New truck needs some security

[Squanto]

Hi. I did look through the recommendation threads but not really seeing what I want. I have a brand new F-350 and would like a good quality system. I would like to have a good chance of capturing plates in the front so I think 4K would be the best current option there. For the rear, it seems most rear cams are intended to mount on the rear window. Th

 

[Squanto]

Problem there is the truck is 4x4 and a long bed so I'm not sure how much the cam would see from there. So I think I'll need an outdoor cam on the bumper. Any suggestions for the 2? Thanks.

 

[Dashmellow]

Problem there is the truck is 4x4 and a long bed so I'm not sure how much the cam would see from there. So I think I'll need an outdoor cam on the bumper. Any suggestions for the 2? Thanks.

My truck bed is nowhere as long or as large as your F-350 but you may find that you can get pretty decent coverage if you place the camera as high in the center of your rear window as possible even if the bed takes up much of the frame. I find it valuable to have footage of the bed for two reasons. When I am parked (and when driving too) I have coverage of the cargo in the bed and if another vehicle impacts the rear sides of my truck in an accident I have footage of it happening. A bumper camera would miss all of that.

Here's an old screen shot to give you an idea of how this would work.

 

[Squanto]

That's a nice shot there and looks like you could capture some license plates. What camera and resolution is that, do you know?

I think if that Lexus was a little closer, the plate would be covered.

 

[Dashmellow]

That's a nice shot there and looks like you could capture some license plates. What camera and resolution is that, do you know?

I think if that Lexus was a little closer, the plate would be covered.

Yes, if the Lexus was closer it would be behind the tailgate. There are some compromises with a pick-up truck but I find them worth it.

The camera is a Mobius with a "B" lens on it. It is a tiny action/dash camera that is highly versatile that has been on the market for a long time. It's not everyone's cup of tea but if it interests you there are many fascinating threads about Mobius cameras and what people do with them here on the forum. It is more or less an enthusiasts cam because of all the unique things you can do with them. You would probably be better off with a more traditional, modern dash camera. I would suggest checking out the Viofo models. I still use Mobius cameras in my vehicle as side facing cameras and one with a telephoto lens on it but for my current rear camera I use a Viofo A119 V3. For many, a two channel camera may be a better choice.

 

[country_hick]

Yes, if the Lexus was closer it would be behind the tailgate. There are some compromises with a pick-up truck but I find them worth it.

There is no reason you could not install a 5th camera on the license plate for more complete coverage.

 

[Dashmellow]

There is no reason you could not install a 5th camera on the license plate for more complete coverage.

No reason at all, but please tell us what dash camera would you be connecting that 5th camera to and what would this cost to achieve.

 

[country_hick]

No reason at all, but please tell us what dash camera would you be connecting that 5th camera to and what would this cost to achieve.

I could easily install an android head unit capable of utilizing a backup camera. That could have .been bought for under $100 camera included.
By hooking up the reverse wire to a constant power wire the rear camera would always send video to the head unit for you to watch.

On Amazon for black Friday I found a double din 4gb 64gb PX5 10.1" android head unit for $70 that can work with an optional front dashcam. I also found an android compatible dual (front and rear) dash cam for $27 with a 64g sd card included. The 2 combined cost $97 before tax at that time. Yes, I did get both. I already had the correct car radio wiring harness. This gives me the option of placing a front and rear cam where I wish to by using very long cables.

Now the same android head unit is $187. The $27 dual cam (imitation starlight) system (now $43.50) has a waterproof rear view camera and good night vision. If it fails it did not cost me much money. I am still using a $10 1080p rear view mirror cam from Amazon that has performed well and has lasted for several years unlike the 2k mobius that bricked itself.

If routing the wiring is a problem you can always buy a wifi camera adapter for under $20 and go wireless.
Just be positive the rear view camera you choose can work under constant use. One rear view camera for sale says it can only be used for 10 minutes at a time. I would say to use a backup camera system but they do not record.

In reality the 1 year warranty $43.50 android capable dual dashcam I mentioned will record video when just plugged into a usb power port. The front cam has a sd card while the rear cam can sit anywhere with just a wire connecting it to the front cam. I tried a short recording in the house during a power outage with a 1.9w light plugged into a tripplite UPS just to try it out. It showed very good capture on both cams for such low light conditions. However, that dash cam has no buttons for doing anything like saving a desired segment. Those features are all hiding in the APK that must be sent to the android head unit to be functional.

 

[Dashmellow]

I could easily install an android head unit capable of utilizing a backup camera. That could have .been bought for under $100 camera included.
By hooking up the reverse wire to a constant power wire the rear camera would always send video to the head unit for you to watch.

