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Originally Posted by patrick_g Thomas, You can glue or otherwise attach a little piece of galvanized sheet metal in strategic locations and use the yellow balls from HF. You don't put the magnet on the ball but forward of it a bit.
On my 1 ton Dodge/Cummins with the service body, I carry a convex mirror and a U shaped mount that straddles the tailgate to hold it so I can see the ball and watch the coupler align with it while backing. It works super EXCEPT when the sun angle is wrong and the glare is big time and contrast is poor.
There are accessories for sale that use really heavy gauge metal in a 90 degree configuration (a corner) with the angle's bisector aligned with the midline of the receiver. If you can back up close to the coupler the device deflects the coupler a bit forcing it to move over the ball.
I built my own rear view system a while back, before little LCD screens were so cheap. It was a CCD camera and a 5 inch CRT intended as a baby monitor or door view thingy. I got it super cheap on closeout. I opened up the monitor and reversed the wires driving the horizontal deflection coil. This was to get a mirror view instead of normal view. I don't understand everything I know about the results but it did make a mirror image but it was upside down???? I just turned the monitor upside down and all was fine.
I do have one of the little $100- units from Wal*Mart NIB awaiting a lull in the excitement to be installed. As best I can tell, for my purposes I will modify the lisc plate holder that has the tiny camera on it so it looks down more. It is wide angle so aiming it down a bit (10-30 degrees, to be determined experimentally) will not lose the rear view just lose some view of the sky.
It is a small screen but I don't intend to replace the rear view mirrors with it just use it for hitching a trailer and checking for hazards to navigation when backing up. I was thinking I would power the camera from the backup light circuit as I wouldn't NEED the camera when not backing. Even if you have to pull up a bit and try again when hitching, you don't really need to see the ball/coupler relative position/motion when moving forward and the rear view will be restored as soon as I put it in reverse.
I see no big problem if it were wired to a circuit that is live when the switch is in the run position if for some reason you want a poor electronic view of what is behind you in addition to the mirror's view. I will have to experiment with camera placement and might even end up mounting it high on the tailgate with a quick disconnect polarized plug to facilitate tailgate removal. That brings up the issue of "I want the camera to work when the tailgate is removed."
Who knows, maybe I will make a little telescopic mount from some pieces of square tubing (that fit nicely to facilitate the telescopic action (pins or ... to adjust height) and put a wing nut adjustable down angle mount. This could be mounted to the receiver and allow elevating and aiming the camera to accommodate most foreseeable needs (such as lowering it to allow tailgate lowering.)
Bigger is usually better (I just replaced my newly dead ViewSonics CRT monitor with a 22 inch HI res LCD unit) but I don't think I need a "WIDE SCREEN HDTV" rear view to watch a coupler and ball attain the same Lat and Lon. As it will be sort of a SLOW MOTION evolution I don't need a high performance setup, large screen hi res, or big $. I think the Wally World unit will be OK for trailer hitching.
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Pat if you hook it up let me know how it works. I just spent all the play money my wife lets me have so I have to wait a while to save 100.00 so I can buy me one. Of course I am happy with todays purchase I bought a 6 foot brushhog ( I am not sure of the brand name yet it is the kind that hooks up to the swinging drawbar and you adjust the heighth by raising and lowering an axle on two tires at the back of the unit. I gave 200.00 for that so I am broke for a while
If you hook that unit up in the next month or so give me a yell. For powering the camera I would think that you could hook it up to a 7 pin trailer connection if you have one. they have a pin for backup lights that would work and they also have a pin that is used for charging a trailers batteries while travelling. You could just hook your connector to that plug and then when you hook up your trailer unhook the camera connector and hook in your trailer.