Papago P3 • the witness to your next incident

In the seventies, a KE35 I owned came with a factory fitted air conditioning system. The in-dash cooler was a boast then as low to mid-range cars, to which the Toyota belonged, had coolers hanging below the dash if you desired one.

Four decades later, the witness to your next road incident is hanging like a hernia on the windshield while luxury models have them factory fitted. Mindful that by 2015 black boxes will be mandatory for new cars sold in the US, it is said driving recorders will be mandated worldwide thereafter.

The 'hernia' will disappear once Blackboxes are factory-fitted

Papago’s P3 looks like a miniaturized old CRT but records the vitals. Over the weekend I was pulled over for speeding where the officer armed with a scribbled notepad announced with authority that I was gunning 93 in a 60 zone.

I politely said that scribbling vital evidence in the 21st century is quaint, if not archaic, and since it was too much for him to peer at the 2.4 inch ‘hernia’ hanging on the windshield to view a replay of my ‘offense’ I whipped out the AIR and invited him to view my ‘umbrage’ in 1080 clarity - that proved I was no quicker than 53.

The officer was impressed more with the Mac displaying coordinates, speed, audio, date, time, geo-tracking and lane diversion beeps of the P3, rather than being embarrassed at the scribbled notepad he was clutching. In any case, he should not be, simply because his position was defeated not by me but by a an 'independent witness' that backed up my side of the story.

Words - Tommy Peters

Post Script: The clips below depict test runs from the author’s P3 units fitted on the front and rear windshields. Surprisingly, vital information such as speed, geo-tracking and speed camera positions are still gathered from the rear-mounted  unit.

Rear and Front camera test  ∆

Day-test (front-mounted) without audio  ∆

Day-test (rear-mounted) with audio  ∆

Night-test (rear-mounted) with audio  ∆