IR Camera for Vandalism

dfeck · Oct 7, 2005

I woke up this morning to a demolished mailbox. This has been the second time in two weeks that my mailbox has been damaged. My neighbor also had his vandalised plus he's had issues in the past. We just moved into the place 5 months ago and talking to my neighbor this kind of thing happens frequently. I was thinking of getting one of those IR wireless camera's and hooking it up to a VCR to catch the vandal's. My question is are the quality of these any good? I was looking to spend no more than $50. I like the wireless option due to the distance of my mailbox to the house (~280 feet). My thought was to catch them on video in the act and get the license plate number to give to the police. Does anyone have something like this they can offer advice on?

Thanks,

Gatorboy · Oct 7, 2005

I'm not sure how the camera's would work, but I'd suggest trying one of these three things:

1. Build one of those brick structures to enclose the mailbox
2. Put a pipe in the ground immediately to the right of the mailbox that extends to the height of the mailbox. This way, when the hooligans drive by with their baseball bat, they will swing and hit the pipe and not your mailbox.
3. Buy one of the plastic type mailboxes that can take a beating.

RedRocker · Oct 7, 2005

I'd build a box out of some heavy steel pipe. I'm not sure what will fly with the feds though.

Toiyabe · Oct 7, 2005

I would not beef up the mailbox/post. It's a potential liability problem if anyone runs into it, and may be illegal if your mailbox is in the right of way (IIRC the default right of way for non-dedicated roads in NY is what the Highway Department typically uses, which is often the outside edge of the snow bank in a typical winter. If it is dedicated, there should be a document that defines the width of the right of way.).

kensfarm · Oct 7, 2005

I bought a RubberMaid mailbox a few years ago.. after baking in the Sunshine.. pushed over by an 18 wheeler using the driveway to turn around in.. the kids' baseball bat shattered it. I went to Lowes and bought a heavy duty steel box($60+ /forums/images/graemlins/mad.gif).. it has survived one M80 attack so far.. no visible damage.

Dargo · Oct 7, 2005

( I would not beef up the mailbox/post. It's a potential liability problem if anyone runs into it... )

Yes, this could be an issue. It's very stupid, but you have to make sure you don't have the morons destroying your property get hurt when they are doing so. I used some 3/4" armor plating (thanks to my buddies at the 101st) and had a large welding shop use a submerged arc 500 amp machine weld my pieces to gether. The new mailbox was mounted on a solid hardened 4" solid steel post. The 4" solid steel rod (10' section) was buried 6' in 1200 pounds of concrete with 4' above ground holding the mailbox. That gave me a mailbox that weighed about 850 pounds secured with 1200 pounds of concrete and rebar.

I had to remove it because it was an "unnecessary hazard" if someone hit it. Nevermind that they would be driving in my lawn to hit it, it still was not allowed. /forums/images/graemlins/mad.gif

I sold it to a rural resident who used a trackhoe to pull it up and he has been using it for several years now. Nobody has said anything to him about it. He has seen a few "pock" marks from where someone has shot it after they couldn't club it. So far, he has only suffered scratched paint on it. /forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif Myself, I ended up going with the brick design with a planter attached. It isn't nearly as strong as my first design, but the USPS allows this mailbox.

1bush2hog · Oct 7, 2005

I didn't know real M-80's were still available /forums/images/graemlins/blush.gif

Toiyabe · Oct 7, 2005

( It's very stupid, but you have to make sure you don't have the morons destroying your property get hurt when they are doing so )

The real concern is your average driver who looses control of their vehicle, perhaps when there's snow on the road. If they hit a solid object that you purposefully put next to the road and are injured or killed, then you may be in for a big lawsuit. And you may also feel real bad about it - I would.

jmc · Oct 7, 2005

My armchair solution for this is to rig up some kind of a "paint cannon" under the mail box, pointed toward the road, and activated by impact. The next morning, when daddy sees the right side of the family car, there'll be **** to pay.

hayden · Oct 7, 2005

Back to your question about cameras .... I don't think you will get satisfactory results. I've done a security system for a second home I have including a high quality surveylence camera and high quality lens for about $300 total just for the camera and lens. The results are just about useless. The bottom line is that an NTSC image, which is the TV standard that all these cameras use, is such poor quailty that it's almost useless. For example, when zoomed to be able to just capture the parking area where a car would pull up to my house, I still can't read a license plate. A $50 camera with a crap lens will only be worse.

I'm in the process of switching to use a commodity digital camera via computer control. The difference is night and day. I can count bugs on the license plate now. And the whole setup is cheaper too. What's not to like?

There's another aspect to your question, which is night photography. There, IR is probably your best bet. There are IR flood lamps that are not visible the the eye, but will light an area for a camera. I haven't tried any yet, but it's next on my list.

One other thought. From my experience there is a pretty significant delay (1-5 seconds or so) from any kind of sensor that would detect your vandels, to your first image from a camera. If someone is driving by and wacking you mailbox, you might find all you get are pictures of the wreakage after the fact. One solution is to run the camera continuously if you have the storage space for the footage/pictures.

Good Luck.