Go Pro or Data Logger
Discussion
Lagerlout said:
Just reporting back. Have to say pretty disappointed with the Kiwi3+iPhone combo. Been using the track addict app and it has me all over the place, certainly not on the circuit! So firstly it seems the internal GPS is no good for using in this situation. Also, it seemed to disconnect the GoPro and the Kiwi3 randomly.
Think I'm going to have to look at the AIM as above. Any other suggestions? The AIM seems to want to work with their own camera but I really want to keep my 4K GoPro as it produces brilliant quality video.
If you are going down the data logger route (which it sounds like above), have a look at the stuff from RaceCapture, the UK distributor is here and there is a decent support forum hereThink I'm going to have to look at the AIM as above. Any other suggestions? The AIM seems to want to work with their own camera but I really want to keep my 4K GoPro as it produces brilliant quality video.
I've got one of the early models and once I configured it and set it up its worked well on my Atom. I had to use external sensors etc but it looks like the new versions can connect to the OBD port. I use it with GoPro's and Mobius HD cameras and, like other posters above, use Race Render to overlay graphics etc. Might be a bit more "fiddly" then some of the bigger brands, but they are a fraction of the price with as good as, if not better, specification and features etc.
Couple of examples from my channel with different overlays etc:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Up5HHlQjtZY
https://youtu.be/oltv7tj9CgE?t=13s
Lagerlout said:
Think I'm going to have to look at the AIM as above. Any other suggestions? The AIM seems to want to work with their own camera but I really want to keep my 4K GoPro as it produces brilliant quality video.
Having worked a bit with both I'd say the Racelogic units are better than the AIM - neither are inexpensive though. I have successfully hooked up the PerformanceBox + HLT + Garmin Glo combo and the results are reasonable: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFdc2Oc1sAEI'd still say the interface for HLT isn't intuitive or user friendly and it seemed to change the gopro down to 1080/30 even though it is a 4k camera. If you want 4k video with overlays I'd say at this stage you need to use the GoPro and RaceRender with something capturing the data. RaceRender says it can work with HLT data, so the cheapest route to what you want may be GoPro + HLT (with an external GPS like the Garmin Glo) and put all that into RaceRender. If I can figure out how to get HLT to leave the video as 4k that will be the best solution.
Cheers guys, some great driving on those vids! Looks like the racecapture + BT + Wifi will control the Gopro recording and stream to a BT dash combined with OBDII data. Not too pricey either.
The Racelogic stuff always seems to suffer from this wave effect on the video?
What about something like this? It's pricey for sure but I assume I could fit this in the cluster of my Lotus (replacing the gauges) and just manually stop/start the recording. Has a lot of other useful features like shift lights etc.
http://www.aimshop.co.uk/collections/car-racing-lo...
Also, has anyone hardwired their GoPros? Mine is an utter nightmare, I've literally only managed to capture warm up laps before the battery is gone. I've got two batteries now but is there a better solution? It's a Hero 4, but when it works the quality is stunning.
The Racelogic stuff always seems to suffer from this wave effect on the video?
What about something like this? It's pricey for sure but I assume I could fit this in the cluster of my Lotus (replacing the gauges) and just manually stop/start the recording. Has a lot of other useful features like shift lights etc.
http://www.aimshop.co.uk/collections/car-racing-lo...
Also, has anyone hardwired their GoPros? Mine is an utter nightmare, I've literally only managed to capture warm up laps before the battery is gone. I've got two batteries now but is there a better solution? It's a Hero 4, but when it works the quality is stunning.
Lagerlout said:
The Racelogic stuff always seems to suffer from this wave effect on the video?
No, data is captured using racelogic, video using GoPro. The racelogic vbox video stuff has a "global shutter" which definitely won't give the wobble, but I think it is expensive and at 720p not high enough resolution. You see the wobble on many gopro videos where the fps is 30 or below - set it to 60fps and you eliminate the problem.Lagerlout said:
What about something like this? It's pricey for sure but I assume I could fit this in the cluster of my Lotus (replacing the gauges) and just manually stop/start the recording. Has a lot of other useful features like shift lights etc.
That is really designed to be paired with their smartycam products - it is a good solution if you want video + overlays with no worries about syncing or start/stop etc - really is a hands off solution but very expensive. Some smartycam footage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C1bAecN6Pu4Lagerlout said:
Also, has anyone hardwired their GoPros? Mine is an utter nightmare, I've literally only managed to capture warm up laps before the battery is gone. I've got two batteries now but is there a better solution? It's a Hero 4, but when it works the quality is stunning.
http://www.goldstaronboard.com/brand/gopro/battery-eliminators/gopro-battery-eliminator-hero-3-4-unterminated-cable.htmlEdited by GreigM on Sunday 2nd October 13:47
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXdJCxIQUq4
Here's some vid from mine in 4k. The vignetting in the corners only occurs in superwide mode and you only see it on totally clear skies.
