Saw an unusual automotive device this morning, trying to figure out what it is

PhotonWrangler

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This morning I was sitting in a parking lot, preparing to back out. I put the car in reverse and when the backup camera came on, I saw something odd on the front of a car parked behind me. There was a brief flash of light emanating from the area of it's high beams with a 1 second cadence.... blink-blink-blink. I turned around to look at it directly and I saw nothing flashing. Apparently whatever it was, it was operating in the near-IR range. I did a double take just to make sure that I wasn't seeing a reflection off of something else - I wasn't.

So what was this thing? Some sort of infrared obstruction sensing system? It was a newer car but I didn't get the make/model.

:thinking:
 

kingofwylietx

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Does your vehicle have LED reverse lights? If you do, could it have been some PWM from your LED reverse lights being picked up by the camera? If so, perhaps your lights just happened to be in the perfect position for the camera to pick it up?

I was going out on a limb, but it's all I could think of.
 

Ls400

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The fact that the device was near the headlamps, and blinking, makes me think it's a laser jammer. These operate at 904nm, which is visible to many cameras, but not to humans. And they send out pulses of 904nm light to confuse police laser. And they must be placed near headlamps because these are the most reflective areas of a car's frontal area, and they are what police target with their speed laser guns. Some of them can double as parking-assist systems, sending out pulses of light and relying on time-of-flight to calculate distance to obstacles; they mainly have a parking-assist mode to mislead police, not for actually helping you park. These laser jammers are legal to use in many, but not all, states.
 
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Str8stroke

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The fact that the device was near the headlamps, and blinking, makes me think it's a laser jammer. These operate at 904nm, which is visible to many cameras, but not to humans. And they send out pulses of 904nm light to confuse police laser. And they must be placed near headlamps because these are the most reflective areas of a car's frontal area, and they are what police target with their speed laser guns. Some of them can double as parking-assist systems, sending out pulses of light and relying on time-of-flight to calculate distance to obstacles; they mainly have a parking-assist mode to mislead police, not for actually helping you park. These laser jammers are legal to use in many, but not all, states.

Not sure that is what it is or not, but I did learned something new today, that was educational, thank you!
 

Alaric Darconville

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This morning I was sitting in a parking lot, preparing to back out. I put the car in reverse and when the backup camera came on, I saw something odd on the front of a car parked behind me. There was a brief flash of light emanating from the area of it's high beams with a 1 second cadence.... blink-blink-blink. I turned around to look at it directly and I saw nothing flashing. Apparently whatever it was, it was operating in the near-IR range. I did a double take just to make sure that I wasn't seeing a reflection off of something else - I wasn't.

Most phone cameras also pick up IR/near IR. You could have someone in your car in reverse and you could watch the rear of your car through the phone camera and see if you see that your own vehicle is the source.

If it's the other car, maybe it's a proximity detector, but 1-second intervals aren't extremely useful. It's definitely not a quick enough interval to trust while parking because you routinely move more than several inches per second when parking unless you're super paranoid about it.
 

alpg88

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i heard a rumor that law enforcement vehicles use ir strobes so traffic lights turn green for them, it's called Traffic signal preemption
 

Alaric Darconville

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i heard a rumor that law enforcement vehicles use ir strobes so traffic lights turn green for them, it's called Traffic signal preemption
You can, if a passenger (or ask a passenger to) record the active police cars to see if you detect them, depending on if your own city uses such a system.

Poorly-implemented TSP can cause a whole host of problems, not that this is within the scope of the topic, which is identification (or conjecture regarding thereof) of whatever device was seen in the rear view camera.
(This is my way of saying let's not talk about TSP itself further because it can quickly devolve into conspiracy theories or whatever)
 

alpg88

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i have never seen any light to turn green, out of pattern, for any emergency vehicle in nyc, they just go thru reds with lights and sirens on, light does not change, i do not think we have this, in nyc. but other cities may have it.
 
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PhotonWrangler

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The fact that the device was near the headlamps, and blinking, makes me think it's a laser jammer. These operate at 904nm, which is visible to many cameras, but not to humans. And they send out pulses of 904nm light to confuse police laser. And they must be placed near headlamps because these are the most reflective areas of a car's frontal area, and they are what police target with their speed laser guns. Some of them can double as parking-assist systems, sending out pulses of light and relying on time-of-flight to calculate distance to obstacles; they mainly have a parking-assist mode to mislead police, not for actually helping you park. These laser jammers are legal to use in many, but not all, states.

