me car) was keyed both sides within a month of getting it home, I just decided I wanted better protection - both put people off damaging my car and for driving if involved in accident.

I ended up going into my local Halfords and see their display of dashcams and saying professional hard wiring for £50. So, I went for the full package front and rear 522GW hard wired. This was during pandemic where I'd also lost my job so wasn't using car much. Battery was always depleting after I got Dash Cam and it was a brand new one bought in 2020 probably about 4 months before having Dash Cam installed. In the end after 2 years of having to take battery out to charge every other week if hadn't used the car for a few days (because it was dead) it wouldn't take a charge anymore - was shot. I had to get it replaced, batteries should easy lady 5+ years from new but mine f'ed after just 2. So, I replace it luckily it was still under warranty. This was like 2 months ago.

But last week I get home from shopping turn ignition off and instead of dashcam turning off it bleeps at me and says battery low connect charging cable. This blew my mind as I thought it was hard wired, how can it be saying this. I can't get through to Halfords on phone (you can't call stores direct anymore just a call centre in SA). So I call Nextbase and they talk me through a few things and tell me it's not been permanently hardwired - as they would recommend but has been ignition wired or something like that. Nextbase technician is almost certain this is what killed my last battery and will be doing the same now. I freak out and make trip back to Halfords store I got it at and they tell me way they install dashcams is to whatever something standard and its fine. I'm also told as I've never taken dashcam out of car to charge that's why I'm getting this message as even though I'm running car with a rear dash cam it piggy backs of front one and uses more power than what's put in it from hardwire kit. So, every month or so you need take it indoors give it a 4 hour charge or so for the internal battery and your be sweet. It sounded weird to me but I went away, disconnected dash cam found cable in box back at home and left it to charge overnight (as guy told me it has a cut off when fully charged so wouldn't damage it) but next day despite being plugged in for 10+ hours as soon as disconnected power still got that battery low message. I call Nextbase get a different person this time who tells me the lithium-iron battery inside camera has failed if it's not taking a charge.

So did way dash cam is wired up kill my previous car battery. Did it kill battery inside dashcam as it over used it to power rear dashcam?
Or did not being told I have to take it out to charge when I bought dashcam originally mean I've f'ed it buy not knowing it needed charging ever?

Who's at fault - why are Halfords installing these dashcams different to the way Nextbase are now recommending they should be hardwired if you have a rear dashcam as well?

Also why are the 522GWs not cutting off when not in use.

I've read all the comments here in this thread but now left with very little confidence in Halfords or Nextbase, nor how to install things myself. I guess I now want it so when my car is off - not in use - I want dashcam not drawing power. Guy who installed my dashcam in 2020 has changed stores and guy who took a look other day can't figure out how previous guy wired it so didn't want to mess with someone else's work. I had insisted I wanted it rewired to a permanent live as Nextbase now recommended.

So, I have now have been booked in to go to the store where original installer now works on 22nd August for him to do this but my confidence is shaken in Halfords. It's also a fair drive away but my real question is should I go through with this?

Nextbase say if I send Dashcam to them it's £31 to have internal battery replaced. Plus, I have cost of sending dashcam to them and what could happen to it in post.

I begin to wish I had never got the damn thing. If I don't get hard wiring redone to be a permanent live surely my current car battery will suffer the same fate as previous one - but this time cist me to replace.

Advice most welcome.

Can I buy, ask Halfords install a manual switch to cut power off when not using car?

Or what is that trickle charge thingy I see some of you talking about in earlier posts. Can I connect such to my cars battery when not using car for more than a few days or so. That sounds good if it would fit under bonnet with hood closed - as I park in shared car park at home. Just disconnect when driving and charge the trickle charger thingy indoors right?

What is the best course of action to take now?

Quote
 
Bluelionman,
My advise to you would be” Forget Halfords, go find a qualified auto electrician, leave halfords to their wipers and auto bulbs”. There are plenty of unhappy people on here who have used Halfords/or it’s agents.
You say you purchased the dashcam after your car was keyed. I’m sorry to say that it’s very unlikely that the dashcam would have caught the culprit. 1, your cameras are looking forward and backwards, not sideways. 2, To initiate the camera operating from a sleep cycle, it needs a bit of a nudge depending on your sensitivity setting.
I drive a Volvo, who recommend I charge my battery every 2 weeks if not used on decent runs regularly. That is why my dash cam is hard wired to the ignition as I don’t see any benefit it coming on every time the car wobbles in the wind.
 