Here's some vid from mine in 4k. The vignetting in the corners only occurs in superwide mode and you only see it on totally clear skies.
Lagerlout said:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXdJCxIQUq4
Here's some vid from mine in 4k. The vignetting in the corners only occurs in superwide mode and you only see it on totally clear skies.
Looks like North Weald, was that a "No Limits" activity day? Here's some vid from mine in 4k. The vignetting in the corners only occurs in superwide mode and you only see it on totally clear skies.
mark284811 said:
... Race Logic VBOX HD2...
however quite costly at approx £2500 depending on the options you pick.
Holy showever quite costly at approx £2500 depending on the options you pick.
t. This is where I stopped reading.Absolutely invaluable for racing, I'm sure. But MAJOR overkill for a trackday. Surely your video capture device will be worth as much as most cars?
C70R said:
Holy st. This is where I stopped reading.
Absolutely invaluable for racing, I'm sure. But MAJOR overkill for a trackday. Surely your video capture device will be worth as much as most cars?
Definately. When i was doing track days i purely used 2x Go Pro's linked to the "TrackAddict" iOS App to control them and also capture some data. As others have mentioned previously though the GPS is 1Ghz on a iPhone compared to 10Ghz or in some cases 20Ghz in a dedicated telemetary unit.t. This is where I stopped reading.Absolutely invaluable for racing, I'm sure. But MAJOR overkill for a trackday. Surely your video capture device will be worth as much as most cars?
So for the occasional trackday i'd say its fine.. but i probably should have paired with a external bluetooth GPS unit to increase the accuracy.
There's a few other options not mentioned here.
For the past few years we've been running a combination of GoPros and a Traqmate data acquisition system: http://store.traqmate.com/default.asp (they sell their own cameras but you can use GoPros as well)
The software isn't the friendliest but the data overlays are pretty good and more importantly if you want to use it to analyze your driving it obviously does all of that. Also, once you've bought a GoPro and the necessary Traqmate bits you're probably looking at ~$2k (prices will be in USD because I moved here many years ago and I can't be arsed to convert them). However, the TraqDash is really quite good and does stuff like give you predictive lap timing (i.e. a delta telling you whether your current lap is a good one or a bad one).
There's also a new product that uses a smartphone called RaceCapture: https://www.autosportlabs.com/ I can't vouch for how good or bad it is because they weren't able to get me a demo unit the last time I was on track.
What might fit your bill perfectly is this new gizmo from Waylens: https://arstechnica.com/cars/2016/09/the-waylens-h...
It does overlays (doesn't do all the clever laptiming etc as a proper data logger) but it's only slightly more expensive than a GoPro, and is a doddle to use. Only problem is they might only be shipping to the US for now but there are ways around that.
Hope this is helpful.
For the past few years we've been running a combination of GoPros and a Traqmate data acquisition system: http://store.traqmate.com/default.asp (they sell their own cameras but you can use GoPros as well)
The software isn't the friendliest but the data overlays are pretty good and more importantly if you want to use it to analyze your driving it obviously does all of that. Also, once you've bought a GoPro and the necessary Traqmate bits you're probably looking at ~$2k (prices will be in USD because I moved here many years ago and I can't be arsed to convert them). However, the TraqDash is really quite good and does stuff like give you predictive lap timing (i.e. a delta telling you whether your current lap is a good one or a bad one).
There's also a new product that uses a smartphone called RaceCapture: https://www.autosportlabs.com/ I can't vouch for how good or bad it is because they weren't able to get me a demo unit the last time I was on track.
What might fit your bill perfectly is this new gizmo from Waylens: https://arstechnica.com/cars/2016/09/the-waylens-h...
It does overlays (doesn't do all the clever laptiming etc as a proper data logger) but it's only slightly more expensive than a GoPro, and is a doddle to use. Only problem is they might only be shipping to the US for now but there are ways around that.
