Digital mirrors

I was toying with the idea of doing away with my mirrors by trying out a rear mounted camera hidden under the tail tidy connected to a small screen mounted next to the clocks. I hate the mirrors on bikes - always look better when they are off for track-days. And they don't work very well anyway - most of what I see is elbows unless I pull my arm in. SD mirrors don't vibrate much but the image you get in them is not that great. Some bike's I've owned the mirrors are totally useless. I had my LC4 without mirrors on for 5 years and just looked over my shoulders.

Anyway, I just found this site selling a small kit. Does anyone know of any problems with this principle?

http://www.4kam.com/bikeeye_wireless_re ... camera.htm

I know legality might be one. I think the camera is no problem - it's running a live screen whilst riding that might be an issue. Although Sat nav. screens and modern displays must allow this law to be seriously disputed if it ever came to court.

What about vibration? A wildly shaking image would not be good for a check check behind you.

And what about light sensitivity and stuff, (riding away from a sun set etc.) would this be any worse than real mirrors? I don't have a GoPro or other cams so have no experience with lenses and light sensitivity etc.

What about the lens type? Will it not have enough peripheral vision to be any good?

Not sure why this technology has not been adopted by manufacturers. Is there a big problem I'm not aware of?

Any thoughts welcome.

Hi Bic,

Never seen one of these on a bike but I have some experience with video senders of various types.

Picture interfearance is a big issue on many systems that I have used. Obviously this is frequency and power dependant but it seems unlikly that this device is frequency agile or that it has high power output so it might be worth asking the question.

Interesting idea, let us know how it works out.

Legality wise you dont need mirrors on a bike its not a legal requirement, I see no issue with having a screen its no different than a Satnav or being distracted by a hot blonde walking down the pavement.

Sounds a bit form over function to me though

Hi Bic,

I did this on my Aprilia RSV mille as the mirrors are sh*t!
I used a wireless reverse camera. And it was easy to wire in, power for the screen out of the dash in the front and power from the rear light for the camera, easy.

I had several issues, one of them the vibrations. While in a normal mirror you can still see something when there are a bit of vibes a screen turns to custard all together.
I also had problems finding a camera with a lens which gave me the right balance in between wide angle, enough to see both sides, and distance to actually see what is behind you. Like is it a white car or the plod....?

Technically it worked but the view was not that good.
If I find the right gear I'll do it again.

Latest update on this experiment is a bit of an anti-climax so far.

Got the kit but when I wired it all up for a test it didn't work. Had to wait ten days to get a replacement camera unit but that didn't solve the problem. Now waiting to send back the whole lot to get replaced.

What I do know is that even if it all works well in a test then I will have to make a complete new casing for the screen unit because it is not waterproof and stuck up over the handlebars it wouldn't survive long in the rain. Have a few plans on how to do this and intergrate it into a bracket to fit over the Scotts damper unit. Involves carbon fibre as you can imagine.

I'll keep posted.

Still waiting to send back the camera unit to the supplier - been too busy at work this last week. Got some carbon sheet to start fabricating the mounting bracket but I can't help feeling that I'm jumping the gun a bit because I don't even know if the principle works yet. I lie in bed thinking about the vibration issues and whether the camera will even project a usable image to the monitor at speed.

You might think I'm a bit sad but I have to have a plan in my head to get to sleep with the twins crying all the time and work things occupying my brain. Solace in the next SD plan is what keeps me sane.

Here's how the project is progressing. While I'm waiting for the new screen to come from the supplier I've been pondering how to incorporate it into the instrument cluster. If I can get hold of a second hand speedo and rev counter unit then I can make a carbon housing that will attach in the same place but extend to accommodate the screen and my new gear indicator. This is a bit bigger than I would have liked but it's based on the assumption that the original unit will not come apart. If I find that I can get rid of the outer casing and just repackage the internals then I think I can get the whole thing smaller. Challenge is to get all the machining, tolerances and assembly so that it's waterproof but I think it will be OK if I can source some rubber type buttons from somewhere or scavenge them from an existing appliance.

wow, I hope it doesn't look as stupid in real life!

I'm imagining the side-on view to look a bit like this fella's head...






love the tinkering factor though, keep it up

I know, this is what I'm not happy about. The other option is just to keep the screen separate and mount it like a GPS unit off to one side above the handle bars.

i reckon it still looks better than the mirrors

What about this? Better?

So fitted the camera and screen today, (just used the suction cup mount stuck to the rev counter), and went for a test ride. Wow, much better than I expected. In fact I'm a convert - this is the future. did every sort of road, town traffic, filtering, bumpy country lanes, fast A roads and a bit of motorway. Wide angle lens is just about perfect - I can just see the two Akras at the very edge of the screen and the view at the edge is very similar to what you'd see in the tip of your mirrors. Definitely wide enough to see a car just to the offside and rear - where you'd want to check as a life saver before overtaking. But the view directly behind is a revelation - not something I've ever experienced on a bike before - just like a car rear view.

