Parking Battery-Power Station, 3X capacity and 3X cheaper than dedicated options + extra functionality

Pctallpaul said:
Hi All,

Thank all so much for your guidance and sharing your expertise here.

I’m a complete novice when it comes to electronics but keen to complete an installation that is safe in my vehicle.

I’m looking at a power station to power my Thinkware U3000 2 channel dash cam in parking mode. This camera shuts down after only approx 15mins from ignition of. I suspect this may have something to be with my hybrid vehicle and fussy BMW electrics. (Car battery protection minimum voltage set at 12.9 Volts as per TW menu presets for a Hybrid vehicle.) Hence looking at a PS to possibly solve this issue.

Here in the UK the only PS I can find from a reputable retailer is an Ecoflow River 2, so will be looking at purchasing this unit only.

Could someone please advise as to the best wiring configuration for this set up? My vehicle BMW 330e touring has a 12v socket in the rear, so this would be my preferred connection to the car battery and securing the PS in boot.

Many thanks in advance.
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I am not familiar with Thinkware U3000, but I don’t think the hardwiring process is much different then Viofo, may be just wire color coding (for Viofo, the Yellow is parking trigger/signal and the Red and Black are power, positive and negative respectivaly)

Here is the re-post of my answer from this thread (post #26):
https://dashcamtalk.com/forum/threads/ecoflow-and-viofo.51429/

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There are a several ways how the EcoFlow River2 can be wired, with 12V out or 5V out to DashCam.
My preferred method would be 12V out like shown in attached diagram below.
In this case original HK4 can be used as is.

Use included Cig adapter/XT60 cable to charge River2 from car’s ACC activated Cig socket. (Make sure it is rated for 10A (the fuse is usually 20A for these sockets).
Splice yellow trigger wire (18-20AWG) with positive wire of the included Cig adapter/XT60 cable or use splitter like one in the link below, connect the included charging cable to one barrel and cut-off the other barrel and use positive 12V wire for the yellow trigger wire. (tape and do not use negative wire).
https://www.amazon.com/gp/B08CMT94CV

Get USB-C to 12V cable, similar to one in the link, and cut-off the barrel connector, to connect positive wire to Red and negative to Black wires of the HK4 to power DashCam. (15V cable provides better margin for 11.8V min setting of HK4 and may be better, but I am not sure without testing).
https://www.amazon.com/gp/B07PT9SXL8 or https://www.amazon.com/gp/B0CDFWRZB7

If you don’t have 10A rated ACC activated Cig socket you can similarly wire and charge form the fuse box (for the long wires 14 or better 12AWG wires would be needed) since River 2 charge rate using 12VDC is about 90-100W)
 

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Hi, I use Ecoflow River 2 but sometimes my 229Pro could not turn on when starting up the car (after the PS running out of juice). I have the same connections as instructed in the previous diagram but no splicing the yellow trigger wire with Cig adapter/XT60 cable (yellow wire connected with the fuse box). Could this be a reason?
 
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Thank you GPak, that explanation and diagram are exactly what I needed. The U3000 wiring colours are identical to the HK4 except there’s no inline voltage protection switch (this is selected in the menu of the camera itself.)
 
ductt said:
Hi, I use Ecoflow River 2 but sometimes my 229Pro could not turn on when starting up the car (after the PS running out of juice). I have the same connections as instructed in the previous diagram but no splicing the yellow trigger wire with Cig adapter/XT60 cable (yellow wire connected with the fuse box). Could this be a reason?
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No, it doesn't matter where you get the positive ACC from.

It could be some kind of protection so the PS won't send power to the USB ports until it reaches some initial charge level.
Next time this happens, I suggest trying to wait and see if the dash cam eventually turns on, it may take some time.

How do you turn-on the dashcam when this happens? Do you recycle the PS (turn-off/turn-on) or recycle the USB-C (unplug/re-plug) the USB-C cable?
 
GPak said:
No, it doesn't matter where you get the positive ACC from.

It could be some kind of protection so the PS won't send power to the USB ports until it reaches some initial charge level.
Next time this happens, I suggest trying to wait and see if the dash cam eventually turns on, it may take some time.

How do you turn-on the dashcam when this happens? Do you recycle the PS (turn-off/turn-on) or recycle the USB-C (unplug/re-plug) the USB-C cable?
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After starting up the car, the dashcam will turns on automatically after 20min or longer, sometimes it does not turn on. Turning on/off the PS/USB-C can fix this. Ecoflow discharge limit has no effect because of too low consumption power (5-7w) so PS runs out of juice in parking mode (the limit works on >25w only, it's a bug on this PS). I guess the PS's 0% charge on starting up cannot power up the dashcam? While driving, the dashcam draws power from PS, but not ACC in this diagram.
 
