Home surveillance systems

There are many different types of mounting methods for the conduit since it's stucco over wood I'd use these...

http://www.homedepot.com/p/3-4-in-Steel-Conduit-and-Pipe-Hangers-5-Pack-26781/100161284

1 Like

I might just bury part if the cable since it's a direct burial cable.
For the other 3 cameras I want to just run the ethernet fastened onto the soffit externally. How will I route the cable and connecting points to the camera.
Will I have to drill into soffit and feed ethernet cable up and then down to the camera?

That will be hard to do, if you plan on putting the cable inside the soffit, if you drill a gig enough hole you might be able to "fish" the cable to the location you want but if your soffit has insulation in it that is going to make it almost not possibleunless you can remove the gutter to gain access to the fascia and move it so you can get inside the soffit.

Depending on how the actual soffit was built you may have wood in the way of running cables...

Yes.....if that is how you choose to run you cables.

The picture above is what your trying to avoid, this is one camera on the side of one of our buildings, it is high enough that it can't be reached from the ground, but the cable is ran on top of the soffit, because of how this roof is constructed I didn't want to open the soffit up to run the cable inside...it just made more sense to run it on top of the soffit instead of inside.

In the picture above our new garage/barn you'll see the clean install of the cameras, the reason I was able to do such a clean install (no visible wires) is because the inside of the walls are still open and unfinished, if it wasn't for that I'd have to probably run conduit on the outside of the building or used a hole saw to drill through the metal and hope I didn't hit any wiring in the process.

I know you want a clean install, but it might not be possible without taking the soffit apart which might be above your comfort zone.

Anyway...hope that helps.

1 Like

Thank you for the reply.

I think for simplicity I will just install the cameras like you did (picture 1). The cameras will be very high off the ground. I will just have to zip-tie the loose connectors, will try my best to make it as tidy as possible like yours.
Home Depot should sell metal cable fasteners right?

As for one of the cameras, I think I will bury the Ethernet cable and then route to the mount
I found some mounts that I will need for one of the cameras.


http://www.trendnet.com/products/proddetail?prod=105_TV-WS300 (Coming soon sadly)

THE SECOND link seems like the cable can feed fromm the bottom. The first link I cannot find another cable route
EDIT: the first link mount actually has a tiny hole on the bottom of the mount for the ethernet cable to go.

I will probably still use conduit for the part where the Ethernet goes up the wall since perpetrators will be able access that portion.

thanks again for the help

1 Like

Every dome camera I've used allows the cable to exit out the bottom, so on either of the mounts you linked to would allow that to work, both of them feed the cable through the mount either to a opening behind the mount or to a box that conduit runs into....the Hikvision looks like the cable exits the bottom of the mount while the Trendnet has a weatherproof box that either conduit can connect to or the bare cable through the weather tight connector.

I would hope so....but I go there almost every weekend to get materials for the garage and honestly I've never seen them, above somewhere I linked what I used that came from Amazon....if your ordering anything from them it's just as easy to get a couple bags as to spend a hour looking around HD even with a employee's help (some don't seem to know their product lines very well)..

1 Like

Is there a type of seal that I can use to prevent water from entering if I want to go with the all exposed cable under soffit option (your first picture two posts back)?

People have recommended coax seal for the ethernet cable and camera connection point

Is there a type of seal that I can use to prevent water from entering if I want to go with the all exposed cable under soffit option (your first picture two posts back)?

People have recommended coax seal for the ethernet cable and camera connection point

1 Like

If you use the supplied cover for the camera connection you should be good, if you look at the picture I posted the other day you can see the connection to the right of the camera, while it isn't 100% water tight it should stop any ingress of water from a blowing rain which would be the major concern. The cable itself should never be a issue under the soffit, I don't even use outdoor rated cable and have never had a issue, we have lots of blowing rain in the course of a year and temps well below 0F during the winter months, still never had a problem with the weather....just flippin' spiders!. I had 2% of my drive space and thousands of events last week because of one lone spider web in front of a camera that is 14' off the ground I really dislike having to spend a lot of time clearing bogus events off the drive.....I can set a filter to do it for me but then what if I miss a event that I need?

1 Like

I hope the trendnet cameras that I will be getting have that camera connection cover.

Lol spiders , spiders ,spiders

Is there a way to have some adhesive around the around to prevent spiders from entering vicinity of camera?

Btw , I have a nas with 6 TB of storage, should I save the footage from the security camera recording PC to the nas?
I also need to find a way to be able to see footage from mobile device away from home.

So far (knocking on wood) the Vaseline works better than anything we have tried, it's somewhat water resistant (doesn't wash away with rain) but getting enough on in the right spots is a trial and error affair, naturally you want it around the IR/lens on bullets, even on the edge of the sun shade if the camera has one but spiders are tricky if they can't get directly on the camera body they will build a web however big they have to in front of the camera from anything that is within a few feet......