On Amazon for black Friday I found a double din 4gb 64gb PX5 10.1" android head unit for $70 that can work with an optional front dashcam. I also found an android compatible dual (front and rear) dash cam for $27 with a 64g sd card included. The 2 combined cost $97 before tax at that time. Yes, I did get both. I already had the correct car radio wiring harness. This gives me the option of placing a front and rear cam where I wish to by using very long cables.

Now the same android head unit is $187. The $27 dual cam (imitation starlight) system (now $43.50) has a waterproof rear view camera and good night vision. If it fails it did not cost me much money. I am still using a $10 1080p rear view mirror cam from Amazon that has performed well and has lasted for several years unlike the 2k mobius that bricked itself.

If routing the wiring is a problem you can always buy a wifi camera adapter for under $20 and go wireless.
Just be positive the rear view camera you choose can work under constant use. One rear view camera for sale says it can only be used for 10 minutes at a time. I would say to use a backup camera system but they do not record.

In reality the 1 year warranty $43.50 android capable dual dashcam I mentioned will record video when just plugged into a usb power port. The front cam has a sd card while the rear cam can sit anywhere with just a wire connecting it to the front cam. I tried a short recording in the house during a power outage with a 1.9w light plugged into a tripplite UPS just to try it out. It showed very good capture on both cams for such low light conditions. However, that dash cam has no buttons for doing anything like saving a desired segment. Those features are all hiding in the APK that must be sent to the android head unit to be functional.

It all sounds like a questionable and kind of complicated solution just to gain a camera that's really not all that needed if you've already got 4 other cams, but hey, go for it.

Personally, having a rear cam in my truck's cab window for the last 5 years I pretty much always capture the front plates of vehicles approaching me from behind before they get behind my tail gate. A lot of people here seem to like to pontificate about how certain things work even if they have no direct experience with them.

 

[country_hick]

It all sounds like a questionable and kind of complicated solution just to gain a camera that's really not all that needed if you've already got 4 other cams, but hey, go for it.

Personally, having a rear cam in my truck's cab window for the last 5 years I pretty much always capture the front plates of vehicles approaching me from behind before they get behind my tail gate. A lot of people here seem to like to pontificate about how certain things work even if they have no direct experience with them.

Having a license plate mounted camera makes sense for a truck. It makes backing up to a trailer much easier. It also helps to see behind that tailgate to avoid a tragic circumstance when someone is in the blind spot that otherwise exists that could be run over. That is why I can see having 2 reverse cameras. One up high in the rear window and one down low by the license plate for easier and safer backing up.

 

[kamkar]

If i went back to driving a truck i would be "in trouble" CUZ i would have a hard top on the bed, so a camera on the rear window would just film the bed and what little it could out of the side and rear window.
But if i was "roughing" it like "DM" with a strait up truck, for sure i would put the camera in the rear window, even if it have its challenges in regard to plate capture.

I would also get a reversing camera if it was not there from the factory, but as a result of convenience, CUZ when i did have a truck well hard to see what happen all the way back there, so if i was backing up to something " dead" i would use my town hitch as a kind of curb feeler.

 

[Dashmellow]

Having a license plate mounted camera makes sense for a truck. It makes backing up to a trailer much easier. It also helps to see behind that tailgate to avoid a tragic circumstance when someone is in the blind spot that otherwise exists that could be run over. That is why I can see having 2 reverse cameras. One up high in the rear window and one down low by the license plate for easier and safer backing up.

It makes sense to have a back-up camera but who needs the redundancy of two of them? Factory installed back-up cams are already very good at what they are designed for.

Based on what you say in your earlier post you seem to have an affinity for cheap generic dash cams and head units. Most of us old timers here on the DCT learned to avoid stuff like that long ago and wouldn't touch a $10 rear view mirror camera with a ten foot USB cable! You obviously have different standards of what kind of quality you find acceptable.

Installing one of those cheap generic head units with some kind of aftermarket license plate camera might work for you but this doesn't work for the OP. His Ford F-350 comes with a very high quality head unit direct from the factory which doesn't seem to accept aftermarket auxiliary cameras. Where is he supposed to install a second one so he can install the kind of license plate camera you are talking about on the rear of his truck? Or maybe you are suggesting he replace his factory head unit with a cheap Chinese Android generic head unit from eBay or AliExpress?

It might be nice to have a 5th camera on the back of a pick-up truck to capture the plate of someone tailgating you but that's a lot of expense and hassle to go to for a marginal, essentially superfluous capability, especially when a good quality camera on the upper part of a truck's rear window will capture the plate number of any vehicle as it approaches your tailgate.

Here's a simple example. When a vehicle approaches me from the rear, the camera always captures the plate number. By the time they get close enough to be blocked by my tailgate I've already recorded the plate. This happens pretty much every time in every circumstance. In this example, I'm at a traffic light leaving a shopping center/hotel parking lot.

