[kimokono]

I have been reading about various dashcams and I stumbled upon the Mini 2 from Garmin. As an accessory, they offer an OBD II cable (link below), which provides constant power. it seems to me, that it's a great alternative to the invasive hardwiring. I understand this might drain the car battery if kept for an extended period of time, but this specific cable has an embedded timer 10 minutes, 24 hours and eventually always on. Additionally it monitors the battery voltage level and would cut off power if it drops below 12 V. Given this would function as expected, does anybody think it's a bad idea to draw power from OBD II, for parking mode, in general ? would that cause any problem to the car electronics or to a diagnostic scanner capabilities ?

https://www.garmin.com/en-CA/p/735279

[g11hoonigan]

I don't doubt the garmin quality but it's a little on the expensive side. I got mine for under $20 from amazon with the same cut-off feature - although it's voltage-dependent only, no other option. Still working great since I bought it last year.

IMHO, it's not a good idea to draw power off of the battery for long period, esp if you're parking the vehicle outside most of the time. Our batteries are not getting charged that much within the duration of average commute time/distance.

[ContactPatch]

Originally Posted by kimokono

I have been reading about various dashcams and I stumbled upon the Mini 2 from Garmin. As an accessory, they offer an OBD II cable (link below), which provides constant power. it seems to me, that it's a great alternative to the invasive hardwiring. I understand this might drain the car battery if kept for an extended period of time, but this specific cable has an embedded timer 10 minutes, 24 hours and eventually always on. Additionally it monitors the battery voltage level and would cut off power if it drops below 12 V. Given this would function as expected, does anybody think it's a bad idea to draw power from OBD II, for parking mode, in general ? would that cause any problem to the car electronics or to a diagnostic scanner capabilities ?

https://www.garmin.com/en-CA/p/735279

Curious how you will run the cable from the dash cam to the OBD port? Using Add-A-Circuit or a fuse tap (same thing) is very quick to wire in the passenger side footwell. You tap into Fuse 46 with a 20A rated Add-A-Circuit, the wire to the dash cam is routed behind the door molding and down the A Pillar, then behind the headliner to the mirror area. You cannot even see the wire, might take 30 minutes to install.

[kimokono]

Originally Posted by ContactPatch

Curious how you will run the cable from the dash cam to the OBD port? Using Add-A-Circuit or a fuse tap (same thing) is very quick to wire in the passenger side footwell. You tap into Fuse 46 with a 20A rated Add-A-Circuit, the wire to the dash cam is routed behind the door molding and down the A Pillar, then behind the headliner to the mirror area. You cannot even see the wire, might take 30 minutes to install.

I think the same as you described, headliner then pillar A, wedging it all the way down to the OBD II near the driver side. The guy in the YouTube video below does it pretty neat (starting from minute 9:00)

[chhappy7]

Originally Posted by kimokono

I have been reading about various dashcams and I stumbled upon the Mini 2 from Garmin. As an accessory, they offer an OBD II cable (link below), which provides constant power. it seems to me, that it's a great alternative to the invasive hardwiring. I understand this might drain the car battery if kept for an extended period of time, but this specific cable has an embedded timer 10 minutes, 24 hours and eventually always on. Additionally it monitors the battery voltage level and would cut off power if it drops below 12 V. Given this would function as expected, does anybody think it's a bad idea to draw power from OBD II, for parking mode, in general ? would that cause any problem to the car electronics or to a diagnostic scanner capabilities ?

https://www.garmin.com/en-CA/p/735279

For my previous car, which was an F30, OBD or any hardworking set off the voltage low warning that happens with any kind of draw that comes from non original car stuff. This was with both OBD with cutoff and dash cam itself having the cutoff. Since then, I've moved to doing hardwired external battery packs and haven't had any issues. Haven't seen it talked about in G series, so maybe that's resolved?

[avi66]

Originally Posted by chhappy7

For my previous car, which was an F30, OBD or any hardworking set off the voltage low warning that happens with any kind of draw that comes from non original car stuff. This was with both OBD with cutoff and dash cam itself having the cutoff. Since then, I've moved to doing hardwired external battery packs and haven't had any issues. Haven't seen it talked about in G series, so maybe that's resolved?

There are reports of parasitic power drain being an issue on the GO1, see below

https://insight.daumphotography.com/...meras-install/

Not sure how BMW get around this with the AXE 3.0 parking mode.

[Yobyot]

Originally Posted by kimokono

I think the same as you described, headliner then pillar A, wedging it all the way down to the OBD II near the driver side. The guy in the YouTube video below does it pretty neat (starting from minute 9:00)

This was a great video -- it inspired me to install a Thinkware Q1000 using the OBD II connector. It's possible to make it look really good using just a trim tool. In my case, the cable is totally invisible all the way down to the OBD II port -- and there's room in the side kick panel to store the excess cable. Also, the OBD II connector is small and flat, so there's no danger of hitting it with your shoes or legs.

But...the Thinkware is a bit funky regarding its parking mode. It's designed to go into parking mode when the ignition power is cut. I don't know if a standard hard-wire retains power until the car enters deep sleep, but the OBD II connector apparently does. This has the effect of keeping continuous recording going until the device senses that the car has cut power.

Not a biggie...but for future reference.

BTW, the dash cam itself is quite nice, if expensive. What's terrible is Thinkware support and service. For example, the Q1000 has an integrated GPS. However, the only way to access that info is to use their software, which their website says is unsupported. The Q1000 manual actually details these utilities as the only way to access the information.