Problem with HK3-C Hardwire Kit and A139 Pro (2018 F60 Mini Countryman)

[naruhodo]

I installed my A139 Pro 2-channel cameras connected to the fuse box in my 2018 Mini Countryman, and I was meticulously careful to find the correct separate fuses, red wire to constant battery on, yellow wire to ACC only on. The protection was set to the highest level – 12.4v on the controller. But two times now, the kit has failed to protect the battery, causing it to discharge to the point of requiring a boost to re-start the car. (Luckily, I have a portable booster battery).

The camera actually has Parking Mode set to off in the Viofo app. But is is possible that somehow current is being supplied to the camera, even though it appears to be completely off?

@VIOFO-Support Could the Hardwire Kit be defective? Is there a way to test this. Also, is there a way to connect the hardwire kit so that if I never want to use Parking Mode, I can wire the kit without connecting to the red wire to a constant battery source?

I'd be grateful to hear other people's experience with this, too. Thanks.
-Bob

 

[CaptureYourAction]

You can twist the red and yellow wires together into the same acc fuse. As long as that fuse has no power when the car is off, there will be no power at all going to the HK3-C kit.
This is only if never intend to use parking mode.

 

[LateralNW]

Welcome Bob,

But is is possible that somehow current is being supplied to the camera, even though it appears to be completely off?

Yes

Could the Hardwire Kit be defective?

Yes

is there a way to connect the hardwire kit so that if I never want to use Parking Mode, I can wire the kit without connecting to the red wire to a constant battery source?

see @CaptureYourAction reply.

There have been known cases of faulty HK kits not working correctly. You may have one of these.

Also the Hardwire kit might have a problem if your battery falls below 12.4 volts as the voltage reference seems to get upset the way the HK works.
So check what you car battery voltage is at when the car is off and hasn't been driven for say a day. eg in the morning.
If it is at or below 12.4v this may be the cause in this case.

Cheers.

 

[naruhodo]

Thanks to both @CaptureYourAction and @LateralNW. I appreciate your help with this. With your insights, I think for now that I will wire the HK for ACC only using the method provided by CaptureYourAction. Parking mode is a lower priority until I can do some additional testing on the car's battery. I can undo this easily enough at a later time if I use a WAGO Lever-Nut to connect the HK wires to the fuse tap instead of the crimp connector. I'll provide an update to this thread once I have more information. Thanks again.
-Bob

 

[CuriousGeorge]

I had the same problem on a 2020 Honda HRV. I tried 2 different HK3-C kits. I wasted 2 car batteries. Parking mode was off. Voltage cutoff was set to 12.4V. Luckily I convinced the dealer this should be under warranty, however, I know it was the faulty hard wire kits, so beware when using these kits. I even tried the HK3-C without the camera plugged in. almost killed the battery a 3rd time. The transformer on the HK3-C draws power, even with no camera installed, I suppose to keep testing the battery voltage. This is enough to destroy the car battery within a few days to the point that it cannot be recharged, and must be replaced. Having been through 2 bad HK3-Cs, I'm not gonna buy any more of them, which means parking mode is not an option....ever.

 

[naruhodo]

@CuriousGeorge Thanks for this information. Luckily, I have been able to re-charge my battery with a CTEK charger.

I found an OBD2 to USB C connector from Vantrue dash cams on Amazon. It draws constant power and claims to cut the voltage off at 11.6v to save the battery... and it has mostly good reviews. It's not expensive, but 11.6v seems low for my own vehicle and I'm gun shy after my experience. I guess the only way to get Parking Mode power is to use a solution like the external battery from @BlackboxMyCar to supply constant power.

I'm kind of disappointed not to have gotten any reply from @VIOFO-Support (so far) in this thread for this issue.

Today, I will re-wire the HK3-C to work only on an ACC circuit following the info from @CaptureYourAction , and will report back again after I make this modification.

 

[tchavei]

That's worrysome

For those with defective hk3-c kits, is there any way of finding out the kit is defective without killing a battery in the process?

Measuring the draw at idle (without any camera connected) for example?

 

[tchavei]

BTW, after extensively reading the forum, it appears that if your acc voltage doesn't drop to 0 or you incorrectly bundled the acc together with the red constant supply and hooked it up to constant 12V, the hk kit will never turn off no matter what voltage cutoff you selected

So double check connections and verify that:

a) yellow wire is properly connected to acc output (make sure acc output goes off when locking the car)

b) if you're not interested in parking mode, that yellow and red wires are twisted together and connected to acc output source (never constant source)

 

[VIOFO-Support]

I installed my A139 Pro 2-channel cameras connected to the fuse box in my 2018 Mini Countryman, and I was meticulously careful to find the correct separate fuses, red wire to constant battery on, yellow wire to ACC only on. The protection was set to the highest level – 12.4v on the controller. But two times now, the kit has failed to protect the battery, causing it to discharge to the point of requiring a boost to re-start the car. (Luckily, I have a portable booster battery).

