Mounting rear dashcam on a car with a retracting rear sunshade

[minotaar]

Has anyone installed a rear dashcam on a car with a retracting rear sunshade?

I have a lexus ES with a motorized rear sunshade. It's mounted inside the rear dashboard (or whatever you call that no-man's land behind the rear headrests). When fully extended, it has a rigid bar that touches the top of the rear windshield, so the standard top-center mounting isn't really possible. However, the sunshade actually comes out of the middle of the rear dashboard - there is a six inch space between the slot where the sunshade comes out and the point where the rear windshield touches the rear dashboard.

Is it possible to cable a rear dashcam down along the bottom of the rear windshield? I'm a complete noob with this stuff, but it doesn't seem crazy. Also, am I correct in assuming that the rear dashcam cannot sit on top of the center rear brake light? I presume it will pick up reflections from that brakelight.

 

[kamkar]

Welcome to the forum minotaar.
You can always mount in a lower position, front or rear, its just not optimal.
If your car is a sedan, well a car behind you will have to be further out back for a low mounted camera to have a shot at the plate.
But if you are in a 1 plate in the rear state, well dont really matter that much.

I would still mount as high as i could get away with.

I dont thing the #3 brake light should blæeed very much light, you can always do a quick test at night holding your phone where you would put the camera, and see if the phones wide angle camera recording a video see anything.

 

[LateralNW]

Has anyone installed a rear dashcam on a car with a retracting rear sunshade?

Yes.
It is a wedged shaped dashcam that helps the screen to ride over it.
During retraction it just rides over it again.
The dashcam is mounted near the top of the window.

 

[minotaar]

Yes.
It is a wedged shaped dashcam that helps the screen to ride over it.
During retraction it just rides over it again.
The dashcam is mounted near the top of the window.

Interesting. Does the screen make contact with the camera, like bumping it? I realize the rear camera is basically all solid state, but is the rear camera able to maintain it's alignment and mounting?

 

[minotaar]

Welcome to the forum minotaar.
You can always mount in a lower position, front or rear, its just not optimal.
If your car is a sedan, well a car behind you will have to be further out back for a low mounted camera to have a shot at the plate.
But if you are in a 1 plate in the rear state, well dont really matter that much.

I would still mount as high as i could get away with.

I dont thing the #3 brake light should blæeed very much light, you can always do a quick test at night holding your phone where you would put the camera, and see if the phones wide angle camera recording a video see anything.

Thank you for the welcome. These are excellent points, regarding the mounting and the license plates that I had not thought about.

 

[OldEastSider]

I owned an ES350 a few years ago also with the power rear sunshade. If I recall correctly, the third brake light is at the bottom of the rear glass and not the top. As you say, this is where the clearance is the greatest, so I don't see any issues mounting the camera just above the brake light housing. Most rear cameras are very small and less than 2" in depth. I don't think you will suffer from reflections, but Kamkar makes a very good suggestion of holding your phone where your rear camera would be mounted and have someone sit in the driver's seat and press the brake pedal. Then you will know for sure (though from memory it is a tight squeeze back there!). Do you have a particular brand of camera in mind?

 

[minotaar]

I owned an ES350 a few years ago also with the power rear sunshade. If I recall correctly, the third break light is at the bottom of the rear glass and not the top. As you say, this is where the clearance is the greatest, so I don't see any issues mounting the camera just above the break light housing. Most rear cameras are very small and less than 2" in depth. I don't think you will suffer from reflections, but Kamkar makes a very good suggestion of holding your phone where your rear camera would be mounted and have someone sit in the driver's seat and press the break pedal. Then you will know for sure (though from memory it is a tight squeeze back there!). Do you have a particular brand of camera in mind?

Thanks so much. Yes, I think Kamkar makes an excellent suggestion on that reflection test. You're completely right that the brake light housing is on the bottom and the most space is near that. I'll just have to try sticking something there temporarily to see if I can tolerate the obstruction through the rear view mirror. I think the high mounting position is recommended because it both gives the camera a better vantage point (as kamkar said) and also stays out of the driver's LOS since it's mostly blocking sky.

