Haloview MC10 rearview camera system

[1StreamDream]

I am about to try this, but I am getting feedback from the manufacturer that due to total length between camera and display in excess of 33' (I have a 25' flying cloud) I should upgrade my order from MC10 to RD10. I already have a voyager wireless camera in place, it works and has always been stable in image. I want to upgrade for higher resolution and improved image quality, in addition to getting the display off my dash. Is anyone on the forum using the MC10 on a 23' or longer Airstream trailer ? If yes, is the image stable and consistent, including at highway speeds ? I want to stay with MC10 if I can, its less hardware on the roof, less to go wrong down the road.

Thanks in advance for a quick reply

[Peter C]

I just installed the MC7109 on my 27FB and it does not have great signal strength. I only tested on one drive but I think that I will need to buy the range extender.

[1StreamDream]

Thanks for sharing that. I don't have mine yet so I can't offer any experience but I am planning a couple options for risk mitigations, one of them is a magnetic base antenna that I can position on the Airstream roof, which will cut the radiated RF signal path distance down to less than 33'. I ordered this off Amazon, my hope is I just screw the cable end into the camera, and then screw the antenna that came with the camera into the magnetic base, where the magnetic base will be closer to the center of my trailer. It's inexpensive to try, and minimizes hardware that can fail later in the life of the equipment. Perhaps something like this might help you.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

[n2916s]

Just finished installing the RD10 on my 27’ Safari. Signal strength is excellent even though I had to orient the antenna on the monitor horizontally. Camera is on a magnetic mount on the bumper, cable is run underneath to the curb side of the A frame where the transmitter is mounted.

[1StreamDream]

Originally Posted by 1StreamDream

Thanks for sharing that. I don't have mine yet so I can't offer any experience but I am planning a couple options for risk mitigations, one of them is a magnetic base antenna that I can position on the Airstream roof, which will cut the radiated RF signal path distance down to less than 33'. I ordered this off Amazon, my hope is I just screw the cable end into the camera, and then screw the antenna that came with the camera into the magnetic base, where the magnetic base will be closer to the center of my trailer. It's inexpensive to try, and minimizes hardware that can fail later in the life of the equipment. Perhaps something like this might help you.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Adding a warning note that this cable (antenna mount) has reverse polarity (RP) orientation, I don't know what the camera end is, but its possible you might need an adapter or two to make this work. Once I get my camera, and have the install worked out, I will post the combination of items needed to make it work.

[CMHM]

Originally Posted by 1StreamDream

I am about to try this, but I am getting feedback from the manufacturer that due to total length between camera and display in excess of 33' (I have a 25' flying cloud) I should upgrade my order from MC10 to RD10. I already have a voyager wireless camera in place, it works and has always been stable in image. I want to upgrade for higher resolution and improved image quality, in addition to getting the display off my dash. Is anyone on the forum using the MC10 on a 23' or longer Airstream trailer ? If yes, is the image stable and consistent, including at highway speeds ? I want to stay with MC10 if I can, its less hardware on the roof, less to go wrong down the road.

Thanks in advance for a quick reply

Yes I did exactly that. Brand new 27F Globetrotter. Unscrewed the crappy Voyager camera, cut the cable. Bought the MC10 with the additional mounting plates and reattached the Haloview camera. They also wanted me to buy the repeater but I refused.

I get 2 out of 4 signal bars, resolution and frame rate are fine. Don’t expect iPad quality, but it’s miles better than the Voyager.

[1StreamDream]

That's very encouraging news, thanks for sharing that experience. What mounting plates are you making reference to ? Is there a special adapter plate of some kind or does the hardware that comes with the MC10 include everything ?

[CMHM]

Originally Posted by 1StreamDream

That's very encouraging news, thanks for sharing that experience. What mounting plates are you making reference to ? Is there a special adapter plate of some kind or does the hardware that comes with the MC10 include everything ?

