So I finally bought a nice camera mount for my harness bar. It mounts perfectly but when I record my camera seems to have a recording error everytime and won't record anything after I hit the gas. It records fine with someone holding the camera when I drive. It looks like it doesnt like all the vibrations from being fixed to the car. Anyone else have this problem? I bought the camera new about 3 years ago. Its a 20gb JVC hard drive recorder.

 

http://www.ioportracing.com/Merchant...tegory_Code=CM

 

I have a JVC 30g and I had to use the micro SD to record video. Vibrations and bumps make the HDD go into protection mode and shut off.

 

Some of the new SD card cameras are pretty cheap, and record a decent picture. The HD camera is your problem.

 

I had the same problem with my Sony DCR-SR100. I bought a Canon HDV tape camera for the track.

 

I would suggest looking into the GoPro Wide camera. I just got mine and played with it around the house and the videos great. Its specifically for motorsports so it can take vibrations.

 

The Hard drive and DVD based cameras don't work well with harsh vibrations (i.e. mounted to a roll bar). The tape or SSD type camera's seem to work much better. Stay away from optically stabilized cameras too.

IMO the GoPro are ok for external or foot camera, the quality of the video is ok at best.

 

Well, I have yet to try using the SD on the camera instead of the hard drive, so I think Ill try that first before I try another route.

 

Soon there will be solid state hard drive cameras on the market. Those should be great for track use. I will be waiting for one of those cameras. My sony mini DV is awesome but tapes get expencive.

Edo

 

What about keeping the camera as a recording device only and use a "lipstick" type camera, like a helmet camera, in addition. I used that for my CSR and DSR cars. Far more vibration that any production based car, even set up for the track. I even mounted it on the roll hoop. Lots of vibration and externally mounted.

 

If you want an engineering project, you might just swap the spinning platter drive out of the camera you have for a ssd drive.. I can't imagine that your hard drive camera is using anything exotic like a custom shaped drive, but i could be mistaken. Before you plunk down the coin for a new camera, if you are confident with your electronics skills, you might give it a try. I guess a new SSD drive in the form factor you need might be the same price as a gopro.. but i agree that the gopro image quality isnt there yet.

Its not quite the same, but i did that for one of my laptops i use for data acquisition and i couldn't be happier. Its all about the standard case layout though. As long as the camera is compliant with standards around drive size and mount holes, there should be no reason why swapping it out for an SSD drive would affect it.

http://newegg.com has probably any drive you could need too..