I have finally given up on a small project I installed on my 13 GS.
I have a reverse camera mounted on my front bumper to assist with parking. I have the screen mounted in the glove box.

Initially I installed it and it worked fine. Well, it works fine when you start the car up. Then after driving for about 30 to 40 minutes it stops working.

I have it wired to a tap a fuse on the seat heater fuse. I also have my Wideband wired to this circuit.

I thought maybe it was the camera that was bad, so I purchased another one. That one did the same thing. Then i swapped the monitor, same result. Then I added a lighted switch to be able to turn it on and off, thinking maybe the monitor was over heating. But it still exhibits the same issue. It has an line fuse, which is fine as well.

I am about to give up and just pull it out, but I figured I would see if anyone could figure this out. No matter what I do, after driving the car for about 30 to 40 minutes, the lighted switch/monitor fails to get power. But the wideband is working fine. If I turn the car off, and turn it back on, it won't work, but if I let the car sit for a while, like an hour, it works again. (this is the most intriguing clue for me, but haven't figured it out. Could it be the tiny gauge wires be overheating in the engine compartment causing an issue????, I am supercharged, thus the wideband)

Does anyone have any ideas as to what I am experiencing and what I can do to fix it.

 

yes, well, more than likely i know what is going on. i installed a front and rear camera myself. during bench testing , i noticed that the tiny cameras get really hot after minutes (i didnt time total minutes) of constant running. so with that in mind, i installed a switch to make them come on and will turn them off when done doing whatever i was wanting to monitor.

my advice is to let them run for a good amount of time, then go feel the camera, see just how dang hot it is. i bet its finger burning hot. mine was dang warm in like 4 minutes. you say you have a switch, does the switch turn off BOTH camera and monitor? (or just the monitor) yes, the wires that come out of the camera are really really small , but if you turn off power to the camera using your switch, then its a moot point of the wires being thin.

i know you have yours done , but here is how i did mine...
https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...tallation.html

 

I have my front camera mounted on top of the center air deflector (center bolt) and have it so the monitor and camera only come on when I command it. I have the power wires (camera/monitor) spliced into the driver fog light wiring so when I turn on the fog lights, the camera and monitor come on. I've never had any issues, and the ones I bought off Amazon are the cheap ones.
I can use the fog lights as a power trigger, because I never use them otherwise.

I have had the camera on for at least 1 hour one day, and neither shut down due to heat, although at a stop light, the radiator heat is pretty hot. I have put some insulation above the camera to protect it some.

I wish I could help you, but I wouldn't know how to diagnose your issues from afar.

Good Luck

 

Hey guys, thanks for the response and help! This is driving me nuts.

Chevy dave, my switch turns both the camera and monitor on and off.
I initially thought it was the monitor turning off due to overheating, thats why I added the switch. Now, would the camera getting too hot in the front of the car, cause some type of overheat circuit to trigger, opening the circuit. Reason I ask is because, when the system doesn't turn on, theres no power going to the switch either. Its a lighted switch, so in theory, the switch should still turn on, but it doesn't. Its not getting any power when this little anomaly occurs. I will definitely check out your DIY, which looks great, to see if there are any differences I can try to see if I can resolve this issue.

Hey LV2tour, you were my actual inspiration for this project. Im drawing power from the seat heater fuse in the fuse box in the pax foot well.
I did not want to tap the fog light wires for power. We actually talked about the issues a few months ago. Ive since then changed everything and still am having issues.


The camera sits right in front of the intercooler for the supercharger at the bottom of the front bumper. Now I am wondering if the camera is shutting off, and just causing a break in the circuit, thats why the lit switch is not getting power either. I ran the camera inside the car as well, in the AC, and i still had the issues. This was before the lit switch though, and i never really checked the temperature of the camera when i did that.

So I am drawing a giant blank right now. Anyone else have any ideas? This is driving me crazy.

 

well, you will have to test where you are losing the power. when you have power loss.... i'd start where you would too, at the fuse tap , then before entering switch, exiting switch (clicking it on/off). then it does get difficult, you can test power to where you have connected to the monitor + wire and same for the camera + wire, but... you really cant test voltage right next to them (as the wire enters them) because like you said, the wires are soooooooooooo small.

no clue where your losing power. just gonna have to test. if you have to use the old method, poke a heavy straight pin into the plus wire and check with volt meter from there to a ground point.

actually , rethinking your problem, the very first thing i would test, is... is the camera getting voltage when the switch is turned off. (still thinking about overheated cam somehow)

 

Yeah I will have to get out the old trusty volt meter. Haven't done that yet.
Im curious about testing the camera with the switch off for voltage?

Are you thinking, even with the switch off the camera is getting voltage, causing it to overheat? The switch is lit, so if this was true, the theory, the switch would be lit up wouldn't it?

 

Justa guess: maybe you have too much wired to one circuit?