I bought this plate as well. My Voyager was mounted only with two screws instead of four, so I was glad I could choose from different plates. The camera comes with two plates, and this additional one was the right one:

https://www.haloview.com/haloview-backup-camera-bracket-adapter-compatible-with-voyager-furrion-pre-wired-rvs.html

[Pat Pierce]

I decided to gamble on the mc10 for our 27’ Serenity. This morning, I backed my F150 to the hitch position. I then taped the camera to 5” below the middle top running light with thoughts of tapping power from there. Next, I powered the camera with a portable power pack. This was my way of testing the camera to monitor distance to judge if this would work. My distance is about 38’, more than the 33’. Would it work? I hoped so because I love the mc10 rear view monitor.

Anway, the rear camera showed up beautiful on the monitor. Much sharper than what I thought from a 720dpi. Actually about the same as the front 1080 dpi camera.

But what has me stumped is what should be the simple tap to the middle to running light. I removed insulation from the black and white running light wires and wrapped the bare red and black camera wires, black to black, red to white.
I did that a number of times, yet the monitor said “no connection” to camera. I even used a multi-meter to read 12V across the camera leads assuring 12V was getting to the camera. Then I used the portable power pack to reconnect to the camera leads. Monitor worked perfect. WTH, what am I missing. Yes, the running lights were all on. I spent a few hours on this simple thing. It should work, but doesn’t. Not sure what to do next, since I think I did everything.

But from what I have seen so far for the mc10, I like it. I will not drive around for testing unti I of course get this figured out. Ideas I have not tried so far?

[1StreamDream]

sorry to hear of that difficulty, I don't have an immediate thought unless your antenna orientation or placement somehow changed in this experiment ? My camera just arrived yesterday, but its cold and snowing here, so it will be a couple days before I can do the experiment you describe, but I intend to do exactly that. I already have a voyager installed, and I powered it from the center lamp just as you describe. I actually posted a thread about it, I used a method I had not seen earlier (no holes drilled in the aluminum for the power cable). In case you want to see more details, that thread is here : https://www.airforums.com/forums/f51...ll-211789.html

Halo did offer to send me a "better" antenna for the camera side to try, due to me exceeding the length guidance, but they were very careful to state they would not guarantee this will work (because I exceed 33'). I will post again once I have more info to share ...

[1StreamDream]

finally got good weather, I wired my MC10 camera same as I had for my voyager, the 12v power feed comes from the top center clearance light in the rear. I did solder my connections, I recommend you do that if not already done, and be sure to tape them well. I did notice that in my table top eval, I got connectivity when the camera was very close to the mirror, even without an antenna. Not same for the actual install, I did NOT get a connection until I attached the fixed mount antennas on both ends. Once I did that, I have consistent connectivity and good quality picture. I took a photo showing my signal strength indication. I also noticed that I maintained signal 50-60 ft from the trailer, so prob 80-90 feet total, this tells me the integrity of the RF connection is very good. I have a WiFi hotspot active inside my Airstream and that apparently has no impact on the MC10 camera signal. One final note for others, I got a cheap 90deg SMA adapter, so that my antenna mount on the mirror can be positioned optimally (antenna would hit the headliner without this adapter in use). Amazon link : https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1
All my eval was parked in my driveway, no actual towing, but I anticipate similar results when towing.

[CMHM]

I found two unused antennas for my Pepwave modem, and decided to attach them to my Haloview MC10 system. I have a 27ft Globetrotter, so my camera and mirror are roughly 40ft apart. I used to get two signal bars, now I am at three to four.

These are the antennas I installed. I am now wondering if there are even better antennas out there, has anyone tried that?

https://5gstore.com/product/6511_pep...RoC-50QAvD_BwE

[Mollysdad]

I just received a Haloview 7108. (separate monitor.)
I'll be a pioneer, because I'm mounting the camera INSIDE the rear window.
In theory, it's line of sight, through the windows, but until I see it, I'm concerned. The bluetooth Garmin BC-30 works flawlessly
Haloview does sell a remote antenna with a 15' cable so I could mount the antenna closer temporally.

