Poll

Has the hackabiliy of the E4 made you buy one :  

Yes, I was already looking at the competition at a similar price, but the hack swung it to E4
274 (27.9%)
Yes, I'd not considered buying a TIC before, but 320x240 resolution at this price justifies it (as either tool or toy!)
444 (45.3%)
Yes, I was going to buy an E5/6/8 class of unit but will now get the E4
49 (5%)
No, but am looking out for a cheap i3 to hack
50 (5.1%)
Not yet, but probably will if now that a closed-box hack becomes is possible
164 (16.7%)

Total Members Voted: 803

Author Topic: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown  (Read 3769792 times)

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Offline joe-c

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5075 on: June 06, 2014, 07:36:25 pm »
I've found another three .pal files for the cameras.
Thanks for the palettes. Bluered looks like "reinbow" from the Fluke Ti10.
Freeware Thermal Analysis Software: ThermoVision_Joe-C
Some Thermal cameras: Kameras
 

Offline heavybarrel

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5076 on: June 06, 2014, 09:36:26 pm »
Might be a dumb question but, what folder on the camera did you drop the pal files into? I see them in a few places, some appear
in flashbfs/system/  but not all of them. I think only three are in that location. Rainbow, iron, and one i cant remember at the moment. Thanks much!
 

Offline AintBigAintClever

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5077 on: June 07, 2014, 12:19:50 am »
Not a dumb question at all. If you don't know, ask.

On my E25 they just go in the /system folder along with the rest. Presumably mine runs under a different OS and/or CPU though, as there's no FlashBFS folder on my E25.
 

Offline heavybarrel

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5078 on: June 07, 2014, 12:36:02 am »
Thanks! I appreciate the reply! I guess i sort of assumed (we know what they say about assuming..) the pals work on the modded e4. I did originally see the pals came from a different model. Ill give it a shot and leave a report!
 

Offline joe-c

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5079 on: June 07, 2014, 05:26:17 am »
Hello,
I have stored them only in "FlashBFS\system" and use remote commands to load:
palette bluered
palette saturation
palette yellow

after restarting the camera the files don't be listed in the menu. I thing the menu config must be adjusted to choose the palette direct from camera.
Freeware Thermal Analysis Software: ThermoVision_Joe-C
Some Thermal cameras: Kameras
 

Offline JFA

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5080 on: June 07, 2014, 06:06:51 am »
So far, FLIR did not answer my support ticket about my broken camera in detail yet. The status of my ticket and update date does change a lot, so I think they are very busy working on it internally.

I'm really looking forward to their final answer. As of now, I still think they broke something bad in an attempt to fix something else :)

My E4 up-switch stopped to work only after two weeks + 3 days of ownership.  Legal limit is 2
weeks for returns here. (10 opening days)
FLIR is adamant on their warranty policies, everything has to be sent back (I was told).  I don't know if that is a special directive for the E4, but I seem to have understood that they are like that for any of their machines.  So the dealer sent my camera back. (I guess he wanted to be nice to me, since I bought four E4 v1.22.0...

The dealer said that unless FLIR gets a RUSH mention and is harassed over the phone for results, and kicked in the butt by a large dealer with some commercial torque, FLIR is notoriously slow for effecting repairs, sometimes taking MONTHS. 

Another comment.  There was a remark on this thread about  dealers having cameras shipped to clients directly from factory, cameras not being shipped to dealers anymore... Some seemed to suspect it was a way to prevent E4 buyers to check the firmware v1.22.x / 2.x at the point of sale...

I was told it is because the company has a tremendous production backlog, and prefers to ship on demand rather than running the production line to stock dealer's inventories. That way, they can supply the end-user demand faster, apparently, instead of having their products told to be BO by many dealers.

The owner of the dealership also told me that FLIR seems to be quite mixed up in their operations, half of the company not knowing what the rest is doing.  Or maybe I misunderstood him...   Also, everything the dealer owner told me could be utter BS and sweet talk... I'll see when I see the unit coming back from the service center.
 

