Cuddeback's Cuddelink

[Mark Cuddeback]

A super capacitor is a standard electronic component and are as reliable as any electronic device. They should last longer then the other camera components and I don't see any reliability issues caused by their use. In fact, they could make the camera more reliable because of the lighter load placed on the batteries.

 

[Peplin Creek]

This is Mark Cuddeback. The Power House technology is better for battery life as its puts a smaller drain on the batteries. Power House stores battery energy in super caps (think of supers caps as a small battery). The super caps are used to power the LEDs. The result is more light with less load on the batteries. Plus image quality does not degrade as the batteries age. We expected this to cost an extra $50 per camera, but we were pleasently surprised when the cost increase is only $15 per camera. It is well worth the extra money.

Mark, is there any data that you can share that shows roughly how much battery life is gained with the power house flash unit vs the standard unit in same conditions?

 

[FredG]

This doesn't speak to your question Peplin Creek, but I thought I would post it up for you anyway in case you're interested.

Below is a screen shot of the results from a little torture test I put the super caps through when I first got the Power House 850 module. I was running in stand alone mode with the delay set to FAP (fast as possible) and shooting small critters over bait... (3511 flash pics and 183 day pics). The intent was to evaluate things such as cap refresh rate, how hard do the caps hit the batteries while refreshing, can they keep up with high action periods, is the flash intensity consistent from shot to shot, etc. It was not meant as a test of the ultimate battery life under normal linked-up operating conditions... it was just meant to give the hardware a workout and evaluate how it performs. In short, I couldn't be happier with how well it did. The caps gave each and every shot consistent lighting, cap recharge caused no noticeable slow-up in the shot to shot performance, there was no image quality deterioration start to finish and the batteries seemed to recover quickly from periods of high stress. Everything lived up to my expectations.

 

[Mark Cuddeback]

Fred, thanks for posting your test results. My field testing matches your results - image quality is superior & flash performance does not degrade as batteries weaken. The result should be longer battery life as partially depleted batteries will continue to take full performance images. As a result a person will be able to discharge batteries much further before having to swap batteries. We do know that alkaline battery performance suffers as batteries get below 1.4 volts. With the super caps I would think the camera performance would remain optimum to a battery voltage down to 1.2 volts or lower. What I learned was illumination performance with the Power House flash was superior for the life of the batteries.

 

[Huntingbuck101]

Wow! So much great information in this thread!!! I've read ever single thing on google and FB I could find about these cameras and this thread blows all of it combined away! Read all 27 pages last night before going to bed and yes I did dream about trail cams!

I was planing on going with 4 J series in Black flash but after finding this thread I'm leaning more towards one J series in black and one G series and buying the Powerhouse black flash for it. I'd use the J for my home base for now until the home base comes out and then deploy the J series someplace that I don't need as much ligh.

I'm not seeing any night pics from the J series black flash posted. Could you guys post some so I can see what the flash looks like?

Thanks

 

[Mark Cuddeback]

The advantage of the G Series cameras is the Power House flash & strobe flash. The Power House flash have 3 times the power of a conventional trail camera. However, if you keep the cameras close to the game, say under 50 feet, the J series do an awesome job. My recommendation is to use J cameras and have a few G Power House for fields & food plots. We are in the process of taking some test comparison photos to demonstrate the flash performance differences. As soon as our snow melts we will get these tests completed and post the results - should happen later this week.

 

[Huntingbuck101]

The advantage of the G Series cameras is the Power House flash & strobe flash. The Power House flash have 3 times the power of a conventional trail camera. However, if you keep the cameras close to the game, say under 50 feet, the J series do an awesome job. My recommendation is to use J cameras and have a few G Power House for fields & food plots. We are in the process of taking some test comparison photos to demonstrate the flash performance differences. As soon as our snow melts we will get these tests completed and post the results - should happen later this week.

Thanks Mark. I'm looking forward to seeing them.

 

[Huntingbuck101]

Still looking forwards to seeing those pics between the J and G cameras but I just pulled the trigger on one of each. Figgured if Mark Cuddeback is willing to reply so quick its a product I'm willing to give a try. Getting one of each will help me decide what I'll get in the future for my other cams. Can't show up fast enough!