I haven't purchased a camera yet, but I'm really obsessed with fixing the rear camera issue because all my problematic traffic incidents have been around getting rear-ended. And I'm in a one-plate state too!

I'm new to this forum so I have a lot of dumb questions. So here's one - why is the best camera always the front camera? This sort of ties into the issue of people rear ending me. I've always managed to stop fast enough to avoid doing that to someone else, so it seems that front collisions are generally rarer.. Is the design purpose to record fault when someone walks/drives out in front of the car?

 

[kamkar]

If there is a little brake light bleed due to poor fit / finish on the housing, i assume a little strip of door ( house door ) weather seal rubber could close that gap.

In a decade of taking footage from my dashcams to share, and having had a rear camera for at leat 7 years, and side cameras for over 5 years, well it is always on the front camera the entertainment are, but i have a few times pulled side or rear footage to use as B-roll footage to spice things a little.
The front camera on its own, well it log everything you do with your car, so if you are good in regard to your traffic code, no one should be able to wipe their failures off on you.
So if you drive alone on a multi lane road and a car with 3 people in it rear end you, and they all claim that you changed lane right in front of them, well your front camera will have you driving along nice and easy in your lane according to lane markings and roadside, right up until BAM !
So clearly the occupants of the other car are lying their pants off.

Of course having it directly on tape, well it will increase the entertainment value a lot, but in a situation like that your front camera alone should be enough.

Most rear cameras i am aware off are pretty slick in design, so if you go high enough on the rear widow that your curtain nick it, it should not hang up on it at least.
The plug / wire most often come off at the side, so it should be out of the way if you do not have too much wire dangling.

 

[kamkar]

The rear camera are a must for Americans in 1 plate in the back states, CUZ then a oncoming car, the front will get no identifying capture, so if a car tear off your mirror and dont stop, well at least when its back side come in range of your rear camera, it will have a chance of capturing the plate.

Also why i combine both front & rear camera plate captures in my videos.
Of course if the conditions are fine, no problem capturing plates front and rear on Danish highways.

ALSO !!!!! i deal with easy to rear big EU plates, US license plates are a whole other beast.

 

[OldEastSider]

why is the best camera always the front camera? This sort of ties into the issue of people rear ending me. I've always managed to stop fast enough to avoid doing that to someone else, so it seems that front collisions are generally rarer.. Is the design purpose to record fault when someone walks/drives out in front of the car?

That's a really interesting question. Other members who have far more experience than me could give you a better answer, but I'm thinking it's probably to do with how the industry has developed over the years. Two and three channel cameras (front and rear and front, rear, and internal) are relatively recent developments. Originally, manufacturers sold a single channel front facing camera. In two and three camera setups it's asking a lot for the processor in the main unit to supply 2K (1440p) or 4K (2160p) to two additional cameras. Maybe new technology will make that possible in the future. Viofo's A139 Pro has a 4K front camera but only 1080p rear and internal cameras. Thinkware's new U3000 has a 4K front camera but a 2K rear camera.

It's unconventional, but there's nothing stopping you from placing the main camera on the rear windshield and the "rear" camera on the front windshield. Or you could power two systems independently of each other, with a high quality "front" camera at both front and rear. Plenty of members here do that, including me. That way, if one camera fails then you still have footage from the second camera.

I agree with your comments about driving. Standards have never been so low and drivers have never behaved so selfishly and with such perceived entitlement. Everybody is so distracted these days. Not only is there so much tech to play around with in cars, people just can't seem to put their damn phones down. Apart from a mechanical issue or a tire blowout, there's absolutely no excuse for rear-ending the vehicle in front.

 

[minotaar]

I agree with your comments about driving. Standards have never been so low and drivers have never behaved so selfishly and with such perceived entitlement. Everybody is so distracted these days. Not only is there so much tech to play around with in cars, people just can't seem to put their damn phones down. Apart from a mechanical issue or a tire blowout, there's absolutely no excuse for rear-ending the vehicle in front.