Originally Posted by Pat Pierce

But what has me stumped is what should be the simple tap to the middle to running light. I removed insulation from the black and white running light wires and wrapped the bare red and black camera wires, black to black, red to white.

with 12v. white is ground, no?

[1StreamDream]

with regard to ground, I have found that generally in low voltage DC wiring, black is ground, so since it did not work in your case, on your trailer side white wire, you probably want the camera side black connected to that. I would have guessed the same you did (black to black) but a multimeter can confirm that. I went back to some old info I had when I wired to my center light, and sure enough I have camera red to trailer black, camera black to trailer white. Multimeter to confirm your trailer is probably your best path. Watch the polarity indicator on the meter to confirm.

Regarding the antennas, this is probably a case by case, my voyager camera is different than my new Haloview, there is something called "reverse polarity" that you have to watch out for. I took a picture of my 2 antennas to show the difference. The presence of the center pin is the key, and if yours is not the correct polarity, there are gender changing SMA adapters you can get from Amazon, or you just get an antenna with the correct polarity. Either way, when ordering anything for the SMA connector, watch out for "RP" in the description (an RP antenna does not have a center pin)

[1StreamDream]

Finally got a small trip to a trailer shop, about 15 miles, but my MC10 system worked perfectly, separation distance about 40ft, see 2 bars on the graphic shown on the mirror. I am using a slightly longer than stock antenna on the camera, it was supplied to me with the MC10. Congested urban area too, so I fully expect consistent success long term with this arrangement.

[Pat Pierce]

I posted on 3/16/21 about trying the mc10 on our 27’ Airstream with F150 Super Crew cab, meaning the distance from the truck rear view camera to the airstream camera is about 38’, more than the max 33’ Haloview recommends.

I found out that the red haloview rear camera wire taps to the black AS wire. At first I thought the blacks would connect. Wrong, nothing worked. I was told I needed to do this by Haloview.

Anyway, we just had our first trip with the new mc10 and we were doing up to 65-70 mph freeway speeds, and the mc10 system seemed flawless to me. Love it. No issues at all. I have no luck for some reason removing the tiny TF card to insert into my iPad SD/TF card reader so we can look at the videos on the iPad for you know, maybe a scenic drive. Not sure why we can’t get that to work.

[ealmasy]

Originally Posted by CMHM

Brand new 27F Globetrotter. Unscrewed the crappy Voyager camera, cut the cable. Bought the MC10 with the additional mounting plates and reattached the Haloview camera.

Did you try pulling the Voyager wire out of the body, to see if there was a connector on it that could be used (as described by Wayne&Sam here, though for an older FC)?

If not, and you did a manual splice to the cut Voyager cable, how did you seal the splice against the weather? I've got an MC10 camera and VF01 bracket in hand, but trying to figure out how best to handle the wiring.

Also, when removing the old Voyager bracket, were you able to reuse the screws/bolts, to attach the Haloview bracket? I'm a little nervous that I might unscrew those bolts and then not be able to get them back in, if they're threaded into nuts inside the shell.

(Pics attached, for anyone wondering exactly what we're talking about.)

[CMHM]

Mine was installed exactly the same way. I kept the insulating foam and the two screws. The Haloview came with a few different plates and one of them allowed me to use the existing two holes. Once the Haloview was mounted I sealed up the entire area including the screws.

I tried also pulling the cable out and got to a point where I would have used too much force and I didn’t want to risk pulling harder. Never saw the connector so I cut the cable and attached the new one and used electric tape.

[ealmasy]

Originally Posted by CMHM

Mine was installed exactly the same way. I kept the insulating foam and the two screws. The Haloview came with a few different plates and one of them allowed me to use the existing two holes. Once the Haloview was mounted I sealed up the entire area including the screws.

Thank you for the additional insights. Does your camera have a light on it, that indicates whether it's powered on? I think I have everything connected right, but can't seem to get the monitor to pair with the camera, and am not sure how to tell whether the camera is even working at all.

(The only documentation I received was for the monitor – there doesn't seem to be anything for the camera itself.)

[CMHM]

No light but when the Airstream running lights are on the camera should be on. And they already come paired.