Offline wolflsi

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5081 on: June 07, 2014, 07:51:34 am »
Hello, I am a new FLIR E4 user in Taiwan,I bought FLIR E4 two days before(6/4), Camera information shows model E4 1.1L,software version 1.22 S/N is 63926142 P/N is 6301-0101,so it means not every new FLIR E4 is with hardware 1.2L and software 2.XX ?

Even you bought it on June 4th
You have to see your calibration date
That is the date mostlikely came out of factory
My second unit was luckily May 6th and it was still 1.1L and 1.22.0

Another member had calibration date may 23rd
It was 1.2L and 2.1.0

So between May 6 to May 23 flir upgraded the firmware

My E4 calibration date is May 2
 

Offline wolflsi

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5082 on: June 07, 2014, 08:35:14 am »
Thanks Marphy,your tool works very well on  E4 1.1L s/w 1.22,it works like a E8 and get better resolution/function now. I appreciate your application!!
 

Offline AintBigAintClever

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5083 on: June 07, 2014, 05:38:00 pm »
Palette files corrected and added to, the zip file in my earlier post has been updated accordingly.
« Last Edit: June 07, 2014, 05:42:35 pm by AintBigAintClever »
 

Offline Taucher

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5084 on: June 07, 2014, 05:45:58 pm »
Just a small reminder: using telnet and the palette command (or was it pal?) one can load/activate palettes not available from the menu - ideal for testing purposes :)
Edit: note they still have to go to the correct folder as no path can be supplied.
« Last Edit: June 07, 2014, 06:22:17 pm by Taucher »
 

Offline heavybarrel

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5085 on: June 07, 2014, 10:31:44 pm »
Just replaced the bw.pal with the yellow pallet, seems a bit more visually appealing than the black and white. It replaces black and white for all color pallets that use it, ie,, grey, red above, blue below, white hot, black hot, etc. I think i'll be keeping it that way!
 

Offline Iphone_hack

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5086 on: June 08, 2014, 04:24:32 am »
I was talking to my local supplier in Vancouver Canada. He said they don't like to stock them because they don't sell much. Also due of the calibration date.
He said problem is that if he ordered 2 units, let's say May 1st, so the calibration date on those units may be April 28th as example. They will be on the shelf until they sell. Let's say it sells one in May, might be still ok as the customers sees the calibration date is only couple of weeks old.
But let says the second unit sells in June, the customer buys it takes home see calibration date is April, he would be thinking this unit is 2 months old.
I know most of us here don't mind if the units are older because we can hack it. But most wants newer as possible, and remember the unit might need recalibrate service, the longer stays in shelf meaning the shorter life span left until next service.
Well that is what my supplier told me! I guess it make sense too!
 

Offline AintBigAintClever

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FLIR palette generator
« Reply #5087 on: June 10, 2014, 06:49:08 pm »
My first play with JavaScript.  ;D

The attached web page will read a .PNG file, take the leftmost strip of 224 pixels and create a custom palette file from it. I've tested the resulting files on my E25 and they work pretty well. They should also work on any other FLIR camera that supports this .PAL file format.  :)

Unzip the folder to your hard drive, double-click index.html and you're away. The two example .PNG files were done using the gradient tool in Paint.Net but you can use whatever you like.

You can easily "acquire" a palette from any image on the net that has one displayed, such as the one here: http://www.wired.co.uk/magazine/archive/2012/06/start/infrareds-walk-on-the-wild-side
Just crop the image to just include the palette block, resize to 224 pixels high and save as a PNG.

Another way to create the gradient is to go to http://www.colorzilla.com/gradient-editor/, make your gradient, screen-grab it (ALT + PRTSCR in Windows, CMD + SHIFT + 3 in OSX) and crop/resize it in an image editor as before.

The E25 reads palette files in alphabetical order (probably ASCII order) with uppercase names all grouped together (e.g. Example.pal, Newpal.pal, bw.pal, grayred.pal, rainbow.pal) so if you want them in palette name order (the name inside the file) rename the file accordingly.

