Thinkware ivolt mini external battery issue/Viofo dash

[DefMan]

Driving a 2018 Kia Sorento EX, I have the Viofo A129 Duo Pro with rear hooked up to THINKWARE iVolt Mini External Dash Cam Battery (Hardwired). It has the SAMSUNG PRO Endurance 256GB MicroSDXC Memory Card. Using HK3 Viofo hardwire kit with mini USB spliced to Thinkware power outlet cable. Red to red (ACC), yellow to yellow (B+) and black to black (GRD). Thinkware input cable is on add a fuse tap with two 30A ACC and grounded to a bolt. Car does not have ACC 20A inside, under the hood it does so I didn't want to wire there.. Battery and dash cam are on when driving. Both shut off when ignition off. The battery and cam are getting power when ignition on. I drive more than 45 minutes just about everyday and that should be enough to fully charge the battery. When ignition on, the back of the battery has green light. Viofo parking mode is enabled. I even tried switching the voltage protection settings on the HK3 hardwire kit. Power is connected to camera. Works on GPS module as well with same result. So I'm thinking the unit is defective because it's not providing power to dash cam in parking mode but provides power when driving. I searched for threads on this here and even tried to apply the settings through the dash cam such as timer for parking mode and using SD formatter for the microSD card and formatting the card in the cam. Am I right to think the unit is defective or did I miss anything when troubleshooting wiring and cam settings? Still waiting to hear back from the manufacturer and I bought this on Amazon back in December and installed it this weekend. Here are pics of spliced wiring from hardwire to output cable.

 

[rcg530]

I believe I see a problem with how VIOFO HK3 hardwire kit and the Thinkware iVolt Mini cables are spliced together. The color coding for accessory and battery power is not consistent across the entire dash camera / battery pack industry.

The VIOFO HK3 wires are Red = Battery, Yellow = Accessory and Black = Ground.

The Thinkware iVolt Mini (as well as many other battery packs on the market produced by EGEN) use Yellow = Battery, Red = Accessory and Black = Ground.

Here's a screenshot from my 2019 video where I install a A129 Duo dash camera (later it was updated to a A129 Pro Duo using the same hardwire kit). You can see the labels on the wires match my description of the wire colors.



Here's a screenshot from my April 2022 video where I discuss how to splice together a dash camera hardwire kit's 12-volt wires with the output cable from the battery pack or add a connector to the end of the dash camera hardware kit's 12-volt wires to allow it to directly plug into the battery pack (if you don't have the output cable from the battery pack).



I believe you need to redo the red/yellow wire splicing to have the VIOFO Red wire connected to the battery pack's Yellow wire and the VIOFO Yellow wire connected to the battery pack's Red wire.

One additional suggestion I would make would be to change the fuse for the Thinkware iVolt Mini from a 30 Amp down to no more than a 15 Amp fuse (upper fuse socket of the fuse tap). There's no way the iVolt Mini will draw 30 amps. The point of the fuse is to protect the wiring and the device being powered by the fuse tap by using a fuse that will blow when an unusually high load or short circuit is present on that circuit. You could even get away with using a 10 Amp fuse for the iVolt Mini in the upper fuse socket of the fuse tap. I'm not saying to change the lower fuse in the fuse tap (that being the original fuse from the fuse box).

 

[VIOFO-Support]

Driving a 2018 Kia Sorento EX, I have the Viofo A129 Duo Pro with rear hooked up to THINKWARE iVolt Mini External Dash Cam Battery (Hardwired). It has the SAMSUNG PRO Endurance 256GB MicroSDXC Memory Card. Using HK3 Viofo hardwire kit with mini USB spliced to Thinkware power outlet cable. Red to red (ACC), yellow to yellow (B+) and black to black (GRD). Thinkware input cable is on add a fuse tap with two 30A ACC and grounded to a bolt. Car does not have ACC 20A inside, under the hood it does so I didn't want to wire there.. Battery and dash cam are on when driving. Both shut off when ignition off. The battery and cam are getting power when ignition on. I drive more than 45 minutes just about everyday and that should be enough to fully charge the battery. When ignition on, the back of the battery has green light. Viofo parking mode is enabled. I even tried switching the voltage protection settings on the HK3 hardwire kit. Power is connected to camera. Works on GPS module as well with same result. So I'm thinking the unit is defective because it's not providing power to dash cam in parking mode but provides power when driving. I searched for threads on this here and even tried to apply the settings through the dash cam such as timer for parking mode and using SD formatter for the microSD card and formatting the card in the cam. Am I right to think the unit is defective or did I miss anything when troubleshooting wiring and cam settings? Still waiting to hear back from the manufacturer and I bought this on Amazon back in December and installed it this weekend. Here are pics of spliced wiring from hardwire to output cable.

