I was recently called to a body shop to calibrate a front facing windshield camera on a 2019 Honda CRV (Figure 1) that just had a windshield replaced. This vehicle was equipped with the Lane Keep Assist System that worked in conjunction with the Electronic Steering to keep the vehicle safely within its lane while driving on a highway. It is part of the Advanced Driver Assist System that is designed to limit accidents on the road by using multiple onboard systems that work with one another on the same network. If one component of the ADAS system is disturbed in any way it becomes a liability for the repair tech to make sure the system is put back to specification.
There may be no lights on the dash or even a code stored in memory but knowing that the system has been tampered with, it is recommended by the manufacture that a calibration should be performed. In this case a new windshield was installed and during the process the camera assembly was removed from the old windshield and was remounted on the new windshield. It may not seem like a hard task to R&R a camera from its mount but there are no guarantees that it would be placed back in its original position. If an aftermarket windshield is used, you must make sure it is to factory specification of having a proper glass pitch and a composition of glass material that a camera can see through. If any of these requirements are not met, then the camera calibration process will fail. It is also important that the windshield cones with a quality heating grid for the camera lens to keep it from fogging up during certain weather conditions. The body shop in this case settled for a factory original windshield.
In order to perform a front windshield camera calibration, you need a large space in front of the vehicle. It is recommended to have 10 meters (32 Feet 9.7 Inches) of open area in front of the vehicle and about 4 meters (13 Feet 1.48 Inches) of width (Figure 2). There also cannot be any black and white objects in the aiming space because it may confuse the camera and not allow the camera to focus on the target patterns. The vehicle was inside the shop so you don’t have to worry about direct sunlight but you do need to make sure you have proper lighting in the building and not have lights directly reflecting on the targets.
Once you have established a working area with the correct dimensions it is equally important that you are working on a level floor that has no pitch or roll for drainage. The vehicle and frame machine must be on level ground in order to properly align the camera. You will have to find the centerline of the vehicle and this can be done by first using a plumb bob at the rear of the vehicle referencing the string line with the emblem to mark the floor (Figure 3). Next you will need to plumb the front of the vehicle and in this case, I centered a 5-way laser directly under the plumb bob (Figure 4). By rotating the laser housing, I directed the laser line to hit a laser target I placed on the floor at the back of the vehicle on the rear floor marking (Figure 5). The laser also shot out in front of the vehicle so I could place a further mark ahead of the vehicle in line with the laser and create a taped marking. I made a measurement of 4 meters from the center of the left front wheel out towards the front of the vehicle and moved my laser further out keeping in line with vehicle centerline until it’s horizontal laser line met with the 4 meter point (Figure 6). This would be the spot where my frame machine would be centered on.
The frame machine came with an attached 4-line laser, so I simply turned it on and aligned the horizontal and vertical lasers with the 4-meter mark and the centerline of the vehicle (Figure 7). I locked and leveled the frame in place by adjusting the frame floor knobs while watching the bubble gauges on the frame. It is important that the frame is fully level with the floor. Once this is accomplished it is equally important to set the height of the frame arms that hold the targets to the specific height for this vehicle at 59.06 inches from the floor. This was easily done using a laser measure attached to the frame (Figure 8). The next important step is to properly set up the 2 camera target supports to be equally distant from the frame center at about 630 mm (24.8 inches) by sliding the supports on the measured markings on the frame machine (Figure 9). The last step is to place the targets on the target supports so the camera is ready to be aimed.
You will notice that the targets placed on the frame arms (Figure 10) are not identical but have inverse patterns. There is a right and left target for this vehicle, and you want to make sure you do not place them on wrong sides. These targets are specific to this vehicle using square black & white patterns that must be the correct size and laid out on a target board that also must be the correct overall size so you really have to make sure you don’t use a target that is not properly configured for the vehicle you are working on. A wrong target or frame specification set up may not allow the camera to finish its calibration or if it does then you may have issues on how the vehicle will perceive the roadway and that will be a liability issue on your part. Once I made sure everything was to the proper setting all I had to do was hit the continue button on my scan tool and the camera calibration was successfully completed. It was kind of like being at a movie set where I was ready to yell Lights! Action! Camera! Is this the new “Norm” of working on cars today?
The set-up procedure takes a lot of patience and time, but it is critical to follow through with every step. The procedures on this vehicle may not apply to the next year, make or model vehicle you encounter so each job you perform becomes a challenge. This vehicle only required a Static Calibration but there are some vehicles that may not have a Static procedure and require a Dynamic procedure on the road by reading marked highway lines that are clearly visible. These Dynamic Calibrations can take anywhere from 10-30 minutes of driving and you must be on a roadway that is straight, with clean lines, staying in the center lane, maintaining 45-65 MPH and with at least 5 car lengths behind someone. If there is heavy traffic or bad weather, then the procedure will never complete and you would need to pick another time or day to perform the Dynamic task. Then there are some manufacturers that may require both a Static & Dynamic Calibration so be prepared to spend some serious time on these types of vehicles. My only hopes are that I have given you some insight on how involved it is just working on 1 aspect of the ADAS system.