Tried riding into the sun which is the best camera picture, (good colour and exposure), and it's OK to see the screen. Tried riding away from setting sun and as expected this was the worst for the exposure but it was OK and no worse than looking into a real mirror riding away from a setting sun. There's no vibration issues or blurring - which was what I expected.

Very, very cool. Now the next step is two cameras to a split screen

In the interim, what you have is fantastic. Thanks for the reports.

Here's my latest thoughts on the design of my screen and gear indicator. Going to reverse print the graphics on the back of 2mm Perspex so the whole front is sealed against rain. Got the CAD data finished for the frame and will get it rapid prototyped and then sprayed with soft touch, rubberised black finish. Frame has groove for thin diameter "o" ring seal so the allen bolts round the perimeter will hold the whole sandwich together in a waterproof package.

Realised with the riding tests I made that the camera and screen create an on board lean indicator which I thought was pretty cool to incorporate into the graphics.

I dont know how you do it, that takes tinkering to a whole new level, pardon the pun.
When I was a sprout, I had a swim meet at a local college. They let us use the gym locker room and it had all sorts of grafiti and messages on the walls. I was dumfounded. I went into a shitter and was taking a dump and I noticed another message written in small letters in the tile grout. I leaned forward and read" If you can read this, your shiiting at a fortyfive degree angle" . That is sort of what I get from your lean angle graffic. You could deliniate the danger angles in the same fashion that the Rev gauge is oranged in.
Why leave off what comes on a Provost when there is plenty more room on my fat bar. Did you need to remove the barbell?
Dont forget to read the roof pitch of that school house you just blasted by.
Nice work.

It's easy mate. But for this one-off I will not print as it would not be cost effective. This is how I do it in the modeling world of product design.

You have to visualise the design in layers - but in reverse of the way you normally think of them. On top is the clear sheet material. Then first level down is the black and white lettering. then the orange lines and blocking, then finally the black background. Instead of screen printing I use dry rubdown transfers. I make an artwork for each of the colours, (in Illustrator), and then I send them to one of the many companies that specialise in packaging mock-ups - this is the one I use. http://www.main-titles.co.uk/

Remember the most important thing is to get them to either put the rubdown glue surface over the TOP of the colour or make your artwork in REVERSE. Other wise your design and type will be the wrong way round. Specify the colours from a Pantone book. 24 hour turn around usually.

Then you carefully apply each layer of colour onto the back of the Perspex. It helps if you have made some registration marks on each of the artworks which helps a lot in getting the registration correct. You do not have many chances at repositioning these transfers and small type can easily get stuck and come off in the wrong position. Always get a spare set of each sheet. If it goes wrong then lighter fluid will get everything off again.

When all the transfers are down then, (on this particular screen design), I will have to mask off the places where the screen and gear indicator are placed and I want to remain clear. When this is done the last thing is to spray the whole back surface with black paint. Don't over do the paint as it may start to dissolve the transfer material - just build up the layers. Doesn't matter what finish the paint surface is - what you're trying to do is to seal on the transfers. When you turn it over and see the paint finish through the Perspex it will be amazing and perfect and shiny. Like an i phone. And all the layers of transfers will be miraculously sealed between the black paint and the bottom of the Perspex. The depth of the Persex has a strange effect on the type and design - the thicker it is the more this effect. It's a bit three dimensional - looks good.

This is when you realise there is a letter missing from one of the words or there is a small fly also captured under the paint. Time to start again

Not sure about the "roll" indicator marks yet! Will think about it as the project develops - maybe a bit too gimmicky for me, like the wear marks on Metzler M5 tyre edges. Couldn't resist seeing what it looked like though.

Good work Bic

Applied Imagination and Creativity - fantastic!!! Thanks

This is where I'm at with the design of the unit and how the screen looks. Just need work to ease off a bit and give me some free time to get it made. Too busy at moment.

Bic, if your gonna do it then do it proply - what you need is a HUD inside your helmet dude

Finally had time to get my digital screen design made into reality. Taken a while because of work and family commitments but here it is. Going to re-do the front screen graphics because there is a mistake which was only noticed when everything was finished and assembled. Showed it to the guys in the studio and my senior designer spotted it straight away. Bummer!!! Can you spot it?

The bolts are inside the seal??

Yeah, looks like the buttons on the screen panel are on the wrong side

You got it!!!

Mate, you should have told me!!

Bic. Hats off to you mate, that is super trick. Well done.

Bic if you ever see 15* and haven't parted company with the bike you will be my hero!

