My Wonky Drift Innovation HD170 Stealth

If you've read my previous posts, you'll know that I have two Drift Innovation HD170 Stealth POV cameras that I like to mount to my motorcycle to capture forward and rearward facing footage.  Over the last several rides, I've been having problems with one of the cameras.  It initially started as the random file being corrupted, but then I'd find that the camera would be powered off after a random period of time, or the camera would be locked up and couldn't be reset unless the battery was removed. After a lot of testing, I determined that there was a loose connection in the camera.  I dug up the original order from Amazon.com and found that the camera was 2 months past the end of the 1 year warranty period at this point, but I figured I had nothing to lose by contacting the good folks at Drift Innovation.

I initially used their email contact form on their website but didn't get a response, so I hit them on FaceBook and got a near instantaneous response from Laura, who recommended I open up a service request on their Support page.  I opened the ticket, got a response asking me to send a video of the behavior I was describing, made the video and uploaded it, and waited.  I then received an auto-generated email from their Support site asking me to complete a satisfaction survey, which I thought was odd since the ticket was still open, so I figured I'd just give them a call.  I got a hold of the Support Tech who had my ticket, and he said this definitely looked like an odd problem, but since they do not manufacture the HD170 Stealth any more, he couldn't offer me a replacement camera.  He did, however, offer to send me a refurbished Drift HD camera, which is an upgrade to the HD170 Stealth.  That seemed to be a very good deal to me, especially since they could have simply told me that my camera was out of warranty and that I was SoL.  He even offered to send me an additional battery to offset the fact that I would not be able to use the additional high-capacity batteries that I had purchased for my HD170 Stealth in the new camera.

The next day, I took the camera to FedEx, and despite shipping it via FedEx Ground for which delivery is 3-5 business days, the camera was delivered to Drift Innovation's offices 2 days later.  Kudos to FedEx!  Even more amazing was that 3 business days later, I had my replacement Drift HD camera!  Unfortunately, the tech forgot to pack a spare battery, but that's okay since it uses the same standard capacity battery as the HD170 Stealth.  Once I have a chance to spend some time with the new camera, I'll post some thoughts on it versus the old one.

So thumbs up to Drift Innovation for stepping up and standing behind their product rather than leaving a customer high and dry with a faulty product because of an expired warranty period.

UPDATE:  Shortly after I received the replacement camera, my other HD170 Stealth started exhibiting similar problems, so I contacted Drift Innovation again.  Again, they stepped up to the plate, and they provided another refurb Drift HD to replace this unit.

I am pleased to say that these cameras seem to be working perfectly.  I am, however, having to adjust to having only ~90 minutes of record time with these standard sized batteries.  I really do miss the HD170 Stealth's 4 hour long lifers.  Perhaps I'll sell these cameras on eBay and upgrade myself to the Drift Ghost, which has batteries with a claimed 3 hour run time.

Windshields, iPods/iPhones, Wheel Stripes, and POV Cams

Of windshields...

Just a quick update to share some additional thoughts on the X-creen now that I've had a chance to go on two extended rides with it installed.  The two rides I've been on since installing the X-creen were both over 100 miles each, and I have to say that I'm very please with it still.  I've tweaked the wing angle just a tiny bit, but for the most part it's where I had it positioned after my initial test rides.  I no longer feel the side-to-side buffeting that I used to, and it seems that the wind roar is a bit less than with the stock shield, too.  I can still duck down a little bit and notice some change in the amount of wind roar, but nothing like before.  I think it would be nice if the X-creen had some standoffs like the stocker's to raise the angle of the primary shield a bit more.  One bit of concern to me is that the X-creen does seem to flex quite a bit in the wind at highway speeds.  I haven't seen any cracks or anything yet, so I'm assuming that it's performing as designed.  I'll just keep an eye on it as time goes by.  On the whole, though, I'm very pleased with it and will keep it installed in favor of the stock windshield.

I have to admit that I'm still curious as to how well the Givi AirFlow AF3101 windshield works in comparison, but at $200+ it's not a curiosity I can see satisfying any time soon, especially considering how well I think the X-creen is working.

I'm also curious about the Saeng Micro-swirl edging, and at only $12.50/foot, I can even justify buying it even if I ultimately don't use it.  I'm wondering if a combination of this edging and the X-creen might be an even better solution.  Stay tuned as I may well place an order.

Of iPods and iPhones...

When I ride long distances, I usually wear ear plugs, but sometimes I want to listen to music instead of my own random thoughts or humming.  Yes, I actually hum to myself and even perform private karaoke while motoring down the road.  When I delegate the music performance to my digital stable of better-talented MP3s, I've been depending on my trusty old 4th Generation iPod Photo 30GB.  Unfortunately, I've noticed lately that the battery only lasts about 2.5 hours, forcing me to take up the slack again and go back to humming and karaoke.

I've looked into eBay and purchasing an after-market replacement battery to prolong its useful life as well as simply replacing it with the current 160GB iPod Classic.  The replacement battery is a much cheaper solution than the 160GB iPod Classic, but 160GB will just about hold my entire library.  I then realized that I still have my perfectly functioning 32GB iPhone 3GS sitting idly in my drawer resulting from my 4S upgrade, and it is perfectly capable of providing music and more.  So on this last ride, I loaded it up with some Pink Floyd and the MotionX GPS app.  Even though it may not be quite as accurate without cellular data, the GPS still worked quite well.

The MotionX GPS app is nice in that while cruising along, it will give me audible updates every 10 minutes, telling me how long I've been riding, how far I've gone, and what my current speed is.  The current speed information was a little bit sketchy, considering it's GPS-based, and often wasn't even close to my actual speed if I had sped up or slowed down significantly prior to the update.  If I had traveling fairly steady, then my indicated speed was approximately 4mph higher than my GPS-reported speed, which is also good to know.  At the end of the ride, it shows my track on a map, which I can then share or store for future reference.  The app also has the ability to send regular updates to people via email, FaceBook or Twitter.  I haven't tried this feature yet, but I will.

With the music running along with the GPS app, I had about 45% of the battery life available at the end of my 2h 45m ride.  This means I would get approximately 5 hours of total battery life, which isn't too shabby.  For a multi-day truly long-distance trip, I can see where an extended battery pack or tying into the bike's electrical system would be warranted.  I would eventually want to get a weatherproof case for the iPhone and a RAM mount so I could actually see the controls (or even use MotionX GPS Drive) instead of just leaving it in my jacket pocket, but that's not really a necessity for me right now.

Of Wheel Stripes...

I finally received my order of orange reflective wheel stripes from the good folks at GLSigns.com, but I haven't had a chance to install them yet.  The orange isn't a perfect match, and it's even arguable that it's close.  In the shade, you would say it's close, but I need to pull the bike out in bright sunlight and do a comparison just to see if it's so different that it would annoy me.  I figure my fallback position would be to order some black reflective stripes that reflect silver.  The primary goal is to increase my night time visibility to other drivers.  The secondary goal is aesthetic.  I was lucky with my Ninja 650R in that the deep red stripes matched the red frame almost perfectly.  I may look at this in the morning.  Check back later for an update.

That's it for this update.  I hope you learned something or at least enjoyed the read.  The next post will probably be about my POV camera's woes and their hopefully pleasant resolution.