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I was curious and decided to check how the Necesspow N150 PS will behave in similar situation.
And, … it is similar to EcoFlow.
With A229 Plus (2ch) in parking recording, I discharged PS to empty until it died.
Then I started to charge PS and yes, DVR did not turned On.
I needed to turn off/on PS to start the DVR.

So, we can conclude that, after the battery has been shut-down by BMS system protection, the PS/BMS needs to be turned Off/On to power the USB ports.
This is really inconvenient.
There is a fix for this by adding a UPS module, but I want to re-test it first
I will post the test results soon.
 
As I already have a hardwire dashcam and battery installed, I noticed the ecoflow unit has the same xt60 input, so I'm assume I could literally take out my cellink and put this in its place as its a larger capacity?
 
This is the beauty of devices that use standardized power connectors. You should be able to just swap out one battery for the other and not notice any changes other than how each battery pack behaves as GPak noted above.
 
GPak said:
I was curious and decided to check how the Necesspow N150 PS will behave in similar situation.
And, … it is similar to EcoFlow.
With A229 Plus (2ch) in parking recording, I discharged PS to empty until it died.
Then I started to charge PS and yes, DVR did not turned On.
I needed to turn off/on PS to start the DVR.

So, we can conclude that, after the battery has been shut-down by BMS system protection, the PS/BMS needs to be turned Off/On to power the USB ports.
This is really inconvenient.
There is a fix for this by adding a UPS module, but I want to re-test it first
I will post the test results soon.
Click to expand...
The two USB-C to 12V cables I ordered to test the UPS's functionality with a completely discharged PS were delayed and are now due to arrive by 10pm on Saturday, so my test has been postponed until then.
 
I'm so tempted to return my cellink and home charger before the return window closes

But from what I've read from gpak is the fact that I need to switch it on and off and won't automatically switch to charging mode etc?

I'm thinking of leaving my camera and battery hardwired in, buy a river 2 max in the boot, use the hardwired cable (xt60) to charge it whilst on the move and then plug the dashcam into the cig output socket? And forget the 4 pin molex connector

If it would automatically charge when Engine running and stop charging when the engine is off and switch the camera to parking mode automatically, then I think I'll do it

I'm not keen on cutting wires and wiring it into the car, I want to use what's already there
 
Shiwarrior said:
If it would automatically charge when Engine running and stop charging when the engine is off and switch the camera to parking mode automatically, then I think I'll do it
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This is exactly the behavior that I have with my LTO battery pack (GPak's other thread). No reason why you can't achieve exactly the same behavior with LiFePo4 batteries. I'm using my 12v utility outlet in the car for charging, mine goes on and off with the car's ignition. If your utility outlet is always live, then you just need to tap a fuse in the fusebox to get an ACC switched voltage and use that to control a heavy duty relay to turn charging on/off with the ignition and add the relay to the inside of your battery box. If you can build a battery, it will be easy for you to tap an ACC fuse. The River2 will be a less expensive option and will behave the same way, but comes with temp limits. If the temps inside your car will exceed 45c, that will cause problems - my USB-A outlets on the River2 failed after a several days of the car sitting in the sun with 35c temps.
 
EricSan said:
TI'm using my 12v utility outlet in the car for charging, mine goes on and off with the car's ignition. I
Click to expand...

im using hardwire via fuse box as per norm (when not using 12v cig lighter) so mine does go on/off with ignition as it is wired to do so, but if i was to use the cig lighter it stays on (i found out this when the guy who hard wired it in, stopped working, so i had to temporary connect the dashcam straight to cig lighter and forget parking mode for now) (i left it connected and it drained my battery completely)
 
Yeah, it's easy to reach the EcoFlow 45c limit inside of a car in the sun. This is why I'm building my own LTO parking battery. I also modified one of the 12v utility outlets in my son's car to turn on and off with the ignition (tapped fusebox for an ACC line and connected this to a 40A automotive relay, all tucked into the center console). Otherwise, it was on 100% of the time, which didn't match the way I wanted to use it.
 
Yep. If you look around a little more, you can find them for sale with the wire harness as well. This makes connections and relay replacement easier. I'm not endorsing this particular one, just using it as an example to show.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/B074FSZWVT
 
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