Cool

First install of the unit onto bike at 5 am this morning. Thankfully everything worked first time, camera, screen functions and gear indicator. It's always a bit of a risk when working with electronic stuff and PCBs because of the dust and the amount of times you have to handle the bits.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y82NQqTN ... e=youtu.be

Nice going Bic!
Looks factory fit!

I take my hat off to you, Bic!
Like Guy said, looks factory fit.

outstanding m8

does look good ,
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what are you gonna sell these for ?

Ha ha! Non of you will want to know the cost of this.

Ask any of the forum guys who develop stuff, Aaron doing his Motohooligan stuff and Mr Z32 and his dual velocity stacks. I'm sure they will tell the same story, it's not the price of the end part, it's the time and effort and cost of trial and error that goes into the front end of anything. But this is my profession and so I'm used to the cost of developing things. This unit was done on an absolute shoestring - because I was paying for it. But if it was a real job, with a real client I would have spent a lot more!!

But seriously. The cost of this is not economically viable. Otherwise we would have seen digital mirrors on production bikes years ago.

So for those of you who want to know.

MATERIALS
1. Blue tooth wide angle lens camera and original screen were bought at a unit from 4kam.com, it's really a reversing camera I think, pretty good resolution and function. About £140
2. Healtech gear indicator unit was about the same if I remember £130
3. Frame component CNCd out of black nylon and post finished. (Excluding CAD Pro-E work and file output for rapid prototyping) - this was done as a favour at half price by one of my suppliers. £200
4. Front and back screens CNCd from 3mm acrylc £50 (as above)
5.Rub-down transfers in orange and black from Maintitles in London £60
6. Universal mounting bracket from a US supplier. About £60 but with shipping and taxes it was over £100 (outrageous!!! The worst part of this undertaking )
7. 1 metre of 2mm diameter rubber 'O'ring material for seals from Pentonville rubber in Islington. £2.50
8. Assortment of stainless screws, nuts and washers £20
9. Shrink sleeve tubing for the electrical connections £2.50
9. Black spray paint. £6

TIME
Don't want to even think about it

Working in the product design business though, I know what things should cost if they ever actually got produced for a mass market. This could be yours for the less than the original price I paid for the camera unit. But as you can see the cost of making "one offs" is pretty high and I don't expect anyone would be interested at the above cost.

But I get to ride about with my, more or less, unique digital mirrors and enjoy a free rear view and not seeing my elbows all the time!!

And have fun with my "Leanometer" or "Kneedownometer" or "Bancometer" haven't decided what to call it yet.

Looks pretty smart Bic.

But just out of curiosity, how are you gonna know what angle you are at?

Are you just going to look at the screen whilst going round a corner and go off the horizon? Only asking as if it was me, I wouldn't be able to figure it out at a quick glance as I'd be concentrating on the corner.

Not interested what angle I'm at!

It was just a bit of graphic playfulness because when I did the first few rides it was the thing I noticed was the view pivoting about the screen. It feels different than the view you get in conventional mirrors, (but it's actually not). When I was a kid all I wanted to do was fly planes and my dad bought me one of those black dials that pilots have to measure their lean. Always loved it, always wanted one!

Don't intend to focus on the mirrors when I'm going round corners but it only takes a fraction of a glance to see where the horizon is.

I will try and get a film of what it's like to ride with it. Haven't got a GoPro or anything but I will have a go.

well done mate.. Looks like a ktm hard parts piece. Very impressed with the work... Even if I wouldn't get you to do trigonometry for me 30deg not 20).

But in all seriousness.. Well done... I know how long it takes and how many hours you have to put into these things... Not to mention the cost of one offs... Silly.

Then you have to change the design, to be built in a certain way to save money in production... As how the prototype can be made is very different to a production run... As much work as the prototype

Went out for quick test ride this morning to see if everything worked OK on the road.

This is the wort it gets when you are riding away from the sun and the camera struggles to get the exposure right. Much better when riding into the sun and camera is pointing away from direct light. Just like real mirrors really.

But the biggest problem I had was that with the wireless connection between the camera and the screen I was picking up other signals when riding through housing estates and towns. It's fine on the open road and country lanes but in built up areas sometimes I was suddenly seeing views through security cameras on the outside of houses - great pictures of their front doors, car ports and driveways!! I think I will have to look into hard wiring the connection.

Reading back through the post it seems like Shadowman was right in his first reply. video signal and interference are the biggest problem with the whole idea.

But I will persevere! it's only a problem when there is a lot of other conflicting signals about.

Umm I feel a little bit guilty because this is something that I've experienced a number of years ago but sort of figured that you were on top
of all of the variables so I didn't mention it. In my case (about 5 or 6 years ago) I wanted a camera on the back of my towed yacht so I could see
if I was holding up anyone without them having to be on the wrong side of the road before I could see them.

