ninjajim4

iTrader: (4)

thought i would just share some snapshots of my V1 install, with concealed display embedded in my mirror and remote mute button mounted in dash blank.


Dash blank with mounting hole drilled in:




mute button:




phone cord + w/10k resistor soldered to the button:




button mounted in, view of the back:




front view, finished:




all mounted up!:




this is the V1 concealed display, out of the box:




here's the display out of its case. i should have but didn't photo document all the changes i made, but in short, the phone jack was mounted onto the board, and as you can see, i pulled it off the board and used a bit of phone cord to extend it off.

i also removed the photocell and jumpered it with a 10k resistor. the photocell adjusts the brightness of the display based on ambient light meaning it shows brighter in the daytime and dims at night. obviously being mounted inside the mirror means it would always be dim, which is bad.

i could have mounted the photocell outside of the mirror like i did the phonejack, but i'd rather have it bright all the time, especially since my mirror has other displays on it that don't have this feature and it would look inconsistent. here's the result:




daytime shot mounted in the mirror:




couple shots in the dark garage (will take better night shots later):






i know a lot of people don't like it in the mirror, saying it's too visible from outside, inviting cops and, to quote, 'other drivers crowding up behind you so they can live off your detector warnings ' but the latter especially is just plain idiotic IMO.

at any rate, we've got pretty small rear windows and mine is tinted pretty dark. i like to have everything in my direct line of sight and of course it's tough to beat for clean looks and general aesthetics. i've actually never gotten tagged for a speeding ticket since investing, but i would just reach over and shut it off if i did. the RD itself is just clipped to the passenger side visor, hard wired in. the display is dark on the unit itself and with the tint strip on the windshield and tints on the front doors as well, i never take it down or worry about it when i park. no one ever looks up there anyway, regardless of tints. my other car actually got broken into and they didn't notice my $400 Bel on the visor of that one either.

well.. there it is! another project off the checklist. i may pull the display again and solder in different color LEDs for band identification and threat strength, mostly for the cool factor

trustbuddy

iTrader: (3)

i have to say, this is very impressive.
I wish there was some sort of a "kit" for me to do this.
good job!

Jedi54

iTrader: (7)

very interesting install!
Not sure I would have chosen that location but it's very unique and well done.
I think having it in the mirror would take some getting used to.

firebirdude

iTrader: (3)

Good work! I think I would have mounted the mute button up a 1/2" or so. Either all on the plastic bumps, or all on the smooth part. Probably smooth part as the button is smooth as well.

ninjajim4

iTrader: (4)

do you mean in the mirror in general or the location in the mirror?

there is actually an interface to hook up to my carPC and use it on the nav screen, but i went against that mostly for simplicity's sake. when i looked into it, the constant polling was taking up a lot of CPU and it wasn't reliably working when resuming from hibernate. obviously, you'd want to be confident your RD is working all the time, and this way i know 100%. but still, that would be the ultimate clean install and i think they've got all the bugs worked out of it now. i may switch to it later on down the line.

i'm certainly not the first person to put it in their mirror, if you look around the web. i actually thought about putting it in on the left, but all the other installs put it on the right, so i went with that. presumably so it's not too distracting when actually using the mirror. mine is so wide i may as well have put it on the left since it wouldn't block the view at all. the mirror is large to reduce blind spots but with our tiny rear windows it doesn't do much good.

so far as getting used to looking at it, i am accustomed to looking up for my RD alerts since i've always kept them on the visor where it gets maximum coverage, and i think it's only natural to look there since you always look at the mirror repeatedly while driving anyway (well, some ppl don't ). plus this mirror also alerts to red light cameras (and interfaces with my RD as well), and it tells me how many feet i am from the monitored intersection, so i'm already pretty trained to be getting reads off of it.

i'd like to have done this as well, but if you look at the picture, you can see that the actual mounting of the blank in back is much smaller than the face of the blank itself. the button wouldn't have been able to fit in there if i were to put it on one half or the other, unfortunately, without destroying the mounting tab, and then i wasn't sure if it would sit securely in its space anymore. might be worth trying out. kinda bugs me too