Ganz Dome Security Camera Refurb

One of the things I found in the dumpster at the same time as the Schlage/Recognition Systems Handkey II was a Ganz ZC-D5212NHA security camera. It was packed away neatly in its original box -- which was, as you can see -- labeled "BaD" - In other words "Fix Me, Please!"

The clear dome was still plastic wrapped as shown in the photo below. The box contained all the original stuff as well -- install cutting/drilling templates, mounting hardware and all that. Obviously, this camera was never installed.

You can see a capacitor that had broken from the backplane in the above photo. My best guess is that the installer broke it off accidentally while messing with the camera pivot, then discarded it.

This electronics repair task is pretty straight-forward. These are chip-base electrolytic capacitors with surface mount tabs instead of the more common through-hole electrolytic caps. Soldering this one back on was a little tricky because I had to take care not to overheat the capacitor. It was by no means impossible, though.

Once re-assembled, this camera works just like any of the other CCTV Cameras I've played with in the past. The monitor below is displaying the video feed (upside down) from the camera. It works fine and can go fish-eye wide-angle or up to 4x zoom. It also features a really crisp sensor that works very well in low-light conditions. Boots is wondering if his hijinks will be caught on video now.

I haven't completely decided what I'll do with this one yet. If CCCKC needs more security cameras, I'll probably donate this one. Otherwise, I'll probably sell it. I have plenty of security cameras around, and don't need any more. I could use the extra cash, though.

I decided I'd take the next step and clean up the box and re-package the camera like it was when it was new, just in case.

I don't have any dry-erase markers at home to do the permanent marker removal hack, but 91% Isopropyl rubbing alcohol should work fine in this case as well.

And just like that, it's as good as new. Retail value is about $230. Not a bad find.

Surveillance with old CCTV Cameras

It seems that most of the time I go dumpster diving, I find a CCTV (Closed-Circuit Television) camera or two. Or three. I've picked up quite a few, and left many, many more to rot in the landfill. Some have worked well. Others haven't. We're going to have some fun with them. As more and more companies go high-tech with snazzy digital recording systems, you can often find older CCTV cameras on eBay and Craigslist for cheap. Or in dumpsters for free.

The Broken Ones
There are always broken ones. You can get them for cheap or free as mentioned above. Surf eBay for "Parts only" when looking at CCTV cameras and you'll find a suitable one. The easiest thing to do is to make it look like a real CCTV to give would-be bad-guys the impression that they're being recorded. While this is much akin to security through obscurity, making a fake camera out of one that used to work is a lot more convincing than this:



Compare that piece of crap to my finished product at the end of this section.

First, take the old, broken CCTV apart and gut it to make room for a battery and LED. See the following photos.







Then, drill a hole in the front plate for the LED.



For the next part, I taped a low-brightness 1.7v red LED to a AA battery. Let's face it, this whole fake camera idea is pretty shifty. There's no point in putting a whole lot of finesse into it. LEDs like this one usually drain between 10 and 20 mA, so a plain old AA battery without a resistor should keep this LED lit up for more than a week.



Then, tape the battery/LED down inside the chasm left in the camera and re-assemble it so that the LED sticks out.





It looks real because it IS REAL (well, it used to be!)


Hang it up somewhere and hook all the cables up. They don't have to be actually hooked up to anything on the other end, just tuck them into the ceiling or run them to a wall plate. No one could tell this isn't real by just looking.





The working ones
Although these cameras all have BNC connectors on the back, the signal they put out is typical composite NTSC -- The same thing most VCRs put out. You need a BNC-to-RCA adapter (shown left) and then an RCA video cable and a monitor to view it on. This can be an RFU-adapter hooked up to a TV, or in my case a portable DVD player with A/V inputs. You could just as easily get a video capture card or USB adapter to record the video straight to your hard drive if you felt so inclined.

First, hook up the RCA adapter, RCA cable, and power cables to the camera and mount it somewhere.

Then, hook the other end of the RCA cable up, and enjoy your working CCTV system!