So my first track day was awesome. Unfortunately I couldn't get the best footage of it with my Go Pro. I want to get the best in car view of the dash and road ahead and have it centered right behind the driver and passenger seats like most people do with a roll cage or harness bar.

I ended up using one of the helmet adhesive mounts and sticking it to the back of the adaptive seat and angling it forward. But that didn't work out so well as it was mounted too low and the passenger shoulder blocks the light and view. We don't have sliding glass moonroofs so I can't suction cup it up there and because the lens is such a wide angle suction cupping it to the rear window puts it too far back.

Any ideas or suggestions????

Here are a few pics just for looking ...

 

I say, just get a removable harness bar. That way, you'll still have access to the rear seats on a normal basis, but have a place to mount the cam on track days.

 

I suctioned mine to the back window, between the seats, facing forward. You have to do some mounting bracket origami, so that the camera is not upside-down. This worked great, you can see the dash, and get great engine sounds. This took a lot of practice videos to get just right.

 

I have the LCD bac pac and upside down mode but don't you find it too far back? You don't see much of the road as the cam is such wide angle.

 

Try the front bumper with some traps around the grille to hold it in place.

It worked out well for me...you can see a picture at the end of the video below of how I had it mounted, with the arm thing attached to the bottom part of the front bumper holding the camera up against the grille and some straps tied around the camera to ensure it was really secure and stable:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y9HS0DPyjXk

Driving wasn't good but the video is still cool It was my first time ever with a true stick shift at the track and first time I'd had ever the turbo out as well. I was 8 seconds faster my 2nd time around in December.

I have a suction mount setup from www.stickypod.com that I use to put fairly heavy camera behind me (didnt have it set right for the video above). Unfortunately the GoPro has a proprietary mounting system so I'm not sure how I'd be able to use it my sticky pod for it.

The rubber sticky pads that come with the gopro are pretty darn good at holding the camera in place, so you could position it high up on the rear windshield facing forward. You can of course switch the camera into upside down mode as well or just take care of it when you're editing the video.

 

djben, that's a great set-up!
The wide angle of the gopro is great when mounting on the back window, as you get the whole front windshield, the dash, and parts of the drivers and passengers window. And if you set it up just right, you can capture the drivers eyes, and where they are looking, in the rear view mirror.

 

I mount my video cam in the pass rear window with the suction mount. I then recline the pass seat back and it gives you a pretty good birds eye view of the driver and the track.

 

I'm sort of surprised that the powers-that-be allow suction cup applications inside the car since everything else that's loose has to be removed for safety purposes. Pretty sure you wouldn't want a GoPro flying around the cabin in the event of an incident.

 

I was surprised too, but the suction device and the camera are very small, nobody has said a word. I have not seen the GoPro unit, but it must be pretty small too.

 

I use the suction cup on the right side - center of the helmut and the footage is good. I just bought a G_Lock for my next event, having trouble staying in the seat as you will see the turns I'm having to lean alot. A ride at Sebring with Chris Hall


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-sgW6f0f0KU

 

I had a G-lock but ended up using the power seat / seatbelt lock trick instead.

 

That was a great vid. I'll try doing the front bumper mount as well

 

The suction cup for the GoPro is rated good up to 200mph. It's EXTREMELY strong. It's not like a regular ole little suction cup. Think of those giant suction cups that glass installers use to carry huge pains of glass. They're that strong!

 

I'd like to ask several questions about how you created the video clip.

- What editing software did you use to create the PiP?
- According to RaceChrono it operates on WinMob and Nokia S60 devices, so I don't see how you are applying it here. Can you explain further?
- I'm assuming you use the netbook to collect the OBD data via BT. I'm assuming the power inverter is for the netbook but I don't understand the need for Ethernet or the hub.
- What are you using the Kaseya agent for?

It's such a nice setup that I would like to duplicate it using a PBox rather than your Qstarz. I really don't know if I want or need RPM's (OBD) so that may simplify things.

Merging all this video and data AND keeping it all in sync is mind boggling. Your help would be greatly appreciated.

 

bump - I'm still looking for some help (answers).