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Found an old VHS camcorder in the attic and tried to turn it into a hidden camera
I found my dad's old VHS-C camcorder from the 90s up in the attic last weekend. Got the idea to gut it and put a modern spy camera inside the shell, thinking it would look perfectly innocent sitting on a shelf. Took me about 4 hours to carefully hollow out the plastic casing and fit a tiny Wi-Fi camera module in there with a battery pack. The unexpected result was that the camcorder's internal metal shielding caused major interference with the wireless signal. I could only get a clear picture if I stood within 10 feet of it, which kind of defeats the purpose. Learned that old electronics often have faraday cage type construction that modern gear doesn't account for. Has anyone else run into interference problems when repurposing older tech like this?
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baker.holly2mo ago
The metal shielding acting like a Faraday cage is such a sneaky problem. @west.casey probably ran into similar issues with that CRT monitor since old displays use heavy shielding too. Hot tip though, try running a thin wire from the antenna out through the battery door to get a better signal.
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west.casey2mo ago
My buddy Mike tried the same thing with an old CRT monitor and got nothing but static lines everywhere.
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