Arlo|Smart Home Security|Wireless HD Security Cameras
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Gypsy_Girl21
Aspirant
Aspirant
My Arlo Ultra 2 is positioned over my car in my driveway to catch if anyone steals it. Problem being the camera is constantly sending me notifications of my parked car, this draining the battery.
I do not want to turn the vehicle smart sensor off because my library is still full of a parked car - just classified as “motion” and still draining the heck out of the battery.
Any ideas would be appreciated.
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Dannybear
Master
Master
Could be clouds, if occurring during certain times of the day when the sun shines off the windscreen.

https://kb.arlo.com/583/How-does-motion-detection-work-on-Arlo-cameras-and-doorbells
Gypsy_Girl21
Aspirant
Aspirant
Hi Dannybear, I don’t believe it is clouds setting it off, as it’s also happening all night.
Dannybear
Master
Master
You could try pulling the power and or battery for 10sec to reset the camera. Do the same for the base station.

You can also check the sensitivity settings for motion detection in the camera rule for the armed mode. Default is 80%.

If
StephenB
Guru Guru
Guru

I am wondering if you parked the car somewhere else as a test, whether the camera would still be making these motion recordings.

 

Reducing motion sensitivity is I think the place to start.

Gypsy_Girl21
Aspirant
Aspirant
Hey Stephen thanks for the tips.
I’ve already done both of these. When I move my car - funnily enough the camera doesn’t go off. But the reason I brought the camera is to watch my car as I live in a dodgy area.

My motion sensitivity is currently on 1 and still going off.

If anything I believe this is a fault with Arlo cameras as it seems to be a popular issue with no real resolution.
Cameras should not be constantly detecting a parked car.
Gypsy_Girl21
Aspirant
Aspirant
Thank you for your suggestion Dannybear. I have reset the home kit multiple times and also reset the camera.

I have 2 cameras. One on my car, one on my dads. Only the camera watching my car goes off Constantly not his.

My motion sensitivity is currently 1
StephenB
Guru Guru
Guru

@Gypsy_Girl21 wrote:

I have 2 cameras. One on my car, one on my dads. Only the camera watching my car goes off Constantly not his.


Try swapping them, and see if the problem moves.

Gypsy_Girl21
Aspirant
Aspirant
Thanks, I’ll give this a go.
Dannybear
Master
Master
Will the camera misbehave if you reverse the direction of the vehicle?
Just thinking that if the vehicle has an anti theft indicator on the front dashboard it could be triggering the camera motion sensor.
Gypsy_Girl21
Aspirant
Aspirant
What a great suggestion DannyBear.
I hadn’t even considered that as a trigger and my car does have the anti theft indicator!
I’ll see how that goes 😊
secaz
Virtuoso
Virtuoso

Lately my Arlo Pro cams are being a PIA with triggering constantly.  I have a couple out front that are way far back from the street, and suddenly they trigger all the time.  Used to have them set at 75% and 85%, and they would trigger only when someone came up the walk, which I what I want and always worked fine until past day or so.

 

Now I have had to set them very low, 10% and 45%, but this means they won't pick up people on the walkway during the day... and certainly won't pick them up on the walkway at night... 

 

Since it's the end of the week, I can only assume it's an Arlo thing, they seem to like to start working on their systems every Thursday.

 

Can't angle cameras away from street without losing visibility to walkway.  Besides, always used to work fine, so don't see why I should have to go through conniptions all of a sudden because Arlo likely again changed or broke something.  And it's not false triggers from plants or trees where coincidentally a car or person on the street just happens to be going by at the same time. I live in the desert and my front yard is gravel and cactus and boulders.

 

 

Gypsy_Girl21
Aspirant
Aspirant
Glad to see I’m not the only one experiencing issues!
I’ve since moved my car so my camera isn’t draining in a matter of days
secaz
Virtuoso
Virtuoso

Nope, you are not... this afternoon I've had to reduce mine to 1%, even at 5% was still getting triggers for people walking by 60 ft away or more. 

 

I had to stop using Arlo Smart, sucks life out of batteries, and who in the desert in the summer wants to constantly run outside to replace batteries?  Even at night here it's HOT.  So, activity zones are nice, but not at the cost of battery life... at least not in the summer, may switch back to Arlo Smart in the winter...

 

Arlo is sub-par, have been using for many years, the hardware (at least the older Pro cameras) is REALLY AWESOME, they can stand desert heat without shutting down and take serious abuse from elements and wildlife (favorite targets of Gila woodpeckers), but everything else?  Great when it works, is hell when it doesn't, you can't rely on the system, even if you can rely on the hardware.

 

I have two little terriers who are my eyes and ears, so I rely on them when Arlo fails... which is often...

 

I set up some new custom modes and set "sane" sensitivity levels, will see what happens.  I know what percentages always worked for me, so will see if those in conjunction with new custom modes has any effect... but I really think it's just Arlo upgrading their systems that's the problem...

secaz
Virtuoso
Virtuoso

BTW - I just noticed an old issue rearing its head again.  Got a video which shows no trigger, however, I know there had to be a valid one.  A camera in the same vicinity caught the vehicle going by which was the trigger.  The video from the camera over my garage, however, has no trigger, nothing in the video to indicate there was one.  Both videos have the same time stamp.

