By Shannon J. Sagan, Esq., The Dash Cam Lawyer®, Fla. Bar #10793

Your dash cam has one job: to be recording on the one day you’ll ever need it. In South Florida, the enemy of that job isn’t a car thief or a software glitch. It’s the sun sitting on your dashboard.

A parked car in a Palm Beach County summer can hit 150–170°F on the dash,  hotter than the day the manufacturer ever tested for. That heat does four things to a dash cam, and none of them announce themselves:

• It swells the battery or supercapacitor. Cameras use lithium batteries that degrade fast in heat and can stop holding a charge entirely. 
• It corrupts the memory card. Heat plus constant loop-recording wears out a microSD card. A worn card doesn’t warn you. It just quietly stops saving, and you find out only when you go looking for footage that isn’t there.
• It shuts the camera off. Some have a thermal cutoff that powers them down above a certain temperature to protect the electronics, meaning on the hottest days, exactly when road-rage and fatigue incidents spike, your camera may not even be on.
• It wears down the suction cup or glue. After a while, your suction cup could start drying out or if your dash cam has the peel and stick mount, the glue could get so hot it causes the camera to fall down. 

What to actually do (takes five minutes this weekend):

1. Pull your card and check that recent footage exists and plays. If your camera has a “format the card” function, run it once a month. A fresh format prevents most silent-failure corruption.
2. Know your power source. If your camera runs on a lithium battery, it will not survive Florida summers long-term. Supercapacitor models are the standard for a reason.
3. Buy a high-endurance card. Standard microSD cards aren’t built for the constant write cycle of loop recording. Cards labeled “high endurance” or “dash cam rated” cost a few dollars more and last far longer in heat.
4. Park in shade or use a sunshade when you can. Not always possible, but every degree helps.

Here’s why I care about this more than most lawyers would: I’ve built my practice around dash cam footage because it’s the single most powerful piece of evidence a driver can bring to a crash claim. But footage that didn’t record is worse than no camera at all because you thought you were covered. A five-minute check this weekend protects the one recording you hope you never need. 

This article came about because while recently driving my wife’s car, the camera was not recognizing her sd card, even though it was clearly installed. I noticed the camera was extremely hot to the touch. After letting the car sit in the shade for a bit, I put the sd card back in and it was fine. 

Driving without a working dash cam? That’s the part worth fixing before the next heat wave.

Not sure if your camera survived the summer? Explore Our Dash Cam Resources.