Review on CRUX CUL 03 Universal Mount Camera by Jesse Stewart

[Update: 2019-08-07] Thought I'd upgrade this to 4/5 stars (up from 3/5) simply because it's been working great for over 1.5 years. Use it in our 2010 Civic. Resolution is good and low light performance is very good. Yes, the angle is limited, but it's still okay as it's very useful for parallel parking as we park our car in front of our house on Seattle's crowded residential streets. The camera itself looks great with that "factory" look and I just bought another one to install in our other (even older) Civic. I also bought one as a "backup" in case it fails in the future, but so far it's been great. I remember having to crimp those tiny wires together so I can't go for 5/5 stars, but I think 4/5 would be fair. .Good: - Good build quality, at least feels and looks good - Affordable price considering it's not an unnamed "brand" direct from China (although I'm pretty sure they do is made there) - If you have a good place to mount it (and it should be mounted under a flat surface like a trunk license plate bezel at about a 45 degree angle down) this camera looks like an OEM camera. No silly oversized license plate frame or other obvious aftermarket camera. You don't have to worry about the car wash. Pretty easy to assemble. If you have a suitable place for it, simply drill a hole with the included hole saw (22.5mm), feed the camera thread through the hole and tighten with a nut on the other end. Sealing tape is not included but there is a piece of 3M tape to attach the camera to the shelf instead of or in addition to the thread/nut. I personally applied some clear (although black would have been better) silicone to ensure it was waterproof. The included cables make it easy to connect power from the taillights and send video, as well as activating a reverse trigger on the HU, as a red cable comes out just ahead of the yellow RCA video jack. You connect this red wire to the reverse sensor on an aftermarket (or OEM) head unit to make it work in reverse. The red cable is a nice touch. The camera seems to be of good quality. The image has good resolution and works well in low light. Better low light performance than our 14 year old Toyota Sienna OEM camera. Cons: - Can flip the (horizontal) image and remove leads by stripping and splicing two very thin wires (white for leads and blue for image flip). Unfortunately, the wires are cut by default, which is silly as it's a lot easier to cut those tiny thin wires than it is to splice them together. The **biggest problem** with this camera is that it can't be adjusted at all. , which is good, but even with a roughly flat mount (i.e. at an angle of around 45 degrees down), the camera is aimed too low, so you see most of the bumper and no more than a few feet behind your car. This is for a 2010 Honda Civic and if you have a bigger car or mounting surface your view may of course be better, but the horizontal and vertical view is really limited (i.e. it's not wide at all). It mostly helps not to hit something directly behind you, but not so much in parallel parking as it doesn't give you enough rear sight depth. So to sum up, good cable and relatively easy installation with included hole saw and cleaning, OEM with end result in mind. Good low-light performance, and it certainly looks okay in good light. Unfortunately, the camera isn't wide enough and faces too downward for normal car setups to offer as much utility as you'd expect from a rear camera.