Also can anyone tell me what the native resolution is?

 

[FredG]

...Also can anyone tell me what the native resolution is?

The native resolution of the CMOS is 5MP (2576 X 1984 pixels) with the option for a 2X interpolation to 20MP (5152 X 3968 pixels).

 

[archer100]

Mark,
Have an idea if cabelas will get the 4 packs in? Have a pile of cabelas points built up and want to use on cameras!! Looking forward to trying some!!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[john volkman]

Mark,
Have an idea if cabelas will get the 4 packs in? Have a pile of cabelas points built up and want to use on cameras!! Looking forward to trying some!!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Cabelas will be stocking the 4 packs, most likely in the next month or two.

 

[Huntingbuck101]

This is torture! Orderd a J and G series camera Monday morning from optics planet as well as a Powerhouse flash modual from Farmers Archery. Modual showed up today but cameras didn't.

I was told on the phone that the free 2 day shipping was after the 48 hour processing time!!! Oh well, prices were good but it's killing me! I haven't even seen one of these camera before in person. Not very often I wish away my weekends but Monday can't come soon enough!

 

[12pointer]

Cabelas will be stocking the 4 packs, most likely in the next month or two.

John,

If a camera loses its link does it still collect images like a stand alone camera and store them on the ad card? I ask because camera 6 in my network hasn't sent any images back to the home camera, but the cuddelink html table from the home camera shows the number of images on camera 6 going up? There are no images in the que! It must be communicating because the home camera knows the number of images on camera 6's sd card is going up, but none of the images are at the home camera. Any idea what is going on here?

 

[john volkman]

John,

If a camera loses its link does it still collect images like a stand alone camera and store them on the ad card? yes it does, and when it connects to a home camera on the same channel it will start sending them. I ask because camera 6 in my network hasn't sent any images back to the home camera, but the cuddelink html table from the home camera shows the number of images on camera 6 going up? There are no images in the que! It must be communicating because the home camera knows the number of images on camera 6's sd card is going up, but none of the images are at the home camera. Any idea what is going on here?

hard to say without looking at the report but it may be in another folder on your SD card. Can you check if there is more than one folder on the home sd card? You can post an image of the HTML report and the status report of each camera and that may help. Im rarely on the forum this time of year with everything going on, if im not working im either turkey hunting or working on habitat projects. You can always call Cuddeback CS and get a quick answer but i will try to check this forum. it may be a week or more until im on it this time of year.

 

[12pointer]

hard to say without looking at the report but it may be in another folder on your SD card. Can you check if there is more than one folder on the home sd card? You can post an image of the HTML report and the status report of each camera and that may help. Im rarely on the forum this time of year with everything going on, if im not working im either turkey hunting or working on habitat projects. You can always call Cuddeback CS and get a quick answer but i will try to check this forum. it may be a week or more until im on it this time of year.

Thanks John,

I will call cs if I have to......

There are 6 folders in the 400 cuddy folder and each folder has the correct status image because they all shows the correct battery days, camera id's etc! However, no images from camera 6 have been sent to the home camera! The sd card had 3 images on Friday and 6 on Saturday according to the status report but the home camera had no images!

I don't have my laptop at home right now or I would post the reports, so I will post them tomorrow morning and wait to hear back from you! If that's in a week then so be it

 

[john volkman]

Thanks John,

I will call cs if I have to......

There are 6 folders in the 400 cuddy folder and each folder has the correct status image because they all shows the correct battery days, camera id's etc! However, no images from camera 6 have been sent to the home camera! The sd card had 3 images on Friday and 6 on Saturday according to the status report but the home camera had no images!