 

Incidentally, the camera which recorded the video without showing what triggered the camera, this camera over my garage overlooks my car which is always in the driveway.  So the video I have merely shows my car in the driveway, not the vehicle which drove by.

Dannybear
Master
Master
There is a number of possible reasons for seeing what you have described.

Infrared reflections from surfaces such as glass or mirrors as cars drive past.

A camera rule includes an action to record additional cameras when it is triggered.

The infrared sensor in the camera can cover an area greater than the lens FOV which could explain why you never see the triggering object.

The sensor operating range is up to 25ft although further if sensitivity is increased. Increasing sensitivity will lead to higher unwanted triggering events and hence the test utility in the camera settings menu for optimal values to insert in the camera mode rules.

The direction of movement is also important as the infrared sensor’s fractal cover is contoured for sideways motion so camera positioning is essential.
TomMac
Guru Guru
Guru

To be honest, it sounds like you need to move away from a battery/PIR camera to a powered/pixel change detection...

 

You can look for an older Q camera and or the newer Indoor essential camera.  Yes, neither are outdoor rated and Arlo would not support this.  But, these cameras do work thru glass ( read windows ) and will be fine at night with external IR flood light ( which are inexpensive ). Also the range will be improved.

 

It may not solve the false trigger but will fix the battery issue and be better at detection ( range ).

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Morse is faster than texting!
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Gypsy_Girl21
Aspirant
Aspirant
Given how much these cameras cost and the ongoing subscription charge, the least I expect is some reliability out of these cameras.
I won’t be accepting “buy a new camera” as the solution.
Arlo can fix their hardware.
secaz
Virtuoso
Virtuoso

Warning - rant forthcoming.

 

I have been using Arlo since 2017 - and you know what?  There was a brief period of time, early on, where everything worked like magic for about a year, was dependable as all get out.  Then Arlo started breaking things left and right - and for all their denials that it wasn't them and that it was their dim bulb customers, suddenly everything would work right again... UNTIL the next round of "lets see how many more lines of code we can cram into this unmitigated mess".

 

Think by this point they need to start with a clean slate, honestly.

 

Point being, my cameras work just fine with the settings which have always worked for years and years UNLESS Arlo goes and breaks something with updates.

 

Fact is, my settings worked fine until recently, and it's that time of year again, probably, for a Arlo to again break things.  Same problems crop up, there's a round of denials, then for no apparent reason everything, eventually, starts working again.

 

Look - Arlo breaks things as simple as Arlo Smart notifications.  I had to disable Arlo Smart - could not turn off animated previews to save my life.  Always had them off, then suddenly started getting them along with the non-animated thumbnail which arrives first, then transmutes into an animated preview.  My eyesight is horrible, and the animated previews make it impossible for me to follow whatever, whoever, triggers a camera.  It's way easier for me to open the app and watch the video.  Takes more time, but at least I can SEE the trigger.  Maybe.  Depends on what's broken with Arlo, in general, at any given time.

 

I have 17 cameras on this property, and use three base stations - so, "go buy new ones" doesn't fly.  I understand that support falls off for all but current versions, but this is Arlo breaking things that WEREN'T broken, likely to make customers with older systems run out and by new ones.  Again, the problems mysteriously "fix" themselves.  So, you decide.

 

And getting help from Arlo is a joke and a half.  Their techs just read from a script.  And their pat recommendation is to RESET YOUR ENTIRE SYSTEM.  They've been saying that since DAY ONE and that has NEVER fixed a single thing for me EVER.

 

So when you read posts from cranky customers like me, It's not like we don't have a right to complain after all the money we've pumped into our systems.

 

And again, the hardware is damned amazing, especially older hardware version of Arlo Pro.  My cameras have take the abuse of 122 degree heat, angry Gila woodpeckers, monsoon rains and winds and microbursts and raging haboob dust storms, extremes of hot and cold in a single day, and they work STILL work great... UNTIL Arlo breaks something... then I typically have to wait two or three months, maybe longer, for things to work right again.

 

I'm used to it after all these years, but new customers are far less likely to accept such deficiencies as unreliability.

 

Wired cameras aren't possible for me, I can't do it myself, and I'm not about to pump more money into this system by paying someone to run cables for me so the cameras are always on a charger.  Wire free free works fine for me, and when Arlo Smart sucks, I turn it off and batteries will last a really long time.  Arlo Smart can't tell a person from a cactus, a dog from a rock, it's hysterical what it identifies things as, and useless to me most of the time.  And can't count the number of times it would identify the big UPS or FedEx truck rolling as "other motion".

 

And I can ALWAYS tell when it's Thursday, that seems to be when Arlo starts working on their systems.  I work from home so know when people drive by, dogs tell me or I will see it from the window, or someone will ring the bell, and won't get any notifications, no videos... and yup, it's Thursday or Friday...!!!  lol  And with as many cameras as I have, at least ONE camera is going to trigger no matter what if things are working right, and when none do, it's Arlo working on something, or breaking something...

 

End of rant.  Thx.

Weinc_1
Aspirant
Aspirant
Question:
Brief experiment optional?…
Continuous circumstances revolving around light or the lack there of with the same results then notifications caused by sound reflection- experiment by focusing camera at inanimate objects (yard ornament) in opposite direction of vehicle review results of both vehicle and object notably probable cause sound reflection. Plausible however impractical,
Please post your findings in either regard positive or negative
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