Dash cams

@323 wrote about that one on the last page, but IDK if he bought it?
 
I wanted to see what you all thought about this... A friend posted this on Facebook a bit ago and it's about dashcams.

"Small rant. Took my car to the dealer for it's first service (owned 1 year, only 6300 miles) and the tech turned off my dashcam! That seems super fishy to me and I wonder if it's a dealer policy. If you're doing nothing wrong why would you need to turn it off? I'm really glad I checked it or I might not have turned it back on. What if I had an accident after leaving the dealership and my cam was off?!"

A vendor/friend replied "Likely a shop policy. A lot of tuner/independent shops will turn them off or remove data cards"

Another person asked "Did you disclose the camera?" and the OP advised he didn't tell the dealership nor did they ask. He said it's not hidden either.

What do you all think?

He has a VW GTi and took it back to the VW dealer he bought it from for the service.
 
What a drama queen..... funny how people take their car to the dealer to get work done, but don't trust technicians that work there.
 
What a drama queen..... funny how people take their car to the dealer to get work done, but don't trust technicians that work there.

Drama queen? I don't consider him to be a drama queen. I'd be pissed also. It's one thing if it's shop policy to turn off the dash cam (which is weird to me) but at least tell him after they are done working on the car and/or turn it back on.

I don't trust the dealership but a friend that I've know since 2007 through Subaru's works at one of the dealerships and does all the work on my car.
 
It's hard to trust 20 something year old techs when they pop the hood and see a shiny supercharger staring back at them. The devil on their shoulder urging them to" test" the car after a routine job. My cam turns on with ignition and off with a 1 minute delay when turned off. I've captured techs staring under my hood giggling like school girls at my setup. Also captured a tech urging another to" test" it out, thankfully the tech behind the wheel had enough sense to just drive it to the lobby. The way I see it is if you are a professional at what you do then you should have no worries when a camera is watching you.
 
I got a rearview mirror dash cam and love it! I caught some pretty funny/horrible drivers so far and it was nice to show how beast my Civic is in Lake Effect Snow. XF-Times makes it but I can't seem to find it anymore on Amazon- definitely nice to have it hidden in the mirror and be able to run cords up and around the headliner.
 
I ordered this one (@k757 has it also)

A118 is the model

novateka118.jpg
 
Lots of YT videos of techs abusing peoples cars. Especially that one of the tech taking that guys Audi for a joy ride and doing cocaine in it. If he had gotten pulled over the guy would have lost his car. I think hardwiring the cam and telling them about it is the best bet. I would think they disconnect it just in case they have to do something that while perfectly fine might cause the customer to complain about it.

I was a mechanic in a bike shop for a long time and occasionally we had to use the BFH. Big F'n Hammer. Not to abuse the bike, but sometimes people brought us rusty crap they needed resurrected. They thought the bike was worth $1000's when it's really a scrap heap. If they saw us use a hammer to knock a 20yr old bolt loose they would throw a fit. Same with some of the frame straighteners we used. Totally legit repairs and techniques along with over 100 years of experience. Would have still looked like purposeful abuse to the untrained person watching. Hence, i can see both sides of it.

But for the most part dash cams at dealers have shown techs joyriding and doing illegal things. Unfortunate truth. Best thing is the car that comes with valet mode so no one can F around in it.

Hellcat Valet mode - and the attendants are kinda mad they can't tear *** around in the guys car.

http://jalopnik.com/furious-valets-unable-to-wreck-this-dudes-hellcat-1764032537
 
I've been thinking about getting a dash cam, but I realized my current commute doesn't warranty a dash cam. I wouldn't mind the security of one for parking lots as I've had my car in the body shop twice from people hitting my car costing me 2 x $500 deductibles.

I don't know if it is worth the cost of the Blackvue model though for the front and back.
 
Best thing is the car that comes with valet mode
nice thing about having a flashpro unit to put it in valet mode. Cobb has the same option for wrx/sti etc.
 
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I wish it was easier to do on the fly though. Having to hook my FlashPro up and laptop to switch to Valet mode sucks.
I wish the Bluetooth App had the ability to enable data-logging/valet mode/ and other conveniences like this.
 
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