Dash cam or crash cam? What is the difference!

Do you want to equip your vehicle in this country with a mobile camera so that you can document what is happening in the event of an accident? The partly still not quite clear legal situation regarding the conventional Dashcam but is it too big a risk in this country? Then you should perhaps rely on a so-called "Crash cam" To fall back on. The following post will tell you everything you need to know about crash cams:

What are crash cams?

Crash cams are mobile cameras that are attached to vehicles and in the event of an accident document everything down to the smallest detail. This offers numerous advantages for the vehicle owner or driver, because of a judgment from the Federal Court of Justice in 2018 can the recordings of mini cameras attached to the vehicle are approved as evidence in court. At the same time, however, it was also stated that permanent recording is not permitted for data protection reasons. Here there are strict rulesthat you have to stick to. It may only be recorded and saved in the event of an accident. And even here it is not even entirely clear what intensity such an accident must have in order to be saved. Is a tiny scratch enough or does it have to be a bump?

legal regulations

A clear advantage of Crash cams is that they continuously overwrite the camera's memory card with a loop function and there is no unnecessary accumulation or long-term storage of data. But which legal regulations must be observed when installing a crash cam? According to ADAC, there are currently no special rules in Germany that must be observed when installing a crash cam. Vehicle owners are only asked to adhere to the general traffic rules and not to hinder or endanger anyone by installing the crash cam. For this reason, crash cams must be attached particularly firmly outside of the vehicle's field of vision and safety so that they do not come loose on their own when braking hard and become a bullet. In addition, the cameras may only be used in the intended position.

Why crash cam instead of a simple camera?

Vehicle drivers can also attach mini cameras to the vehicle, which only start recording by manual operation. Through a manual start process, important scenes of the accident can happen before the camera is started and can be lost forever. This would be a considerable disadvantage for the vehicle driver, so most experts recommend using fully automatic crash cams. But you should also consider that such a record can also be seized in individual cases and used against you.

What does a crash cam cost?

The costs for a crash cam are quite manageable. A high quality mini camera usually costs between 100 and 200 euros. An investment that is particularly worthwhile for frequent drivers in areas with high traffic. For car drivers who rarely travel by car or usually only drive in rural areas, the purchase of a crash cam is rather unprofitable. Although there can always be accidents in road traffic, these are generally much less common than in a city. Used in compliance with data protection regulations, a crash cam is an effective way to collect evidence if no or only contradicting witnesses are available.

Crash cam or dash cam?

The main feature is the so-called loop function of the camera. It enables an event to be saved in a buffer before the actual start of the recording. Depending on the size of the memory, “the deed” can be up to 12 seconds ago. The loop function therefore enables recordings to be made before the actual scene. When recording starts, the contents of the buffer are recorded first. A loop function is generally available for modern cameras regardless of the storage medium used. In the event of an accident, the camera should no longer overwrite the files that were protected with the activation of a possible G-sensor or were recorded by manually pressing the file backup button and should permanently store them on the memory card. If a dash cam has the option of loop recording, it can also be referred to as a crash cam.

We hope that you the info report on the topic / term Crash cam (other names / keywords: accident camera) from the field of autotuning. Our goal is that the largest German-language tuning dictionary (Tuning Wikipedia) and to explain tuning terms from A to Z easily and understandably. Almost every day we expand this lexicon and how far we are, you can HERE see. Soon the next one will be Tuning scene concept be illuminated by us. By the way, you will be informed about new topics if you have ours Feed subscribe to.

Below are a few examples from our tuning lexicon:

But of course tuningblog has countless other articles on the subject of cars & car tuning in stock. Do you want to see them all? Just click HERE and look around. We would also like to provide you with news aside from the tuning. In our category Tips, products, information & Co we pick up contributions from car or accessory manufacturers. And also our category Test sites, laws, offenses, information has almost daily new information for you. Here are a few topics from our tuning wiki:

"Tuningblog.eu" - we keep you up to date on the subject of car tuning and car styling with our tuning magazine and we present you the latest tuned vehicles from all over the world every day. It's best to subscribe to ours Feed and will automatically be informed as soon as there is something new about this post, and of course also to all other contributions.