As I mentionned in another post, I was dissatisfied with the view out of the back of the van. If somebody got too close to you, you wouldn't be able to see then out the back window. To fix this problem I bought the flollowing on ebay:
For less than 200 bucks and bluetooth capable I figured it was either a good deal or a steaming pile!
The first thing I did was figure out where exactly on the rear gate I wanted to put the camera. (namely making sure I wouldn't be trying to occupy the same space as say, the hatch release!)
Once that was sorted, I used a chassis punch to make the hole in the hatch. Chassis punches are awesome! Just drill a pilot hole, put the punch through, tighten and voila! instant hole with no chipped paint or ragged edges!
Chassis punch:
Here's a shot of the camera installed:
From inside: (sorry for the wierd Dutch angle) I also took the opportunity to re-glue the crossbraces in the rear hatch using black silicone.
Once that was done I fed the wires through the rubber wire transit into the van. There are two wires being fed through, the RCA signal wire and a power lead going to a home made switchbox (more on that later) I had to get a 25ft RCA cable because the one that came with the kit was too short. You will need to cut one of the ends off to be able to pass the wire thought the wire transit at the top of the hatch. Actually the 25 footer was short also, but I was able to use the other cable and splice two into one.
the viewscreen can run two cameras (or a camera and another video source) and has an automagic selector for the rear camera, selecting it whenever the reverse lights switch on. A nifty feature to this is that it will activate the screen even if it is turned off. In this pic I am running the sensor wire to the reverse light on the passenger side. Note my super high tech wire spool holder!
I wanted to be able to switch the camear on or off independantly from the reverse lights, so I took power from the power window circuit and built a fused switchbox:
The illuminated switches are REALLY bright, I will have to dim them down a bit:
The second switch is for a (future) forward looking camera. I can't see the traffic lights unless I'm slouching, so I will mount a second camera on the backside of the rearview mirror
Finally, here is the final product, camera working, screen lit. The little wire hanging off the bottom is a microphone for the bluetooth connection with my mobile. (I will need to replace that mic, as it sounds like crap!)
Here is a shot with no input signal:
nice good work man never have seen one in my life! COOL!ebay eh!
I emailed the store I bougth it from, apparantly it's under warranty (good thing I didn't open it up to see how it worked!)