You saw the pic of the new garage those cameras are a good two feet from the soffit but yet the spiders still find a way to get a web in front of the camera without getting directly on the camera itself....lol

Hopefully you will have better luck using dome cameras, the two I have outside the spiders don't seem to like but they are both in areas that have other light sources at night besides the IR.....I'll be interested in hearing how it goes for your install.

Here's a pic of my current problem....

I would, if the NAS runs all the time 24/7 I'd just map the drive and have the monitoring software write directly to it bypassing the PC for storage.....but you have a few options on how you do it depending on the monitoring software and the OS the NAS uses.

That's a tricky thing.....to do it on the cheap the storage/monitoring computer has to be forward facing to the internet which is not only risky but a pain in the ass to keep secure, you have to figure that anything you can access outside your network someone else can hack and gain access also, then of course if you want to just remote into your computer there are several ways to do that as long as your ISP doesn't change your IP on a daily basis (dynamic IP), it's doubtful you have a fixed (static) IP which makes things much easier.....

It's really something you'll have to research on what will work, be secure, and give you the access you want/need.

I will eventually switch ISPs and will prolly have to pay for a business account to get a static IP, I have everything setup to host my own web pages, email, and remote server administration, but can't face the server to the internet without a static IP and Time Warner won't give me one, we also have WOW here and I can get a static IP with them by having a SoHo or small home business account...just haven't done it yet because every-time I call to cancel TW they lower the price and up the bandwidth if I sign up for another year....lol


Here's a pic from the Hikvision EXIR that I bought awhile back.....the view is the lot behind the new garage and is 40'x100' it lights it up pretty well.

2 Likes

Thanks for the tips.

Right now I'm thinking of getting a bullet camera for my front enterance which would be mounted on a wall.
If I get a done camera, I will have to get another camera mount (looks too intrusive).

If I get a bullet camera I will still need to find a way to hide the cables since there is only a wall there.

@Blanger

1 Like

Would I have to get a small electival box and stuff the wire connections in there for thr bullet camera?

I turret camera might be better for my front enterance since there it is facing south.

1 Like

You either go up or down with the cable, in most cases it shorter and safer to go up, bullets are pretty flexible and I wouldn't commit to a plan on mounting location until I had one and did a temp wiring to test different locations, it's easy enough to do and gives you a real - true idea of what you will be viewing.

1 Like

Yup....that is what I would do.

1 Like

Turret camera : http://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX51991

Electrical box

1 Like

Link is to a Trendnet 310....


Box is fine as long as it comes with a cover or a cover is available, you either mount the camera close to the box or mount the box and the camera on the cover of the box....just be sure to use the proper diameter screws to mount the box, those little tabs break easily.

1 Like

Is the trendnet 310 not good?
How is trendnet compared to hikvision?
So I will just have the ethernet enter one end and exit the hole to the camera.

1 Like

It's a fine camera...just not a turret camera (it's a bullet cam) a turret cam is kinda' like a PTZ ot like this.....

http://www.a1securitycameras.com/lts-security-cmip3042w-28.html?gclid=COCZzrbF2s8CFdMvgQod7ysCfQ

Kinda' a hybrid between a dome and a bullet but closer to a dome camera. In fact I just bought one of these that I'm testing..it is also a EXIR.

Trendnet is better I believe, but honestly in most models it's the same hardware (camera) with different firmware, both are high quality but if they were the same price I'd buy the Trendnet just because of the firmware, you'll see after you have one of both brands.

If you want, the hole is going to be pretty big and a lot of room left after the cable goes through, I might chose a box with only one hole and enter and exit out the same hole and use RTV to seal it up from the weather and critters. (if your running PVC conduit to the box disregard what I'm saying but do seal up the hole after the cable is ran out.)

1 Like

I wanted to get some Hikvision cameras, but in Canada, they are harder to find. Mostly just the Chinese versions and maybe without proper warranty. I also don't want to buy from Aliexpress (will take too long) or the Amazon sellers (not mmuch reputation). Trendnet just seems more widely available here.

Good idea, one hole for the ethernet cable going in and then out, keeping the camera ethernet connecting point in the box. I don't think I will be using conduit since I have direct burial cable.

BTW, it just snowed here, don't know if I can work in this weather lol. I would have to dig up the snow to bury a cable. I also don't want to risk falling off the ladder.

1 Like

Hey,

Tomorrow I am picking up the cameras.
The store only has 2 dome cameras, so I am going to get the 2 domes and 2 bullets.

It seems like the bullets are easier to install.
Do you think I should install a camera above my motion sensing light?

AND are bullet cameras fine on just a wall with NO cover above it like an eaves?

Should I get an small electrical box and stuff the connecting points of the camera in there OR get a small conduit that leads to the camera? (Protect Ethernet cable and camera connecting point)

1 Like