Cranky trail cam maintenance

[RGrizzzz]

I have several Bushnell trail cameras. Most are the newer DS/dual lens series. They will occasionally get cranky and stop reading cards, despite working for a while. Sometimes they won't read a card when you put it in. I'm not sure if this is weather, card or just luck related. Since they're down for the season, does anyone have any maintenance tips for cameras that are several years old? I'd like to keep them running for a few more seasons, as I have solar panels for them.

I know one of the cellular cams I had was very testy about memory cards. There were all kinds of complaints online about memory card issues. I may replace the cards with newer, higher quality/spec cards.

 

[Stubborn1VT]

Are you formatting your SD cards every time? I used to have problems switching cards between various cameras/brands until I started formatting the SDs in my laptop every time I looked at new pictures. Some cameras also have a "Format card" option.

You're probably aware of this practice, but if not, it made a huge difference for me.

 

[swat1018]

Go with high speed, name brand cards, you will have fewer issues.

 

[Hoytvectrix]

Mark which SD cards you're having the issues with. You'll probably find that it is the card and not the camera.

I format every card within the camera if I can. Otherwise I just use my computer to format the cards.

 

[RGrizzzz]

I'm going to replace the cards. My dad is the guy doing the card pulls usually. I wouldn't call his process "organized". Some of the cards are old/slow cards, and some of the cams do 4k video, which might cause a problem.

We've moved most cams to Cuddelink, but don't want to just trash these. They will go in fields close to house, so we're not driving all over anymore.

 

[Telemark]

I format every card within the camera if I can. Otherwise I just use my computer to format the cards.

This.

And do a hard reset on your cameras.

 

[buckdeer1]

How many download the updates every year?

 

[RGrizzzz]

Some of the things I'm thinking/talking about are more related to physical maintenance. For example, I have solar panels for the Bushnell cams. They were in various states of functionality. One of the panels wasn't charging via USB, so I opened it up. There was some blueish corrosion on the USB charging port. I brushed it off lightly. There was a little more corrosion on the circuit board. I lightly brush it off and hit it with some electronics cleaner. When I plugged it back in, it started charging again. I'll then test to make sure the output ports are working as well. I checked the voltage with a meter while charging to see what was going in, and how much juice the battery had. Another panel still seems dead despite the same process. The solar panel appears to pull 12V in the sun, but won't charge. The board or battery are probably bad.