Hope this is helpful.
go pro for video recording
racelogic performance box for gps performance
motec ecu logging for revs, gear, boost, throttle etc.
using the great software racerender to sync it all together and design my on screen layout.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9ibluLuJhk
go-pro can be related with a 20 quid "action cam" from ebay. same goes for a 10hz datalogger from ebay too, you dont have to use the racelogic unless you want realtime stats on the screen.
racelogic performance box for gps performance
motec ecu logging for revs, gear, boost, throttle etc.
using the great software racerender to sync it all together and design my on screen layout.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9ibluLuJhk
go-pro can be related with a 20 quid "action cam" from ebay. same goes for a 10hz datalogger from ebay too, you dont have to use the racelogic unless you want realtime stats on the screen.
andycaca said:
go pro for video recording
racelogic performance box for gps performance
motec ecu logging for revs, gear, boost, throttle etc.
using the great software racerender to sync it all together and design my on screen layout.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9ibluLuJhk
go-pro can be related with a 20 quid "action cam" from ebay. same goes for a 10hz datalogger from ebay too, you dont have to use the racelogic unless you want realtime stats on the screen.
Do you have any more details about the Motec data logging? racelogic performance box for gps performance
motec ecu logging for revs, gear, boost, throttle etc.
using the great software racerender to sync it all together and design my on screen layout.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9ibluLuJhk
go-pro can be related with a 20 quid "action cam" from ebay. same goes for a 10hz datalogger from ebay too, you dont have to use the racelogic unless you want realtime stats on the screen.
Cheers for the advice everyone. I thought about this for a bit as to what I was looking for out of it and decided to upgrade my existing setup. After delving into the GPS issues I realised I needed a more accurate unit as the iPhone is 1hz a good GPS 10hz and a great one 20hz. As far as i can work out that means 1 update per second per hertz so in other words the 20hz can update twenty times a second and is therefore much more accurate. You travel a long way at 100 mph in 1 second I guess!
Anyway so I bought one of these:
http://www.vboxmotorsport.co.uk/index.php/en/produ...
The VBOX Sport (BT) works fine with Harry's GP app. Harry's works fine with the GoPro Hero 4 (Wifi) and the Kiwi3 OBD dongle (BT).
I also bought the extended GPS aerial so I can remote mount the GPS itself and run the aerial on the roof of the car.
I'm going to do a road test of it and post up a video. Seems to be a relatively cheap setup (if it works!!)
Anyway so I bought one of these:
http://www.vboxmotorsport.co.uk/index.php/en/produ...
The VBOX Sport (BT) works fine with Harry's GP app. Harry's works fine with the GoPro Hero 4 (Wifi) and the Kiwi3 OBD dongle (BT).
I also bought the extended GPS aerial so I can remote mount the GPS itself and run the aerial on the roof of the car.
I'm going to do a road test of it and post up a video. Seems to be a relatively cheap setup (if it works!!)
theboyfold said:
Do you have any more details about the Motec data logging?
what kind detail do you want?I have a motec M4 Pro, which includes onboard ram for datalogging. once i have completed a sprint, i download the ecu logs to my laptop and wipe the onboard ram so it is ready for the next sprint.
logs are output by motec software into csv format, from which i can load into racerender and make pretty dials from
Little bit annoyed at the moment. Bought a battery eliminator for my Hero 4 from Amazon plugged it in and it has nuked it. Completely dead.. 
I finally got HLT, Kiwi3, Hero 4 and VBox Sport GPS all working together. It all works really nicely but can't seem to get 4k working. HLT also crashes a lot on some of the charts.
Anyway before I replace the GoPro, I've been looking at the new Garmin Virb Ultra 30. Does anyone know if it's possible to connect the cam to the Kiwi3, and also if it's possible to combine a GPS feed from the Vbox and not use the Virb GPS. I'm seeing some poor feedback over their GPS in the camera itself. Virb Edit though that comes with the camera is excellent software. For the moment I'm going to use my old Hero 3 and see if that works OK.
Been very interesting getting the raw Vbox output into Vbox Circuit Tools, also found how to sync the GoPro video into it. Great tool for improving your driving.
I finally got HLT, Kiwi3, Hero 4 and VBox Sport GPS all working together. It all works really nicely but can't seem to get 4k working. HLT also crashes a lot on some of the charts.
Anyway before I replace the GoPro, I've been looking at the new Garmin Virb Ultra 30. Does anyone know if it's possible to connect the cam to the Kiwi3, and also if it's possible to combine a GPS feed from the Vbox and not use the Virb GPS. I'm seeing some poor feedback over their GPS in the camera itself. Virb Edit though that comes with the camera is excellent software. For the moment I'm going to use my old Hero 3 and see if that works OK.
Been very interesting getting the raw Vbox output into Vbox Circuit Tools, also found how to sync the GoPro video into it. Great tool for improving your driving.
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