The camera actually has Parking Mode set to off in the Viofo app. But is is possible that somehow current is being supplied to the camera, even though it appears to be completely off?

@VIOFO-Support Could the Hardwire Kit be defective? Is there a way to test this. Also, is there a way to connect the hardwire kit so that if I never want to use Parking Mode, I can wire the kit without connecting to the red wire to a constant battery source?

I'd be grateful to hear other people's experience with this, too. Thanks.
-Bob

So sorry for the late reply due to the holiday. Normally, if you have connected the hardwire kit correctly, it will cut off the voltage when the power is lower than the setting. We have attached the manual of the installation below, please check the connection again referring to it. If you have connected it correctly, we suspect that the hardwire kit may be defective. Please open a ticket to get a new one from us:

Submit a ticket

support.viofo.com

Besides, if you never intend to use parking mode, you can turn off it in the settings on APP, or connect both the yellow and red wires to the ACC fuse. Then there is no power at all when you turn off the car.

 

[naruhodo]

@VIOFO-Support Thanks for your reply. At this time, I think that the problem was caused by my incomplete understanding of how some of the circuits behave in a Mini (or BMW – BMW owns Mini) rather than a defective HK3-C. In other words, even though I believed I had done the correct research about the circuits and fuses in my car, it was probably my user error that caused the issue.

TL;DR I now have my A139 Pro 2Ch installed and working properly without Parking Mode enabled. I am using the highest quality and highest bitrate with a 512GB memory card – the image quality of the front camera is excellent, and so far I am very pleased with the product.

There's lots of detail below which I am offering as a recounting of my own experience – I hope that some may this find helpful. But please keep in mind that I'm not making recommendations, per se – everybody's situation is going to be different and personalized – please do your own research for your own scenario. So, "your mileage may vary" and please feel free to correct any information errors I may have unwittingly presented in that I am not an expert in this.

I appreciate the help and input from @CaptureYourAction @LateralNW @CuriousGeorge @tchavei @VIOFO-Support very much. Thank you.

-Bob

Here is my update and lessons learned:

Original installation that caused problem:

• My initial installation of the HK3-C was supposed to enable parking mode.
• Various Mini automobile fused circuits act differently depending on the function being fused. Some circuits are constant power (Battery+), some are true ignition (ACC) and cut out within a second or two of turning off the ignition, and some ACC circuits remain on for several minutes before something (the computer or a relay) cuts them out.
• An example in my car of the third type is the radio – it remains on for about 5 minutes after the ignition switch is turned off. But just before it cuts out, I am warned that the onboard monitor will turn off and I'm given the option to extend the radio play time by hitting the radio's on/off switch after the circuit appears to cut out. That is to say: the ignition is turned off, the radio keeps playing, 5 minutes later I'm warned that the radio will shortly stop, the radio stops, I hit the on/off switch for the radio, the radio starts playing again.
• A second example with a different timing sequence is the circuit for internal lights. They stay on for several minutes after I turn the ignition off or until I exit the car and shut the door and then lock the car. Locking the car appears to trigger the circuit cutoff. But in this case, I could not tell whether it is a true cutoff (ACC circuit) or a relay has turned off the lights on a Battery+ circuit. This was the fuse that I used incorrectly for the ACC yellow wire of the HK3-C – it seemed to behave like an ACC circuit (when I tested it) but was actually a Battery+ circuit. That drained my battery overnight.
• I found it difficult to find specific information about my car's electrical system and fuses. Even with extensive searching online, plus reading the minimal owner information provided by Mini (or BMW – my car has many of the same infrastructure components as a BMW X1), I struggled to gain what little I've actually learned about it.
• Lesson learned: I needed to verify the behavior of the circuits more carefully.

