My project revolves around a raspberry pi with the Arducam that will be inside my car. I was wondering if left inside a hot car can this damage the components?
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Hi Joe
The interior of a car on a hot day can get well above 50ÂşC so in theory yes, there could be damage.
But having said that there are plenty of electronics in a car that survive very well.
I think most of these are designed for that environment where the Arduino and the like are probably not.
I think when designing a product to survive these temperatures you would have to de-rate EVERY component to the expected temperature. Can be done but you might be using say a 1.0W resistor instead of a 0.25W one particularly if in close proximity to others. All this is taken into account
I don’t know what Arduino and similar products are rated to in terms of temperature and indeed this information may not even be published. I have never looked for this.
Cheers bob
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Hey there, @Joe312384,
Unfortunately, I don’t have much experience with these cameras in cars or any environment hotter than mid-forties and there’s not any information I can find on the heat tolerance of these cameras.
Admittedly, I would be more worried about direct sunlight on the camera lens, as that would do a lot more damage to the lenses and image quality than >50 degree heat. Going off you’re other threads, I see that you’re after a camera to work in low light conditions. Would you be using the camera in daylight hours?
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Hi Joe
Is there any way you could use the video from a small dash cam. They are designed to be near a car windscreen so should be built to withstand the heat and withstand some direct sunlight.
Just a thought
Cheers Bob
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Hi @Jane
I would be using the camera day and night, I could put in a protective cover to prevent direct sunlight exposure.
WHat about raspberry pi would you say that is safe under the heat or I need some kind of protective heat sink or something?
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Hi I want to use a raspberry pi instead as I plan on using it as object detection and to hook up any kind of additional peripherals as needed.
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Hi Joe
OK. Well in a nutshell, I don’t know. And to be honest unless you can find something documented somewhere I don’t know how you are going to find out unless you do your own experimenting..
You could be pleasantly surprised if you go for a bit of quality in your components. Most of the electronic bits are quite tough although sometimes any slight damage can be cumulative and fail down stream a bit.
But, as I say in the absence of anything concrete you just might have to “suck it and see” as the saying goes.
Cheers Bob
An environmental chamber would be handy here But I don’t think you would have one of those.
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Hey there, @Joe312384,
I still find myself hesitant to recommend the Low Light Cameras for use as a Day and Night Vision Camera. All Low Light Cameras are designed to be very sensitive to get as much light in as possible. That’s great for night recording. For day time recording, especially for a dash cam, I would worry that the large amount of light going into the camera lens could damage the camera.
Wouldn’t the camera itself just be able to auto adjust its lighting?
Aren’t there any other cameras that are good for both settings?
Have there been documented cases where low light cameras have been damaged when exposed to lots of light?
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Hi Jane
Don’t some phones (Sony ???) advertise these you beut camera devices that will take acceptable pics in near dark. I don’t think they are dark only cameras. Should be OK if you can close the iris down small enough. Unless of course you don’t have any control over that important little bit.
Cheers Bob
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I’m not too worried about daylight in the abstract. It would be fine to use it during the day time as a general camera. It would have overexposure issues sure, but it would still work.
My concern is that as an always on Dashcam, it’s going to be exposed to direct sunlight (sunrise and sunset) or its reflection off of other cars. Since the camera is designed principally to let in as much light as possible, I worry that it won’t have a particularly long life in Joe’s use case.
Hi Jane
The “dash cam” was my suggestion. As a device designed to work in the car heat.
The impression I get is that Joe just wants to leave it in car that can get very hot in the sun. Not to use it as a dash cam.
Joe might like to clarify this
Cheers Bob
Hi mate I made this post regarding an alternative camera for both cases, was wondering if you could answer this for me please?
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Hi mate so I want to NOT use it as a dashcam, rather as an object detection instead, it does not need to operate when the car is off, however leaving it off in a hot car was my main concern.
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Hi Joe
I thought that is the case. I know little about RPi. Seems a bit flakey for me so have stayed away in practice.
So I will have to leave this up to the RPi gurus to try to find the answers for you. Your set up would not necessarily have to operate at this elevated temperature (could be 50ºC + on a hot day) but would need to recover and perform without degradation when subjected to a more realistic “normal” environment.
Cheers Bob
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