Monitoring Boat on Camera from home.

[Sean Carter]

I normally visit my boat a few times a week but have not visited at all for five weeks during the lockdown. As it happens I am on the clubs Webcam in a prominent position which is very nice. But I would like to fit a camera so I could monitor the boat from home. My main concern are possible leaks and security. Is there something on the market that people are using which runs on 12V is reasonably cheap that would work. Any help or advice would be most welcome.
Sean

 

[Scubadoo]

One solution is to set-up a MIFI router which takes a mobile sim card (Three, Vodafone etc) and connect a wifi pan/tilt camera . There are many cheap cameras on Amazon. Select a MIFI router with a built in battery e.g. TP-Link so that if power is disconnected you will have something like 7 hours run time. Some cameras have backup battery, however just as easy to purchase USB power bank used for mobile phones. If you don't have shore power you could set-up an inverter.

Most if not all cheap cameras (pan/tilt) will not be waterproof, so just make sure it is in the cabin or under a canvas and simply cover or remove it when sailing. Reolink cameras are secure and a little more expensive (approx. £50 to £100). One option is the Argus fixed camera (waterproof) with a long battery life (approx. several months) with PIR sensor instead of the normal motion senor less false positives. The pan/tilt camera option is around £28 but not waterproof.

For mobile sim card, there are a few cheap deals around, e.g. Three do a 12GB for 12 months for £29. You will use less 500mb a month if checking the cameras once a day but depends on the camera quality i.e. less than HD 1080p. The camera APP will likely have an option to reduce video quality over the internet.

I hope that helps.

 

[Poignard]

I wondered about having some such system but as my boat is in Brittany and I can't get there to sort out a problem, I decided it's best not to know!