The drained battery

• My car is now 4.5 years old with 60K miles, and the battery had aged. Following the battery discharge due to my incorrect installation, I was able to jump start the car and it ran with no problem.
• But the deep discharge on an aged battery had damaged it further. Without jump starting the car, I could open the doors electrically but wasn't enough voltage or power to start the car. The onboard monitor recommended I charge the battery externally and kept shutting down the electrical system to protect it further.
• I attached an external charger (CTEK MXS 5.0) and tried to recharge the battery. Although the charger reported that the battery was fully charged (to 12.8v at rest) after going through the charging cycle, the reality was that when I tried to start the car, the battery didn't have the power required to kick the starter and crank the engine. After the first starting attempt, the voltage dropped to 11.8v because of the battery's age and possible damage. The car would not start at 11.8v.
• After jump starting the car again and having it run fine, I measured the voltage being supplied by the alternator at 14.8v – the alternator was working properly but the battery just wouldn't hold the charge.
• I had the battery replaced – I believe I would actually have had to do so sometime within the year anyway... batteries these days are said to work efficiently somewhere around 4-6 years and there are a lot of recommendations online to replace the battery somewhere in this timeframe.
• Lesson learned: modern high-performance cars with lots of electronics require more than 11.8v resting battery voltage. Some dash cam manufacturers have wiring kits that protect the battery only when the voltage drops to 11.6v. Some dash cam installers online state that battery protection should kick in at least at 12.0v for modern (current) cars. I think that even that is too low. At least the Viofo HK3-C appears to be more flexible than the hardwire or OBD2 connections from some other manufacturers by offering the HK3-C's voltage protection options.

Parking mode duration and battery protection / Minis and BMWs

• There are many factors that affect the amount of time for parking mode recording before battery protection with a hardwire kit like HK3-C turns off the cameras.
• The cigarette lighter power option for many automobiles will not protect the battery – in my car the fuse for it is Battery+. The HK3-C for me was really the only option, with or without the parking mode enabled – I was not going to be continually plugging in cigarette adapter to turn on the dash cam.
• The cost of the replacement battery was $280 USD plus tax along with $100 USD labor charge (and that was with a discount from the dealer). In the Mini Countryman, there is quite a bit of disassembly required in the engine compartment just to get to the battery, plus the car's computer needs to be updated with information about the new battery – I didn't want to tackle that myself.
• Having the car's battery stressed by pushing the battery cells towards depletion over and over again – especially because I don't commute to work every day – doesn't make sense. Plus, with what I've learned about Mini and BMW power requirements and circuits, if I were to enable parking mode I would choose Viofo's 12.4v option for the least battery drain – and least amount of recording time anyway.
• The primary purpose for me is to have the camera record what is happening while the car is being driven.
• @BlackboxMyCar has provided information about installing dash cams in BMWs on their website. According to them, the BMW computer monitors the electrical system and its health closely. Variations from the nominal voltages can cause the car's computer to try to protect the electrical system and components. That can cause system errors and warning codes.
• Lesson learned: If I felt that parking mode was a very high priority due to the environment where I live, I would power the camera using an external battery power supply of the sort sold by @BlackboxMyCar – and not keep stressing the car's battery – it's too important to mess around with... at least as the way the various technologies stand today.

Routing the cables and airbags in the Mini

• There aren't many instructions or videos from either professionals or owners about installing a dash cam in a 2017-2022 Mini Countryman (F60). Hiding the wiring from the A139 Pro 2CH front camera to the power source and rear camera will bring the actual wires to the airbags.
• Many information sources state or show that the wires at the front can be brought across the front of the A-Pillar where there is a break in the trim, before either descending to the power source or being routed back to the rear camera. At least for my car, this is incorrect.
• Even Mini official diagrams found online appear to show airbag positions symbolically (rather than as actual positioning). These diagrams make it seem that the side airbags at the front do not descend into the A-Pillar.
• Even though I hadn't wanted to mess with it, I ended up removing the A-Pillar trim and discovered that the side airbag does indeed descend approximately halfway down the A-Pillar. I'm not an expert in this, but I believe that running the power and camera wires across the inward side of the airbag is the wrong thing to do and probably would hinder proper deployment in an accident. Once the trim was off, I could route the wires down the windshield side of the A-Pillar and around the airbag completely.
• It goes without saying that you should be very careful working near any airbag... it's a dangerous device. Many information sources suggest that to be safer, the car battery should be disconnected lest someone accidentally trigger an airbag deployment.

My hat's off to you, if you've plowed through all that. I hope you've found it helpful.

 

[acters]

I have an Electric Vehicle, my vehicle keeps the 12V battery charged ONLY if the car is charging OR turned on. Turned off and unplugged will not activate the 12V battery management system, it MIGHT check periodically if the 12V is too low and charge it up. Thankfully it is not a problem for me as I normally have the car plugged in everyday. another plus is that the 12V is used very minimally for starting the car and is quickly charged up if low. usually keeped at 14 V.
I replaced the 12V battery once due to age, it lasted 6 years before it started causing problems.
There is also a hybrid EV vehicle I own that runs exclusively of a large battery and uses the large battery to start the engine to charge the battery for longer range. The 12V battery was replaced once after 5 years. it is usually keeped at 14 volts, and has the same behavior for the 12V battery management system as my EV, except the hybrid does not periodically check the 12V battery when off and unplugged.