realh
New Member
I have to park my car in the road outside my house and it keeps getting damaged by hit & run drivers. This year I've already had a window smashed by a van (witnessed and number plate taken, but the police weren't interested) and now my mirror's been damaged even though it was folded in - they came so close they even scuffed the front wing.
Is there any sort of dashcam that's well suited to capturing this sort of event? I've had a very quick look at a few on Amazon, and those with parking modes seem to be mainly for covering and detecting motion at the front & rear. I need something that can detect and record people hitting the sides, but also get a shot of their number plate just before and after. Preferably on both sides so I don't always have to park the same way round, but if it can easily be swapped from one side to the other, that would do. I don't drive regularly, so it needs to be able to be left running for several days without draining the battery, maybe by using a pair of hot-swappable batteries so I can bring one inside to charge when I'm not driving. I think I would need continuous recording to make sure I capture any incidents actually happening, and only use motion detection to protect recordings from being overwritten, so it might need quite a hefty battery or two to avoid risk of draining the car battery.
I'm a Linux geek, so I could probably cobble something together based on a Raspberry Pi. If that's likely to be a better or cheaper option, please let me know and I'll visit the DIY forum.
Is there any sort of dashcam that's well suited to capturing this sort of event? I've had a very quick look at a few on Amazon, and those with parking modes seem to be mainly for covering and detecting motion at the front & rear. I need something that can detect and record people hitting the sides, but also get a shot of their number plate just before and after. Preferably on both sides so I don't always have to park the same way round, but if it can easily be swapped from one side to the other, that would do. I don't drive regularly, so it needs to be able to be left running for several days without draining the battery, maybe by using a pair of hot-swappable batteries so I can bring one inside to charge when I'm not driving. I think I would need continuous recording to make sure I capture any incidents actually happening, and only use motion detection to protect recordings from being overwritten, so it might need quite a hefty battery or two to avoid risk of draining the car battery.
I'm a Linux geek, so I could probably cobble something together based on a Raspberry Pi. If that's likely to be a better or cheaper option, please let me know and I'll visit the DIY forum.