Relocating backup camera

[greiswig]

Has anyone successfully reloaded the camera from the rear door up to the top or something? Most of my view is now the backside of a spare tire.

Looks like there are 6 wires to the camera, but I don’t have a wiring diagram. Two wires seem to go to a coax cable (makes sense), and two others should be power, but that still leaves two more.

 

[greiswig]

Related question: I'd be happy to experiment, especially if I could find a 6-wire harness that worked. Does anyone know what the connector type is? There are 6 flat pins, all on one row, oval connector.

 

[AdventureTim]

I successfully relocated my camera to the other side of the trunk release handle assembly; I purchased another assembly from eBay from a car without a camera (perhaps an LR3) and then cut out a slot that fit my OEM camera. It was a bit fiddly, but not too bad. The factory cable was long enough to reach the other side of the assembly.

 

[greiswig]

Interesting, @AdventureTim ! I did try that exact thing, temporarily, using gaffer tape. It didn't do enough good for me to make it worth doing permanently, as the spare still blocks everything I need to see on the passenger side of the vehicle even from that angle.

 

[avslash]

I left the factory one in place so I didn't have a water ingress point and added a Kenwood camera mounted to one of my rear swing-outs.

It works just fine and in the same manner as the stock camera.

IIRC, because it's been a while, the stock cameral wiring has a connector inside the cargo area to the upper left as you are standing at the rear of the truck. No need to drop the headliner to access it, although I might have had to remove some plastic trim.

I mounted the new camera and ran it into the truck through the grommet behind the tail light and then up the rear pillar to tie into the factory line side connector. It was some kind of tiny coaxial connector, but I think the Kenwood camera came with a connector that plugged right in. I definitely remember that I did not have to re-terminate any wires to get it to work.

It is infinitely more useful now than with the stock camera giving you a great view of the tread condition on your spare.

 

[greiswig]

I left the factory one in place so I didn't have a water ingress point and added a Kenwood camera mounted to one of my rear swing-outs.

It works just fine and in the same manner as the stock camera.

IIRC, because it's been a while, the stock cameral wiring has a connector inside the cargo area to the upper left as you are standing at the rear of the truck. No need to drop the headliner to access it, although I might have had to remove some plastic trim.

I mounted the new camera and ran it into the truck through the grommet behind the tail light and then up the rear pillar to tie into the factory line side connector. It was some kind of tiny coaxial connector, but I think the Kenwood camera came with a connector that plugged right in. I definitely remember that I did not have to re-terminate any wires to get it to work.

It is infinitely more useful now than with the stock camera giving you a great view of the tread condition on your spare.

Perfect! I was hoping someone might have done this. Do the curving parking guide lines work with the same camera? And does the Kenwood display come on automatically when in reverse?

 

[avslash]

No parking line guides with the Kenwood camera, that must have been internal to the OEM unit.

The Kenwood camera does display automatically when shifting into reverse like the OEM unit. It sometimes takes a bit, just like the OEM did.

 

[AdventureTim]

FYI, this is what the visibility looks like with the camera relocated to the other side of the trunk handle. You get ~90% of the vision:

 

[greiswig]

I did not take a photo of the screen, but I think the combination of the Tactical 4x4 tire mount and the 275/70R18 tires blocked a lot of my camera.

Just yesterday, I installed a WickedHD WRC-117 ($12 at Amazon!) middle of the spare tire plate, peaking out through where the center cap should be. Works great! But….I can’t shut off the parking lines, in spite of the instructions saying to “clip the green wire.” It’s fully potted inside, where I suspect that wire is. I will probably look for one without the guides.

For those wondering, all I did was tap the 12V supply from the rear cigarette lighter for the supply voltage, then routed coax to the existing camera, where I cut the blue and white wires (blue is core, white is shield) and splice in the video from the new camera. So the stock camera is still there, just not doing anything except telling the computer that it's there.

 

[greiswig]

No parking line guides with the Kenwood camera, that must have been internal to the OEM unit.

@avslash , which Kenwood model did you use? I'm looking for something without the parking guides anyway.