In motorcycling terms, a farkle is a gizmo, gadget or other optional feature that is added to your motorcycle. Today I installed a new on-board video recording system and gave it a trial run.

The camera can be seen in this first photo. It’s from Twenty20 cameras and is a motorcycle specific camera system. It mounts using a RAM mount system and is powered off of the motorcycle’s electrical system via a 12 volt regulator connected to the battery. It also includes a microphone to pick up audio. The system still needs a recorder to store the video captured.  I’m currently using my old DV video camera stashed in my tank bag. For today’s test I used temporary mount while some new RAM components I’ve ordered are making their way to me via UPS. That’s one nice thing about using a RAM mount, they are modular and you can buy additional arms, bases, etc to customize it to your application.

The other new thing I installed was a LANC controller that mounts on my throttle using industrial-strength velcro. The controller has a single button and a single LED. Holding the button down for a second or two will either turn the recorder on or off.  Tapping the button will start or stop recording.  The LED changes colors to indicate if the recorder is in stand by mode or is recording.  It will flash different codes to let you know if the battery is getting low  or if you are running low on tape. Much easier than the fumbling around I had to do in the past to power the camera up and make sure it was recording!

The weather was pretty nice today, warm and clear. I just did a quick loop up into Seattle and then back home. I mostly wanted to see how the camera handled the vibration and various light levels. For the most part I’m pretty happy with it, though I’ll be much happier once I have a better mount for it.  It ships with a nice mount, but the base doesn’t work well on my ZZR-1200 because it requires a flat surface about 2-inches round and I just don’t have a good flat surface that big available. I’ve ordered a couple of new bases and a longer arm. They’ll be here this week so I think that will solve my problems.

I edited together a short test video and have uploaded it to YouTube.  As soon as it’s available I’ll edit this post to include it. Hopefully we’ll get more good weather in the coming weeks and I’ll be able to do a better test on more interesting roads!