Bluelionman,
My advise to you would be” Forget Halfords, go find a qualified auto electrician, leave halfords to their wipers and auto bulbs”. There are plenty of unhappy people on here who have used Halfords/or it’s agents.
You say you purchased the dashcam after your car was keyed. I’m sorry to say that it’s very unlikely that the dashcam would have caught the culprit. 1, your cameras are looking forward and backwards, not sideways. 2, To initiate the camera operating from a sleep cycle, it needs a bit of a nudge depending on your sensitivity setting.
I drive a Volvo, who recommend I charge my battery every 2 weeks if not used on decent runs regularly. That is why my dash cam is hard wired to the ignition as I don’t see any benefit it coming on every time the car wobbles in the wind.
I've no idea where to go find a qualified auto electrician nor what to ask of them now. I'm deeply fearful way my dash cam is currently wired in now, its draining car battery 24/7. Would disconnecting unit - as in take the front dashcam in doors with me each time I'm at home stop that?

Just install when I am using car. That would be okay with me if that would stop drain on battery?
 
you can always remove the camera, that will stop drain for sure, second you can also disable parking guard, that too should turn the camera off when you stop the engine / car.
The hard wire kit should not use power on its own if it have nowhere to send that power,,,,, at least it should be extremely minimal.
 
You obviously have a phone of some discription, it possibly has Google, entre a Google search asking for “auto electrician in my area “. It will possibly give you a choice. Tell him what you need. There is no need to knowledgeable. And as kamkar said, you could take the camera out daily.
 
I don't know what training Halfords have but I've seen many posts here and seen and corrected a couple of neighbours cars that in my opinion were wired wrongly.

They seem to not take the performance behaviour of the fuse they tap into.

There are 2 basic requirements :

For parking mode, a fuse that stays live and is controlled by the hardwire kit voltage regulator
For driving mode only, a fuse that powers up on ignition and stays live until ignition off

One of my neighbours who only wanted driving mode, Halfords had connected to permanent power
The other hsd been wired to a fuse that was temporarily killed off at engine start and at every stop/start event.

With a multimeter and about 20 mins fuse testing both were fixed.
 
Mine is wired to an Ignition powered fuse, as I have no interest in “park mode”.
I would not surprise me if Halfords trained their staff on a bench in a classroom using a Morris 1000 type, (very simple) fuse board. From the comments on here in the past couple of weeks, even to the extent of slagging off their co-workers. I wouldn’t let them change my wipers.
 
My brand new Tiguan Allspace car was delivered to me on 28th December. In early January I purchased Nextbase 522GW, rear Cam addon, and Nextbase hardwiring kit. I wanted to make use of the parking mode.
Halfords installed the kit on a permanent live for me.
Due to COVID, I have not been driving much.
Three weeks later I tried to start my car, but the battery was dead and had to jump start it.
This shouldn't happen!
Any advice to resolve, or has anyone else experienced this issue??
 
My brand new Tiguan Allspace car was delivered to me on 28th December. In early January I purchased Nextbase 522GW, rear Cam addon, and Nextbase hardwiring kit. I wanted to make use of the parking mode.
Halfords installed the kit on a permanent live for me.
Due to COVID, I have not been driving much.
Three weeks later I tried to start my car, but the battery was dead and had to jump start it.
This shouldn't happen!
Any advice to resolve, or has anyone else experienced this issue??
Any modern car has enough computers that something is always slowly draining your car battery. If you drive your car at least every two days or so, it is not usually a problem, but any modern car that sits for three weeks without being driven may not start when you try it, so I wouldn't for certain say that the camera is the culprit. I too had concerns that the auto shutoff feature was not cutting power to the battery when it was supposed to. as my car battery died several times while I was testing the camera and the car wouldn't start. Unless I have done something myself that created a problem, my car will start every morning for an entire year without fail. I do usually drive it almost every day though. as lo I solved the "drain the car battery [problem concern by using an external 30,000 mah battery to run the camera and configuring the camera o that it only runs when the engine is running.I had a local mobile electronics shop install it that way. You can find the external battery I mentioned on amazon, or the BestBuy website Somehow the shop found a way to have the car recharge the external battery too, I used 919 Motoring in Raleigh NC to set that up. for any of you local guys. This way the camera has no connection to the car battery. and I can quit worrying if my car will start in the morning.
 
Just a note for VW owners installing dashcams with parking mode. Some VAG models have what they describe as regenerative braking.

Here is how I understand it works as was explained by a VW engineer

The ECU restricts charging when car is under load (driving and accelerating etc) when descending or on the over run the ECU ups the charging rate to full bore, the object being less alternator resistance on the engine and so better performance.

The battery normally is held at about 80% charge to allow for this and so will drop to the cutoff of the camera faster than a fully charged battery. I have a Tiguan and thats how it works in them. I do not use parking mode in either of my VAG cars.
Maybe this will help explain things on cars who have that system built in. My car will start with battery level at 11.8v
 
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