legin_k

One more.. Palatov D4 is so insane.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kBZ0zpZVZw

Lotus99

Hi legin, I noticed on Harry's site that he recommends the Tom Tom as a good match, but was wondering if you've done any video taping using your iPhone and that mount? He emailed me saying it should be possible, since the back of the mount seems not very wide, and therefore, shouldn't be blocking the camera, but I wonder if the suction cup might show up in the screen?

I used a $50 windshield mounting kit from Future Shop (IQ Smart Solutions ZR iPhone Mount (IQ1050C) which worked well, but I could see some of the suction cup in the video still. MOUNT

Thanks for any help!

Here's the video that came of it. I should have adjusted the phone view better, as I ended up getting more of the right side of the car instead of the center and some of the suction cup. And silly me, I left it in portrait position unfortunately - didn't think of rotating it! In landscape mode though there's very little of the cup blocking the image, so next time should be much better.


[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uN2rwfIZme0[/media]

legin_k

Yup, you can use the tomtom mount with video. You have to fiddle with the angles a bit to get keep the suction cup out of the video, but it's not that big a problem.

Here's some of the footage I've taken with it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CEW56du6Dd8

You can see on that day I wasn't careful enough to keep the suction cup entirely out of view - you can just see the edge of the clear part on the right side of the frame. It can be entirely clear of the view, though.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUGtAUvgvsQ

The second video is with the mount suction cupped to the small wind deflector between the roll hoops in the S2000. The wind deflector is tilted down flat, so the suction cup is completely out of the way. There's a bit more vibration, but you can see the driver, which is nice. I had to use the mic on the iphone earbuds, taped down behind the seat, to avoid excessive wind noise.

If I were to do it again, though, I'd put the money from the $110 tomtom mount towards a cheaper mount that charges the phone, and spring for a roqyBT4/bt gps mouse with the iphone jailbroken. The tomtom gps is much better than the internal iphone one, but it still only updates at 1 hz, (one time per second). The above setup will update at 10 hz, which makes the gps data actually useable for autox.

Here's some more video. The initial picture shows the iphone mounted between the roll hoops:
http://vimeo.com/27735215

And one with the phone mounted to the windshield, and the suction cup entirely out of frame:
http://vimeo.com/24195670

Lotus99

Thanks for the reply. Good to know it would work.

With the Tom Tom mount, do you need to buy the app for it too, or can you just use the GPS of it with Harry's Lap Timer? I've got a nice Garmin already, so no need for yet another GPS for driving... The Tom Tom I'd use just for tracking days I guess. In which case I'd have to decide if it's worth spending the extra $50 over the current mount I've got (which I can still return until next week). It does look more secure than mine.

Any reason you're not going in the meantime with the Emprum Ultimate which does 5 Hz and is what Harry recommends as the best standalone at the moment? It's $100 though.

http://www.gps-laptimer.de/Compatibility.html

PS I did auto-x years ago, and never got it... It's so hard to visualize the course thru the sea of cones! I always wondered how people did that... Maybe I just needed more practice, but I gave up. Watching your vids brought back all those feelings of being lost on the course! LOL!

legin_k

There's a free app that lets the tomtom mount communicate with the iphone, so yeah, you don't need to buy the tomtom navigation app for it to work. I bought the tomtom app when it was on sale, and I find the navigation to be better than the older Garmin I had - it bases the routes off previous user data on how fast each particular street is at each particular time of day, so it seems to choose much better routes and displays much more realistic times. However, I haven't tried the newer Garmins to compare.

I haven't gone with the Emprum mostly because the setup I have right now is fine for video start/stop. I bought the tomtom before the Emprum was available, and if I upgrade, it will probably be to a 10 hz setup.

Haha yeah, it can certainly look like a sea of cones on video.. I find the morning walkthrough is key - if you walk through the course until you can play a movie in your head of yourself driving through it, it's easy to remember where to go.

Lotus99

Thanks. Since I'm just going to use my mount for the track days I'll attend, getting something that'll be cheap but strong is my main goal. I don't need the GPS functionality like in the TomTom mount, since the phone's seemed to have worked out ok.

Do you know of a cheap mount that would do the trick? I have a charger cable already, so the mount doesn't need to do that even.

Otherwise, for an extra $20 over my current mount, which is what the TomTom is going for on Ebay, I'll pick one up, and have a better GPS signal too then.

legin_k

Unfortunately, I haven't really done any research into other iphone mounts. Maybe if you do find one, post it up in this thread?

What clubs do you tend to track with, out at mission?

Lotus99

I signed up this summer with the BMWCCBC and did a day there with them, but their mid Sept. session got cancelled due to low turnout, so I signed up for the Porsche Club's day that was a week later, which also got cancelled due to low turnout, and then found out about PDC (performance drivers club), who had their day on Sept. 28. Haven't decided how to do next year's.

BMWCCBC uses Drivers Unlimited instructors who are with you during the day, and has onsite lunch, which is nice, and costs $300. They allow a max of 32 people. Whereas PDC cost $250, but uses their own instructors, and no lunch. We only had the low 20's, so that was really nice. They allowed passing in certain zones, which was cool. Managed to get in 4 sessions of 25/30 minutes each at PDC, but can't recall how BMWCCBC's setup was, though I don't think I had as much track time.

Porsche's website says they also do 4 sessions of 25 minutes each but can't recall what their max is. I think it was quite a bit higher. I guess if it doesn't affect how many minutes you drive, it doesn't matter, but then again, it might be too crowded on the track?

What about you?

legin_k

Ahh, nice. So far I've only done autox. I won a free trackday from UBCSCC, so I'll be using that next year.

Lotus99

Cool. I'd heard UBC does track days too, that's right, though I think I heard the max # they allow is very high (hence the lower cost) so it's a tradeoff b/w less track time and cheaper cost vs. more expensive and more track time. I'll probably try to attend a few different clubs' though to make up my own mind.