Best used in Firefox or Chrome. In Internet Explorer (certainly IE11 here) and Safari you'll find that the download button won't work, for these you need to cut and paste the generated palette code into a separate text file.
« Last Edit: June 10, 2014, 09:08:25 pm by AintBigAintClever »
 

Offline joe-c

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5088 on: June 10, 2014, 08:07:39 pm »
Well done AintBigAintClever, thanks.
I like my normal palettes, but it's good to know, that I could change if I want.
Freeware Thermal Analysis Software: ThermoVision_Joe-C
Some Thermal cameras: Kameras
 

Offline Baya73

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5089 on: June 11, 2014, 12:37:11 am »
I found this a while ago. Have fun !
 

Offline Pinkus

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5090 on: June 11, 2014, 06:44:43 am »
I found this a while ago. Have fun !
Do you have this in a lossless format too (BMP, Tiff)? Reason is that the JPG due to the compression now probably (I did not verify) shows more/less colors.
 

Offline tomas123

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5091 on: June 11, 2014, 08:44:16 am »
thanks
multipage-tiff splitted and uploaded to eevblog.com

Offline tjb1

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5092 on: June 11, 2014, 12:25:51 pm »
Are these images that can be made into palettes to work on the E4 using the tool provided by AintBigAintClever?  I guess I am a little confused as to what is going on now.
 

Offline AintBigAintClever

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5093 on: June 11, 2014, 01:00:40 pm »
Are these images that can be made into palettes to work on the E4 using the tool provided by AintBigAintClever?  I guess I am a little confused as to what is going on now.
Yes. Take the image, find the palette you want, crop/resize/rotate to 224 pixels tall (width doesn't matter as only the left-hand edge is used), save as .PNG and convert using the tool.

By the way, the tool uses 224 colours as this seems to have been the standard. Do E4 cameras support more? Or less? I believe (due to issues with an earlier version of arctic.pal) they can have problems with other length palettes. My E25 will read shorter palettes without crashing but not necessarily behave properly with them (although admittedly I was pushing my luck with the 10-colour medical.pal).

Remember though that the E25 appears to use a different OS and handles the files differently (no need to hack the menus to add new palettes).

If the cameras are compatible with different sized palettes I can change the tool to accommodate that (one extra box to fill in - defaulted to 224 - and a bit of a code tweak).
« Last Edit: June 11, 2014, 01:21:17 pm by AintBigAintClever »
 

Offline Iphone_hack

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5094 on: June 13, 2014, 05:05:16 am »
Hi guys
I have a problem with my second E4,
I did the resolution hack only, everything seems to work.
But when I change the colour palettes, I noticed that my grey and blue is same. Stays grey
It doesn't turn blue. Red works,
I think it was problem from factory. But I can't be 100% sure because I did not check before the hack
Is it possible just palette blue file problem?
Again I did not hack the menu.
Any help?
Thanks
 

Offline heavybarrel

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5095 on: June 13, 2014, 10:39:14 am »
First off, did you use the up and down arrow keys to set the temp that will display blue? If yes then you might have a problem. If no that's the best place to start.
 

Offline joe-c

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5096 on: June 13, 2014, 01:27:46 pm »
There are no blue palette. "Red above" and "blue below" are only the palette bw.pal with enabled isotherm. Isotherm is a separate function that work on all palettes.

So I think heavybarrel is right and you just don't reached the temperature margin.
Freeware Thermal Analysis Software: ThermoVision_Joe-C
Some Thermal cameras: Kameras
 

Offline Iphone_hack

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5097 on: June 13, 2014, 10:25:09 pm »
First off, did you use the up and down arrow keys to set the temp that will display blue? If yes then you might have a problem. If no that's the best place to start.

Hi thanks for the tips
At the end, I remove the hack,
Reset to factory,
Now seems to work
Redo the hack.
Now everything working
 

Offline Iphone_hack

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5098 on: June 14, 2014, 12:15:16 am »
Have anyone bought new E4 lately?
Are they still shipping units with 1.2L and 2.1.0?
Any news?
 

Offline jjmmss00

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Re: Flir E4 Thermal imaging camera teardown
« Reply #5099 on: June 14, 2014, 03:34:46 am »
Received an E4 from Amazon today with version 1.22. The hack worked nicely. I did not make a copy of the original menu files (wasn't included in the YouTube video). Is there any way to get those in case I need to restore the camera to the factory configuration?
 


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