Before heading out on this summer’s home assignment, I decided to order a dashcam online and pick it up and install it in Dallas in order to record our travels. The main purpose is really to provide video evidence for front-end accidents as these days, we see some crazy things out on the highway and people sometimes struggle to tell the truth about what happened (or don’t/can’t remember). Seems like cheap insurance and given our Mexican auto insurance isn’t very good, I figured this would help with some of the innate liability risks of driving in the USA.
Apart from that, we found the dashcam to come in handy for recording unique situations. In the following video, you’ll come across a C-130 cargo plane, a fox, some beautiful scenery in Mexico, some interesting cars, a manned machine gun, and a number of near accidents.
I didn’t have the GPS turned on for most of these clips (but some have it), and I also didn’t get the date and time correct on most of it either. The menu is a little hard to read during daylight. I took a closer look at it last week in a shady spot and got those things figured out. There are several “freeze frames” that I put into place just so you can focus on something in particular. There isn’t much sound. There is a little text included throughout. I’ve got my dashcam set to save 3 minute intervals (it records them seamlessly and indefinitely until the memory is full and then replaces the oldest unsaved 3 minute clips with new ones; the memory card I’m using can handle just over 100 HD clips.)
It was fun to put this together. I used a registered version of Wondershare Filmora to do the simple video editing. It runs around $60 (a little less if you can find a working coupon code/discount). Hope you’ll watch it and enjoy this little creation. Also, the dash cam is a Spytec A119. It runs around $90 on Amazon. I added a high quality 64 GB memory card (Lexar SDXC I, 633x; $40). I installed the camera myself. It simply sticks onto the windshield with a powerful adhesive. I didn’t bother with anything fancy for the power cord and it hangs shamelessly straight down to the 12V power source on the console. I may have it rigged up better since I know of a guy down here who can do it nicely for a few bucks. I’m a little surprised I managed to get it all working and useful. I hope to post more dashcam clips in the future as long as the unit keeps working and as long as we continue to come across things of interest.
Knowing Your ABCDs 