As to overheating vid cams, that's alarming because what it seems to mean is that they're not made for that job. What job or condition they're made for, I don't know. I do know that my black, metal, radar detector in full sun on the windshield gets so hot you can barely touch it--more than half being from the sun and the rest from it being turned on. It doesn't fail due to heat for the past ten years. To me, that means it is intentionally designed and functioning that way, under those conditions. Just an observation.

 

Hey chevydave.

I noticed you grounded the camera and monitor separately.

I have both camera and monitor grounded in the fusebox panel. Could this be causing an issue for me? I ran the camera's ground cable all the way back to the fuse box. Thats about the only thing I see differently from our set up's.

Any ideas?

 

I doubt the camera has any type of thermal fuse, i think if your lighted switch isn't lit your losing power from the add a fuse to the switch, i would get a test light with a pin probe on it and with this you can pierce the wire anywhere and test for power, if the light on the test light lights you have power to that point, to me it sounds like a bad connection between the add a fuse and the switch. you could try installing a jumper wire from the add a fuse to the wire going directly to the camera bypassing the switch and see if the problem still happens, if so try replacing the add a fuse itself if the problem still persists the problem would be forward of the switch, don't think just because the add a fuse is new you can't get one with a poor connection, i would also check and make sure you have a good ground connection at both sides, try wiggling the ground wire connections to see if there are any fluctuations in the picture when you do this, also wiggle the ground wire going to the camera and monitor, i think somewhere there is a poor connection causing this.

 

As long as you have a good ground point on the vehicle, you can pick up a ground at any point on the car thats grounded.

 

i dont know what you used for a switch. if your switch had 2 connectors (power in and power out) then the wiring of the switch isnt the problem.
However, the more connectors , the more i lean towards the wiring of the switch.
my switch had 5 prongs... testing drove me crazy until i found a wiring diagram, kept having power out all the time and led on only when pressed.

voltmeter and patience, you will find it. oh, ya, you can ground anywhere good, i did mine where easy to make

 

My switch had 3 prongs. I will have to double check how I wired it. I Believe one was accessory for the light and the other two were power and ground? So it could be that the camera is getting power the whole time? But wouldn't it turn on when I turn the car on? I'm going to try and bench test it off a 12 volt battery as well.

 

Road king. Thanks for chiming in. Before I had the switch wired in, I had it wired directly to the camera. I don't have a test light but I do have a voltmeter. That would be sufficient to test for voltage right to see at what point I'm loosing the power.

 

voltmeter is all i use. oh, anyway, so after i put cams in the vett, the wife said she wanted a backup in her altima. i wired hers all up, tried it out, NOTHING! grrrr.. ok, i so go to check power at the cam in the back, misplaced my wire tester, so, get my pliers and a strong hatpin type pin, jab it into the wire , test voltage, none, wiggle connector there, power, replaced it, all good. anyway, strong pin jabbed into a wire will work to check if power at that spot , if you need to do that... lol

 

Yes a voltmeter or test light is the same thing, the pin piercing the wire at any point is a good idea. Good Luck.

 

A 3 prong switch is either a single pole/double throw (SPDT) or a SPDT with center off. Power and ground should not both be connected to it. Connect the power from the fuse tap to the center post and connect the power to the camera and monitor to one of the outer prongs. Do not use the other outer prong. Connect the grounds to grounding points.

 

Tapped to "Seat Heater" fuse?

Doesn't the Seat Heater have a circuit that turns the heater "off" after X number of minutes?

Have you tried tapping a different circuit?

 

Oldben, sorry for the confusion, I mis wrote that earlier.
I have the power wire going to the switch, then going to the camera.
Middle prong is wired for the light on the switch. Sorry for the confusion.

Kent1999, never thought of that. I haven't tried any other circuits. Reason I used the seat heater one is because its switched power, so it won't kill the battery once the car turns off. I also believe I have my wideband hooked up to this same circuit, so if this was the case, with the heater circuit turning off, the wideband would also turn off.

I will double check that, but I don't think thats the issue I am experiencing.

Thanks for all the responses, getting one step closer to solving this little mystery.

 

AOroads, just noticed I never responded to your input. I initially thought the same thing, about the camera not designed to be run all the time, thats why I put the on and off switch.
Also the issue with the two things running off the one circuit, wouldn't both of them go down, if there was an issue. Let me know what you think?

 

You've got far brighter minds on this thread than mine, even ones who have done this same installation. Me, I'm just guessing but heat is a killer in some/most instruments unless they're made to take it.

Kent1999 makes a very good point EXCEPT that the cam turns on when you start the car, which the seat heater does not do. Or at least mine doesn't---I don't get heated seats every time I start the car, or I'd notice it! Still, the fact that it turns off after 30 or so minutes does coincide w. what the seat heater does, so maybe there is something in the circuitry/brains telling it to turn off. Maybe someone else on here can comment on that and where they successfully tapped into for their installation. In which case, I'd go with whatever is their methodology. Good luck with it.