Initially I tried a wireless monitor but it did exactly as you described so I converted to a cabled system with a 30 foot video cable to the back of the boat.

Sorry. As I say, given that you seemed to be on top of everything else, I figured that interference was also sorted.

I'm exceptionally impressed with your ability to take a project from concept to completion. I'll look forward to Version 2

In Western Australia where I live, a motorcycle must have two side mirrors fitted.

So, spent my first free day for ages yesterday fitting another different camera with a hard wire cable up to the headlight so that the system doesn't rely on wireless technology and all the associated interference issues. But of course the video input jack on the PCB inside my unit was not originally needed so today I have to take apart the whole thing - so that I can get the frame on a milling machine and get another hole made in the side to accept the video cable. All done, approximately six hours work, everything fitted back onto bike, camera in tail, wires all cable tied through and under the tank, power leads to both camera and screen, gear indicator hooked up, everything ready to go.

Except it doesn't. Nothing happening. Dead. Just ridden all the way from London to home with a blank screen, gear indicator works ok but it's a separate system really. Not sure what it is but I've run out of time now. Frustrating. Not sure if it's a cable issue or a camera that doesn't like to communicate with the screen. Or a fuse, or I've finally damaged the internal stuff with all my continual pulling it apart.

I hate anything electric, electronic, digital.

any news ?

Ha ha. Funny you should ask. This is turning into the longest, pain in the ass experience. I had to send back the monitor internals to the original supplier for diagnostic testing and they reported that they couldn't get it to work either. Think that I somehow managed to damage some part of the circuit board in one of the many, many times that I had to refit it into the new case. So, the only option was to buy a new monitor and hope that the internals are identically laid out as the one I custom made the case to fit. (this is not always the case).

Everything arrived on Saturday, new monitor and all the video leads and power cables. Thought the best thing to do was hook it all up and check everything before I started to take apart the monitor internals. Did this and nothing worked, no picture, no nothing. Took everything off the bike and wired it all up to a spare battery as per the instructions for the camera and monitor and checked everything about twenty times. Nothing.

So yesterday I've sent absolutely everything back to 4Kam to check everything over and see what's up. Waiting for their response today. I'm pretty sick of all this trying to get the technology to work, so far I've had two monitor replacements, two camera's, at least four different return packages and countless e mails back and forth. Not sure if it's me being jinxed or that the hardware is really fragile - or just cheap shit.

Anyway, fingers crossed they will just replace everything as before and ensure it all works before they send it back.

I work with camera's every day, this can't be that complicated.
I had a look at their website, it is only a matter of a power supply to the unit and the wiring to connect the camera to the screen.
They must have sent you dud gear!

Went to Box Hill again this morning and there was this modified CBX with a camera and screen - the only other one I've seen. Couldn't find the owner to ask him about it. Bloody big camera but it seemed to have the infrared lights in for night vision. I'd have liked to see what picture quality he was getting.

where's his numberplate and rear indicators?!

He didn't have one!!

My nightmare continues really. 4Kam replaced both the monitor and camera - and on Saturday I wired each up to a 12 volt battery to test that the set up worked. Really careful to make sure that the positive and negative were the right way round, everything as per the instructions. Screen came on but camera doesn't seem to be sending signal, I just get a blue screen. I've had it with 4Kam, I can't even be bothered to contact them again over this latest failure, it takes too long for them to respond. I'm hoping the new monitor is OK and fitting it into my home made case today and I'm going to buy another camera unit from another supplier and see if this works.

Success!

I now have the new camera, from a different supplier, and plugged everything into the bike. Everything working OK finally, hard wired to the monitor, great picture - better than before - and no interference.

I'll do some road miles to test it out and get some more pictures. Redid the screen graphics because the horizon line was too low so it should be better now.

Bean following this ,it looks grate ,I knoe a few guys with RSV's in the aprilia club , that have done this with suckses ,mainley becose they have fitted a Tuono top clamp and bars to there RSV'S well you carnt see shit out of the mirrors then becose the bars are in the way ,Doh ,so they have fitted camras and screens , I dont knoe what kit they are yousing but its a small screen and tiny bullet camras ,all works ok for them , quit like the idear of doing it my self to my Tuono ,keep us posted it all looks good .

I believe you may need some form of tracking device on screen like a fighter plane to target anything coming from behind, now that would be cool.

Better picture and new screen graphics with the horizon line higher up which should match to the real horizon.
Didn't put on the numbers round the 'lean indicator marks', think it looks cleaner than before.
Fitted the lever clamps without the mirror attachment threads. (hinge pin on clutch side is very easy to replace in situ)