Garmin BC 30 Wireless Backup Camera

I installed this with great ease on my F250. I wired it into the upfitter switch which allows me to flip the switch under my radio on the dash whenever I want it to come on. It has a slight delay of maybe 1 or 2 seconds but then the image comes right up on the trusty old Garmin GPS. I had never installed a backup camera before was was a bit intimated about doing it myself, but it was so easy I am glad I did it.The image is honestly not HD like we as consumers have become to used to seeing, BUT it does the job. I can back up to my trailer and hitch up every single time alone in 1 attempt and I know if there is a kid or bike behind me in my big truck, which is what I wanted. Wonderful and the camera is priced wonderfully for what it is. The wireless connection works no problem. I have the signal box on the back of the truck and the single comes through perfect without fail.NOTE about install: I found that the slip on mount over the licence plate wasn't overly secure so I used a very powerful glue to make that mount more permanent because I could take the camera on and off with the licence plate securely screwed on.

Excellent, excellent, excellent product! I have a first-gen Honda Ridgeline. My truck doesn't have a built-in backup camera. Rear visibility has always been a challenge. After my wife backed it into another car, I decided it was time to do something about this problem. So I purchased both a Garmin GPS--that includes as a featured option the ability to display backup camera images from the Garmin BC30 Wireless Backup Camera; and I purchased this BC 30 Wireless Backup Camera Kit as well.The way this backup camera kit works is that you need to hook up the camera's power leads to the wiring for your vehicle's backup lights. So when you put your vehicle into Reverse, the backup lights turn on, and power is applied to the camera. The camera powers up right away, and it wirelessly transmits what it is seeing to the GPS receiver. The GPS receiver automatically switches to displaying the image from the camera and once you put the vehicle back into Drive, it switches back to what it was displaying before.In this kit, there is a replacement power cord for the GPS receiver. The replacement power cord picks up the backup camera's signal and relays it to the GPS. The power cord has a little, in-line rectangular box that receives the camera's wireless signal and relays it to the GPS receiver. I'm looking at the vendor's picture and it is the set of wires on the left side of the image, where the top cord does a u-turn to the right. Anyway, I plugged in the replacement power cord to my GPS receiver, turned on the truck, put it into reverse and the camera's image showed up on the GPS right away. Absolutely no fuss. I didn't have to do any synchronization between the camera and the GPS. It was too easy.Here's a quick install tip for the camera's power leads: Since I already have a round, seven pin trailer wiring hitch, I elected to temporarily pull the backup power from there, at least until the weather warms back up in the Spring. So I bought a seven pin to flat five pin adapter here on Amazon (Search for: "Optronics A57WH 5 Flat - 7 Round 16" Cable Adaptor and Plug" ). NOTE: The seven pin connector comes in two varieties--round pin or flat tab. So go check your connector before you order this item. Mine has flat tab connectors.On Amazon, I also purchased a flat five pin wire harness. (Search for: "Wesbar 707255 Double Ended Wire Harness Extension 5-Way, 2-Feet"). I cut off the end that doesn't fit into the Optronics connector. This connector has FIVE pins--NOT the traditional FOUR pin connector that is used with U-Haul trailers. The fifth pin (the blue wire) contains the power lead for the backup power.On Amazon, I also ran across some translucent shrink wrap tubing that also contains a ring of solder inside of each piece of shrink wrap (Search for: "Ginsco 65pcs 4 Sizes Solder Seal Heat Shrink Wire Connector Kit Waterproof Connector Set with Case (25Red 25Blue 10White 5Yellow"). So I purchased that too.Once I received it all, I slid the shrink wrap tubing over power leads from the camera kit. Then I connected the ends of the power leads from the camera kit to the backup power (positive/blue) and ground (negative/white) leads on the flat five pin connector. Then I slid the shrink wrap right over the connection, with the ring of solder centered over the exposed wire. Then I used a regular hair dryer and just as advertised, the shrink wrap and the solder worked. Wow! That's a time-saver. Now that's the kind of cheating I like! I didn't even need to go and dig out my heat gun. The hair dryer was good enough. I plugged my newly built harness into the Optronics connector. Then plugged that into the trailer hitch seven pin connector. After all the testing was complete, I tucked and zip-tied all the excess wiring up where it can't be seen. Now that it's all finished, the backup camera works like a top.Hopefully, there will be no more dented cars.

First off, it's pretty expensive for what it is. Then there's the camera bracket which is pretty cheap-looking and sticks out in ridiculous fashion when mounted on the rear of the car. This thing is awful looking and an embarassment to the car owner. I couldn't put it above the plate since the lift handle for my trunk juts out right above the plate and the camera could not fit. I had to attach it upside-down behind the license plate with one of the plate bolts. I wish that the cable were flat and not round. If you have to route the cable behind the plate, as I did, the round cable makes the plate bulge a bit. Not awful, but it does look second rate. Luckily, the awful looking camera bracket draws attention from the deformity. I took the opportunity to remount the plate with secure Torx screws. I'm not concerned about the plate getting stolen after all these years, but I don't want some joker to run off with that little hundred dollar camera. Garmin is too cheap to include the wire connectors for a lame reason they give in their installation video. (All cars are different, boo hoo, so you dear purchaser of our product are on your own.) Everybody is going to use these 3M connectors and buying a few at parts store ripoff prices to install this thing adds more expense. Garmin could have dropped a few in the box for pennies. A while back I bought a bargain basement car radio and it came with so many connectors I had some left over and used them to install this device that cost twice as much as that radio. Installing this thing is no walk in the park. The most tedious thing for me was locating the reverse light voltage. My car does not have simple pair of leads that attach to the lamp like in the installation video. No, my wires are somewhere in an 8-pin connector that go to this Rube Goldberg circuit board in the tail lamp housing and thence to the bulbs. I figured it out and I want to thank German over-engineering for making everything in my car as much of a pain as possible to accessorize. To finish up on a brighter note, the picture looks OK. Good, in fact. I'm happy with it. I have a recent model GPS, a DriveLuxe, and I can make out objects just fine in day or night. I was also able to set up the guidelines nicely, so that's a plus. I timed that it takes 2 seconds for the display to switch automatically to the camera. That is plenty fast for me. Also, I have no problem with lagging. I can watch the camera keeping up with moving objects that I can also see in the rear view mirror and they are in sync. I was tempted to install the transmitter so it was on all the time the car was on. However, I decided against that since I know me well enough to realize I'd then be playing with the camera function while I'm driving and I'd then be just another jerk who has to play with gadgets while driving. (I'm old enough to remember when electric shavers were a new thing and some could work from the cigarette lighter socket. The TV ad showed a guy shaving while driving. Even back then I thought how stupid to go off the road or kill somebody because you could not find enough time to shave before driving. But, I digress.) So in my opinion this gadget works and it is better than no backup camera which is what I had. With my inherent lack of coordination and perception I am grateful for the help it provides. During installation no blood was spilled and no animals were harmed. My car still looks nice except for the the ridiculous looking steam punk carbuncle sticking out under the rear plate. Still, I do recommend it because it works and should improve safety. It just falls short of 5 stars.