 

[country_hick]

His Ford F-350 comes with a very high quality head unit direct from the factory which doesn't seem to accept aftermarket auxiliary cameras. Where is he supposed to install a second one so he can install the kind of license plate camera you are talking about on the rear of his truck? Or maybe you are suggesting he replace his factory head unit with a cheap Chinese Android generic head unit from eBay or AliExpress?

The newest truck I ever had is a 1997. There was no factory backup camera or even a factory CD player. If I am not thinking about factory installed cams it is because I have never owned anything that came with them.

As far as using cheap dashcams why not? Redundancy is not a bad thing. I never said I did not have a better quality dash cam and I do. Sometimes I will try something just to see how it works.

 

[Dashmellow]

The newest truck I ever had is a 1997. There was no factory backup camera or even a factory CD player. If I am not thinking about factory installed cams it is because I have never owned anything that came with them.

The OP of this thread was asking for advice about cameras for his brand new F-350 which of course comes with a high end head unit, so why are you handing out advice suggesting the purchase a cheap aftermarket head unit as a solution?

As far as using cheap dashcams why not?

I hope when the critical moment arrives you don't suddenly discover that your cheap $10 rear view mirror cam failed to record anything. Good luck!

 

[country_hick]

The OP of this thread was asking for advice about cameras for his brand new F-350 which of course comes with a high end head unit, so why are you handing out advice suggesting the purchase a cheap aftermarket head unit as a solution?



I hope when the critical moment arrives you don't suddenly discover that your cheap $10 rear view mirror cam failed to record anything. Good luck!

My expensive mobius maxi died. There is no guarantee anything will work when it is needed. There is always the old G1Ws to fall back on.

 

[Dashmellow]

My expensive mobius maxi died. There is no guarantee anything will work when it is needed. There is always the old G1Ws to fall back on.

The Mobius Maxi has a known flaw, plus at $70.00 it isn't particularly expensive. Then again, the original Mobius 1, also sells for $70.00 is one of the most reliable dash cams ever built. Either way, comparing an otherwise highly reliable and well built Mobius Maxi, where some people reported bricking their cameras during firmware updates with a $10 generic rear view mirror camera that could fail unexpectedly at any moment is an apples to oranges equation which makes no sense. Then again we know you are fond of touting your redneck logic.

Obviously, any camera can fail but the fact is that most knowledgeable and experienced dash cam users go out of their way to install the most reliable camera set-up they can. They don't stick a $10 rear view nirror camera on their windshield while keeping their fingers crossed.

 

[country_hick]

The Mobius Maxi has a known flaw, plus at $70.00 it isn't particularly expensive. Then again, the original Mobius 1, also sells for $70.00 is one of the most reliable dash cams ever built. Either way, comparing an otherwise highly reliable and well built Mobius Maxi, where some people reported bricking their cameras during firmware updates with a $10 generic rear view mirror camera that could fail unexpectedly at any moment is an apples to oranges equation which makes no sense. Then again we know you are fond of touting your redneck logic.

Obviously, any camera can fail but the fact is that most knowledgeable and experienced dash cam users go out of their way to install the most reliable camera set-up they can. They don't stick a $10 rear view nirror camera on their windshield while keeping their fingers crossed.

Many users have reported their dash cam failed when it was needed. Often it was a sd card failure which could happen any time.

 

[Dashmellow]

Many users have reported their dash cam failed when it was needed. Often it was a sd card failure which could happen any time.

Look, if you want to use a $10.00 dash cam, that's your business but to use the justification that, well, anything can fail so I think I'll just go with the cheapest POC I can find seems foolhardy. The idea is to minimize the chances of failure, not to maximize them, or outright court a disastrous outcome should you require the footage. But hey, like I said, keep your fingers crossed!

You started this discussion insisting that a 5th camera on the bumper was necessary to capture plate numbers and suggested a cheap aftermarket head unit solution that OP has no use for. Yesterday, in my reply to you I discussed and posted examples of how I can easily capture plate numbers of approaching vehicles behind my truck before they get too close to my tailgate to be obscured. You completely ignore that and instead dwell on your $10.00 rear view mirror camera rather than the subject you brought up in the first place.

 

[Squanto]

As long as we're talking about license plate capture, what is top or maybe top 5 video processing softwares for zooming videos to 5h3 pertinent part or zooming in on plates?

And just an FYI, the truck in this case is a '22 F-350 and has factory cams all over it but I can't record them.

 

[Dashmellow]

As long as we're talking about license plate capture, what is top or maybe top 5 video processing softwares for zooming videos to 5h3 pertinent part or zooming in on plates?

And just an FYI, the truck in this case is a '22 F-350 and has factory cams all over it but I can't record them.

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