This is one of the possibilities that crossed my mind besides obstacle detection. It was definitely coming from a single point in the headlamp cluster on the driver's side. I'm pretty sure it wasn't the reflection of PWM from my tail lights, however that's a good suggestion and I will test for this.

And the IR-triggered pre-emptor system uses a vastly different flash rate. And in the words of Forrest Gump, "That's all I have to say about that."
 
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boo5ted

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CtnqhjlWEAQYg0Y.jpg
 

kingofwylietx

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From the OP's description, to me, it sounded as if the other vehicle was not being driven. Some of the guesses here are ones that would only be expected on a running/operating vehicle, not one that is parked and turned off.

Photon Wrangler, think back to the headlights and vehicle to see if you can identify it. Then, if you can identify it, we can check the available options for that vehicle to see if the flashing could have originated from a factory system.
 

PhotonWrangler

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From the OP's description, to me, it sounded as if the other vehicle was not being driven. Some of the guesses here are ones that would only be expected on a running/operating vehicle, not one that is parked and turned off.

Photon Wrangler, think back to the headlights and vehicle to see if you can identify it. Then, if you can identify it, we can check the available options for that vehicle to see if the flashing could have originated from a factory system.

I didn't get the make & model at the time, however it struck me as a late model higher end SUV. If I recall correctly, the headlight cluster resembled that of a BMW X5 - a larger round light on the outside with a smaller round light on the inside.
 

Ls400

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I didn't get the make & model at the time, however it struck me as a late model higher end SUV. If I recall correctly, the headlight cluster resembled that of a BMW X5 - a larger round light on the outside with a smaller round light on the inside.

Big, powerful, expensive SUV = owner has deep pockets and is more likely to be speeding and is likely able to afford the aforementioned 904nm light emitting devices.

Did it blink like this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6B7dqhkkuA&t=70
 

PhotonWrangler

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Big, powerful, expensive SUV = owner has deep pockets and is more likely to be speeding and is likely able to afford the aforementioned 904nm light emitting devices.

Did it blink like this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6B7dqhkkuA&t=70

Thanks for the link, LS. Nope, it didn't blink like that at all. It was much brighter and briefer, like a strobe light flashing once per second. The 'on' time was very brief.
 

KITROBASKIN

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Living in a more rural area where we are, rodents will use a parked vehicle as shelter. My latest (1999)Subaru Forester had non-functioning air conditioner when purchased. Turns out rodent chewed a wire. If they get into the HVAC of a vehicle, it is a smelly, nasty event. Had to remember to slide the air recirculator control on a previous car. A solution to this I've seen advertised is a blinking light in the motor area that is said to discourage them from taking residence. Maybe the light you saw was coming from an open seam from the engine bay? ...Another longshot...
 

PhotonWrangler

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Living in a more rural area where we are, rodents will use a parked vehicle as shelter. My latest (1999)Subaru Forester had non-functioning air conditioner when purchased. Turns out rodent chewed a wire. If they get into the HVAC of a vehicle, it is a smelly, nasty event. Had to remember to slide the air recirculator control on a previous car. A solution to this I've seen advertised is a blinking light in the motor area that is said to discourage them from taking residence. Maybe the light you saw was coming from an open seam from the engine bay? ...Another longshot...

Interesting thought. Wouldn't that be a visible light though? I don't think that near-IR light is visible to rodents, although I could be wrong. However I'll keep this tip in mind if I ever move into a rural area!
 

alpg88

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i live in nyc and we have issues with squirrels, especially in the winter, they hide in warm engine bay chewing wires, we had few cars in our shop with that problem. very time consuming diagnostic, and in some cases entire harness needed to be replaced, pretty expensive repair , thou i do not think for a second ir strobe would have any effect on them
 

PhotonWrangler

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Well, I'm an idiot. :p

I figured out what it was. I was at the same gas station the other day when I noticed that there is a blinking blue LED in the gas pump near the credit card slot. Apparently the vehicle's headlight was parked at an angle that reflected the light from the LED into my backup camera but not in my rear view mirror. This is why I assumed it was an IR source at first.

Thanks for all of the theories and information though. I do appreciate it. Now I have to go to the dealer to fix that loose nut behind the steering wheel. :whistle:
 
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