Speed Cameras

[Gus-]

hey guys,

mobile speed cameras...anyone know how far away they can get you and whether they flash at night or not???

i remember it came in in convo on friday with mates and yeah jsut wondering if anyone knew for sure....

and also whats the rule for being placed visually...do they have to be under street lights etc???

gus

[putraged]

i saw lots of them in belconnen way. in the middle of the street and they placed them in a very tricky way. we cant see it over than 50 meters or until we're on top of the road's slope. once i went 90's and there was no flash (my mate behind me). hope it helps.

[a20089]

Effective range is limited to ensure accruate reading, in perfect conditions over 1km is possible. They do not need to flash. Unless on a special funds grab they are set to 10% of actual speed (not what your speedo says). ie 88 in an 80 zone your gone.

The above is based upon conversations with speedcamera operations, friends that have been booked ect.

[Randon_I_Am]

Also they dont use radar, they use the same guns as police... they have to land a laser beam on your car first to get a reading...

theres also a thing called the "cos" factor, It derives from pythagoris theroem... one of the guys who works in them told me that for every 1m they are beside you... (1m off the road) it makes for a 20m difference to the car... NOT 20km/hr, but 20m, the camera then has to then do the math with that difference so you end up with a lower speed overall if the camera is further to the side.

(ie if its sitting off to the right of a 2 lane road you could probably go through in the left lane doing 20% over... they give you 10% and depending where it is sitting the "cos" factor will knock you speed down some more...

also the fixxed cameras using RADAR, you can tell they use radar because there are no loops cut into the road beside it.

They CANNOT take a picture if there is 2 cars in the beam, I have done a little work on these and we were testing the one on hume highway (southbound), everytime 2 cars went across its radar beam it read "ILL" instead of their speed...

[Randon_I_Am]

Also its not 10%, but 10% + 1

the lowest posable ticket for an 80 road is 89... but i only know this is true for the fixxed cameras, i suspect the same for the mobile ones too

harsh too, my house mate just got a ticket for 89 on ginninderra drive lol

[Gus-]

can the mobile ones get two cars at once???

and do they flash at night i ment...?

[RB ONEVIA]

yes they flash at night. my missus exs dad did it. range is 100m at day an 50m i think at night. i dont know what theyre set at but anything over the speed limit is speeding.....

[Randon_I_Am]

because they DONT use radar they WOULD be able to distinguish between the 2 cars... so i would say they can get one of the 2 cars, depending who their pointing it on... usually the right lane, as they keep it set up between cars so they dont have to adjust it over and over again.

[Helious]

I think there is two types of the mobile speed vans. One does flash, but the more modern ones have infra-red so you wont see a flash. But with infra red comes a problem that if the numberplate is too hot, it will be a blur. There is apparently a very large list of restriction using the van, ranging from visibility and humidity all the way to whether there is a tree behind you or whether a bird flys past your car. The reason for this is because they blast you with radiation sending it all over ur car so a return beam is guarenteed, unlike a single beam which would be impossible to get a return beam from. I also remember the vans take 2 photos, one of ur plate and the other of your face.

But as the fixed ones are radar, apparently a very white/bluish white coloured blub for your numberplate light will cause it to blur or haze as the light it too hot for the radar (the only radiation they can use is infra-red as anything else could cause interference)

Most of this info has come from one of those guys who you see working on them, and the rest just what i read...so dont trust any of it ><

But if I'm wrong, correct me

[Shell]

We spoke to some of the guys that operate them, when they were at a car show, and he said that they can get your speed from a fair way away, but can't book you till you're very close (I can't remember the metres exactly, but it was close). His words were, you could be doing 180kms but as long as you slam on the brakes before you get close you'll be fine.

He basically said you have to be a dickhead to get done by one (ie. not paying any attention at all) cos most people keep an eye out and will spot them way before they can book you.

These are the vans I'm talking about. This was also a couple of years ago... so things may have changed.

[Randon_I_Am]

the fixxed speed camera "numbner plate light" is a load of sht... sorry... but they use a normal flash and a standard digital camera inside them, trust me ive seen all the files on one, each time they take 4 pics, 2 up close of the plate and 2 to get the whole car, its very rare that the fixxed ones will miss ya.

[slaughter]

also the customised black and white plates are cheaper then the customised black and yellow, because black and white show up easier on a speed camera, then the black and yellow.

[Scooby]

The reason for this is because they blast you with radiation

Fark, a speeding ticket as well as being made sterile and glowing in the dark. Time to break out the alfoil suit. As long as it doesn't reflash my ecu!!

[natett]

Guys stop adding to the already ridiculous amount of rumours regarding speed vans, cameras and police etc.

I doesnt matter what colour your number plate is. If it is legal and from the shopfront it is reflective. If you have fakes then i laugh when you get pulled over for being so stupid.

With regards to the Vans. You need to be within 100m and generally around the 75m mark is where most get their picture. The van can take a clear picture of you from over 1km away however the photo and correct speed need to be taken at the same time.

If you want to know how i know...lets just say i have a lot of police in my family

[mjfawke]

I did some research on this after almost getting done a few years ago, so this was for when the cameras were first introduced.

The laser speed checker part of the camera's is effective to at least 500m, but in good conditions (ie. NOT through a tinted window) and with a red target car, it can get accurate speed at over 1km. But the camera itself has two lenses, a wide and a telephoto, and has an official range of 100m - but I've talked to someone who reckons they got pinged at close to 150m. And for those who think they were going too fast to be caught... the speed range was +/- 320kph. The only useful bit of info is that the auto focus used to be a bit slow, so it couldn't get a good shot if you were rapidly decelerating... like someone I may know who doing 190kph on the parkway when he saw the van and managed to slow to 90kph (courtesy of Brembo) as he passed them and didn't get done.

[Guest]

Cop's speed gun range depends on how steady they hold it.

My cop neighbour let me play with his hand held speed trap gun. it's easy pointing a red laser dot on an object and click.

The laser pulses at something like 1000Hz, and it calculates distance and speed of the object.

I've managed to get a distance to light pole about 70m away, pointed at my neighbour's dog doing 3km/h, 50m away. Note that

those are small objects compared to a car.

These speed guns don't have a camera that takes a photo.

[TRB-001]

point of the story is..... dont speed

[Gus-]

point of the story is..... dont speed

bah

haha

[joshguy]

out of curiosity, whats the go with the hand held ones? do the coppers get in the car and come after you or do the camera thingys hav a photo taker? i see them all the time and it just looks like a waste of time...

[RB ONEVIA]

Cop's speed gun range depends on how steady they hold it.

My cop neighbour let me play with his hand held speed trap gun. it's easy pointing a red laser dot on an object and click.

The laser pulses at something like 1000Hz, and it calculates distance and speed of the object.

I've managed to get a distance to light pole about 70m away, pointed at my neighbour's dog doing 3km/h, 50m away. Note that

those are small objects compared to a car.

These speed guns don't have a camera that takes a photo.

hence why they are called radar guns.

Edited June 7, 2009 by RB ONEVIA