I don't have my laptop at home right now or I would post the reports, so I will post them tomorrow morning and wait to hear back from you! If that's in a week then so be it

how strong is the rf signal on camera 6? its possible there is something up with that camera but if its sending the stats report it should be sending the images as well. How many cameras do you have out ? 6? post the HTML report and the status report for camera 6 when you can

 

[12pointer]

I have 6 out and 4 more to go! I have been installing 2 at a time each week and making sure they work, and it seems like 5 and 6 are doing the same thing! The status reports are accurate as far as battery days, camera id, etc.....just no images are coming back! When I install them, I wait until it arms so it will take my picture when I leave! About 3 hours after I installed cameras 5 and 6 I pulled the sd card on my home camera and both status reports showed 3 images on each sd card ( I am set for 3 pictures per event, but no images got sent back for either camera! I checked the home camera sd card two days later and based on the status report camera 6 as card went from 3 images to 6, but still no pictures on the home camera for either camera 5 or 6!

I would agree that if it knows how many pictures are on each camera then it's communicating! The rf level was low and bouncing between 22 and 18, but as I said I believe it's communicating or the status reports wouldn't update! I will post them tomorrow!

One more question, what triggers the cuddeback html status table! There are usually two each time I pull the card! Is a certain time everyday? Doesn't seem that way, because it seems to contain recent info if I go walk in front of one of my other cameras a d then go pull the home card!

 

[Peplin Creek]

I have 6 out and 4 more to go! I have been installing 2 at a time each week and making sure they work, and it seems like 5 and 6 are doing the same thing! The status reports are accurate as far as battery days, camera id, etc.....just no images are coming back! When I install them, I wait until it arms so it will take my picture when I leave! About 3 hours after I installed cameras 5 and 6 I pulled the sd card on my home camera and both status reports showed 3 images on each sd card ( I am set for 3 pictures per event, but no images got sent back for either camera! I checked the home camera sd card two days later and based on the status report camera 6 as card went from 3 images to 6, but still no pictures on the home camera for either camera 5 or 6!

I would agree that if it knows how many pictures are on each camera then it's communicating! The rf level was low and bouncing between 22 and 18, but as I said I believe it's communicating or the status reports wouldn't update! I will post them tomorrow!

One more question, what triggers the cuddeback html status table! There are usually two each time I pull the card! Is a certain time everyday? Doesn't seem that way, because it seems to contain recent info if I go walk in front of one of my other cameras a d then go pull the home card!

What are your time intervals? Do you have both the trigger time and cuddelink time set to the same?

 

[12pointer]

What are your time intervals? Do you have both the trigger time and cuddelink time set to the same?

Not sure what your asking... The trigger is every 10 seconds and I believe it's sending every 5 seconds which was the default time! I believe the other 4 are set the same way and they are working

 

[john volkman]

I have 6 out and 4 more to go! I have been installing 2 at a time each week and making sure they work, and it seems like 5 and 6 are doing the same thing! The status reports are accurate as far as battery days, camera id, etc.....just no images are coming back! When I install them, I wait until it arms so it will take my picture when I leave! About 3 hours after I installed cameras 5 and 6 I pulled the sd card on my home camera and both status reports showed 3 images on each sd card ( I am set for 3 pictures per event, but no images got sent back for either camera! I checked the home camera sd card two days later and based on the status report camera 6 as card went from 3 images to 6, but still no pictures on the home camera for either camera 5 or 6!

I would agree that if it knows how many pictures are on each camera then it's communicating! The rf level was low and bouncing between 22 and 18, but as I said I believe it's communicating or the status reports wouldn't update! I will post them tomorrow!

One more question, what triggers the cuddeback html status table! There are usually two each time I pull the card! Is a certain time everyday? Doesn't seem that way, because it seems to contain recent info if I go walk in front of one of my other cameras a d then go pull the home card!

if you have it set to 3 images (burst) you will not get all the images because the shortest the cuddelink delay can be set is 5 seconds. You want the camera delay to be the same or longer than the cuddelink delay. You should be getting at least one of the 3 images. Set your camera delay to 5 seconds with one image per trigger (or longer) the next time you are by the cameras and see if that helps. if it doesnt i would pull those cameras and have them in front of you when you call CS so they can go thru the menu with you and make sure something isnt set different.
The html report is set to build once per day, usually at night(if you have times set on the cam). The status reports build every 2 hours or so but only save the latest one for each camera.