Just like what rcg530 said, the cables you spliced before may be wrong. The Red cable from Thinkware shall be combined with our yellow cable and then connected to an accessory fuse that can detect the ignition. The yellow cable shall be combined with our red cable and then connected to a fuse that supply constant power. Then the camera will enter parking mode after your card is parked.

 

[DefMan]

Thanks, I'll get started on that. rcg530, you're saying just replace top one of the two fuses down to 15A? Leave the bottom one for original? It's in the 30A for the A/C because it's not always on. I think there is a 15A slot that's not live as well that I can tap into instead. Thanks again.

 

[rcg530]

Thanks, I'll get started on that. rcg530, you're saying just replace top one of the two fuses down to 15A? Leave the bottom one for original? It's in the 30A for the A/C because it's not always on. I think there is a 15A slot that's not live as well that I can tap into instead. Thanks again.

Using the fuse box fuse socket with a 30 amp fuse is just fine for the fuse tap for the iVolt Mini. My suggestion was only to change the fuse in the upper socket of the fuse tap that protects the wires an the iVolt Mini to a 15 amp fuse. There's no need for a 30 amp fuse in that fuse tap fuse socket position for the iVolt Mini. The lower fuse tap fuse socket should have the 30 amp fuse from the fuse box fuse socket.

 

[DefMan]

Yep, I looked it up on YT. Using the micro 2 fuse. The installer says to take the fuse out of the circuit I'm tapping into and put it on the bottom and place the fuse to power whatever I'm installing on top where it will draw from. So I'll use the 15A fuse the kit came with. If I bought the whole thing from blackboxmycar website, I would've came across the warning about constant and ACC wire being different colors and the Fuse 1, Fuse 2 positions of the add a fuse tap. That website has tons of info to get started which I missed out on. But dash cam from Viofo and battery from Thinkware were cheaper on Amazon back in December so I was working on two different paths instead of one from blackboxmycar. Thanks again.

 

[macncheeseeeee]

I believe I see a problem with how VIOFO HK3 hardwire kit and the Thinkware iVolt Mini cables are spliced together. The color coding for accessory and battery power is not consistent across the entire dash camera / battery pack industry.

The VIOFO HK3 wires are Red = Battery, Yellow = Accessory and Black = Ground.

The Thinkware iVolt Mini (as well as many other battery packs on the market produced by EGEN) use Yellow = Battery, Red = Accessory and Black = Ground.

Here's a screenshot from my 2019 video where I install a A129 Duo dash camera (later it was updated to a A129 Pro Duo using the same hardwire kit). You can see the labels on the wires match my description of the wire colors.

View attachment 67061

Here's a screenshot from my April 2022 video where I discuss how to splice together a dash camera hardwire kit's 12-volt wires with the output cable from the battery pack or add a connector to the end of the dash camera hardware kit's 12-volt wires to allow it to directly plug into the battery pack (if you don't have the output cable from the battery pack).

View attachment 67062

I believe you need to redo the red/yellow wire splicing to have the VIOFO Red wire connected to the battery pack's Yellow wire and the VIOFO Yellow wire connected to the battery pack's Red wire.

One additional suggestion I would make would be to change the fuse for the Thinkware iVolt Mini from a 30 Amp down to no more than a 15 Amp fuse (upper fuse socket of the fuse tap). There's no way the iVolt Mini will draw 30 amps. The point of the fuse is to protect the wiring and the device being powered by the fuse tap by using a fuse that will blow when an unusually high load or short circuit is present on that circuit. You could even get away with using a 10 Amp fuse for the iVolt Mini in the upper fuse socket of the fuse tap. I'm not saying to change the lower fuse in the fuse tap (that being the original fuse from the fuse box).

When wired this way, would parking mode work? ie. will the iVolt battery send the correct signals to the Viofo dashcam to say if the engine is off or not

 

[rcg530]

When wired this way, would parking mode work? ie. will the iVolt battery send the correct signals to the Viofo dashcam to say if the engine is off or not

Yes, the iVolt batery pack can be used to supply power to the VIOFO hardwiring kit and it will be able to turn on / off the power to the hardwire kit so the dash camera will enter / exit parking mode correctly. You just need to make sure you account for the wire color difference between the iVolt battery pack's 3-wire cable and the VIOFO hardwire kit's 12V power input wires.