2020 Hoggies & earlybirds on my garden trailcam!

WendyBartter said:

Hi Mike, not the cam at fault thank goodness as two year warranty was up yesterday ... Bushnell live view btw ... the fault is in the electrical adapter cable which I use instead of wasting many £s on batteries which are such a fiddle to fit & don't give good service as they wear down! Fortunately the cable is still on warranty ... just the inconvenience of being without cam til it's repaired or replaced!
Cam has been good & so convenient being able to line up exactly using the hand held screen!

Noted on Bushnell Liveview.

If the power supply does go again, the chances are any good electrical stockist should be able to sort a suitable power unit for you. Just take the cam in, along with the power unit, so they can check the power ratings etc, and connections, polarity etc,

With mine, I use 8 AA Lithium dry cells, which give almost two months of power, 24/7. If I used alkaline, then 14 days at best, a big drop!

Good suggestion Mike as it's only a female pin at fault & needs a new one soldering on but using the fact that it's warrantied to get repair/replace!
Great strength & manual dexterity needed to clip batteries in (plus the cost as I put mine on every night) & I have neither due to arthritic fingers ... plus very little/no patience when they all pop out at last second!

WendyBartter said:

Good suggestion Mike as it's only a female pin at fault & needs a new one soldering on but using the fact that it's warrantied to get repair/replace!

Great strength & manual dexterity needed to clip batteries in (plus the cost as I put mine on every night) & I have neither due to arthritic fingers ... plus very little/no patience when they all pop out at last second!

Those single female pins come in different diameters and the polarity can be one or the other, but any good electronics person would solve that in a matter of a few seconds. A replacement plug can be bought, but then someone needs to solder it on to the power lead.

From what you're saying, it would suggest the lead has been bent at the point of feeding onto the plug, and I'm guessing the base of the cam is quite low down, forcing the cable to bend. A simple way to defer that happening would be to wrap insulation tape around it, but that would depend on the gap height between the ground and the cam.

Have taken all the precautions re insulating tape to protect lead into plugs ... the problem lies in a male ppn plug which takes the power to the female before travelling to reducer which then plugs into cam ... the centre needle in in the female plug has sheared off so no power getting through!

Quite difficult explaining that in an email to the supplier!

On batteries again til cable repaired/replaced ... only one clip night before last then showing out of power!!!

Bit better last night but still only two of hoggies plus two of male BB who looks as if nesting again or feeding another juvie?

Good one Wendy, the Blackbird was carrying wasn't it, bit late really for another family but you never know these days. I had both female and male in the garden feeding today but they scoffed the food themselves I think. The male is moulting well so that will be the season ended for him I suppose.

WendyBartter said:

Have taken all the precautions re insulating tape to protect lead into plugs ... the problem lies in a male ppn plug which takes the power to the female before travelling to reducer which then plugs into cam ... the centre needle in in the female plug has sheared off so no power getting through!

Quite difficult explaining that in an email to the supplier!

Yep, I believe you fully on trying to explain to the supplier.

Its hard enough over the phone, but email (especially as many businesses are not taking files or photo files for fear of computer virus/hacking attempts) or online chat, forget it.....

Fingers crossed for a good outcome, we'll miss those vids just as much as you will.

Have had positive reply from supplier although disappointingly theg have none of this type in stock ... Hermes courier picked up cable late Friday but still waiting to hear it's back with supplier, likely today!
ITM am back to batteries which can be unreliable even though paid a fortune for the best ... coincidentally the hoggies appear to have gone walkabout ... know cam is working cos of two clips of neighbour's cat!!  Wondering if our current blistering heatwave has disrupted hoggies pattern?

Hope all is resolved quickly as this is the month when youngsters are out & about ... 23rd August last year!

Good to see hoggie back on regular visits, getting nicely fat for the Winter?