So true. Seeing people get to a stop sign and just immediately pick up their phones as they wait for traffic is just depressing to watch.

I wonder if the existence of power connectors in the back dome light area has been the historical cause of the best camera being in front. The most traditional car has no rear fusebox and not necessarily any connectors in back. Still, it seems more common these days, and it would be really great to have a second camera wired totally independent from the front camera, with an independent power connection. Why would I care about the two video streams being perfectly time-matched? if there's an incident, time matching the two won't be hard, nor would it be beyond my own interest to do.

 

[kamkar]

I am at a place where when i see a person looking at their phone, driving / walking / bicycling or just standing or sitting down on a bench, my gag reflexes are tested.
I touch my phone for like 5 minutes every day, and that is most often skimming news headlines i do not dare to read anyway as i al also veru displeased with the level of journalism in my country.

Getting / making a call or a TXT, well that only happen for me every 2-3 days.
Monthly i use about 2 GB of my data plan which are 40-50 GB, and i think i have talk as much as you please now, and of course free TXT

Here phone use while driving is a fine and 1 mark on your licence, a mark that have a 2 year retention time, if you get a #3 mark, you have to retake your driving test again, which can be quite a pain if you like me are certified to drive most things.
It would also be pretty costly, CUZ i do think if i had to retake my big rig / big town licence now, well some refresher classes will probably be needed.
None the less booking a new theoretical and practical driving test, that too cost money in a country that dabble in socialism as Denmark do,,,,, many things are not free here.

Its not like you just show up at the DMV, places some X on a paper, and drive around the block with someone, O on, its much more complicated here and require a platoon of government employees to pull off.
The DMV which it is my understanding is the butt of many a joke and many a frustration, well its a cakewalk compared to here.

 

[LateralNW]

@minotaar
In this photo you get to see how the two types of rear dashcams fit.

The Dashcam in the distance is the wedge design I mentioned above.
The blind rides over it with a bit of a clunk sound but the lens stays in position.
With a little ingenuity adding some triangle guides to the side of the dashcam could resolve the clunk problem.

With the cigar shaped rear dashcam the blink just hits it and would damage the vehicle blind eventually.
Personally, I prefer the wedge shape.
In this photo I could have fitted a right-angle connector just to allow the unit to be closer to the top.

I have lent this car so when I next get to see it, I'll grab some footage of the blind going up and down.

The other thing to note is the slope on the back window is enough where most of the reflection off the parcel shelf
is in the view of the camera. My car has a light cream interior which reflects everything.

My solution to this was to place UV safe black non reflective cloth across the parcel self.

Hope that helps you out.

cheers.

 

[minotaar]

The other thing to note is the slope on the back window is enough where most of the reflection off the parcel shelf
is in the view of the camera. My car has a light cream interior which reflects everything.

Thank you - I see what you mean. I had been thinking much more in terms of the shape of the camera but did not consider the way the cable comes out of the device as much, and clearly that is a factor.

I would like to find out more about the accessibility of power in the back of my car. Can you recommend a community resource that might help me find where I can plug a dashcam in the trunk or near the back seat of the lexus ES?

 

[kamkar]

I think many new cars have a 12 V plug in the back, but how it behave might be a surprise or at least not like the in dash / console ones you are used to.
Back in the day when there was only 1 channel systems around, i got a 3 port 12 V extension which i hardwired to a 30 A fuse and then put under my back seat, CUZ i tried a long USB cable from the front, resulting in the first time i was rear ended i did not get that on direct video.

 

[LateralNW]

Thank you - I see what you mean. I had been thinking much more in terms of the shape of the camera but did not consider the way the cable comes out of the device as much, and clearly that is a factor.

I would like to find out more about the accessibility of power in the back of my car. Can you recommend a community resource that might help me find where I can plug a dashcam in the trunk or near the back seat of the lexus ES?

Here is a simple video of the Sun Screen passing over the Viofo A129 Duo rear dashcam.