Video interference is a common problem when building a CCTV surveillance system. We sell many security cameras and it often seems like many people have no clue or have never dealt with wiring. Naturally, when customers receive their surveillance system, many are unsure how to properly do things. One of the major task is running video cable and putting the ends to raw wire. There are all sort of CCTV video cable on the market and even listed on our site. Some are bundled for convince and price factors. These bundled cables make it easy for newbies, or any installer in the field. But what about video interference? Shielded cable is shielded for a reason! There are all sort of reasons that play into the fuzziness of video feeds. When we trouble-shoot these video problems, we always find that it was the smallest problem. One of the biggest problems is the way BNC connectors are put on to the RG59 video cable.

Above looks like a successful BNC twisted-on-to this RG59 cable. But if we were to take off most of the connectors from clients, installers, or just end-users, we will find that their grainy or fuzzy video was due to the frayed copper wires that are touching the copper video cable. You must take those frayed endings off or twist them backwards. You cannot leave not one of those fuzzes to touch the main copper wire. Most people will try to avoid dealing with modifying cable and go for the bundled cables of 50 feet, 100 feet, or 150 feet. But not installs have distances like these! Some distances are 500 to 100 feet. So you are still stuck with either RG59 or CAT5 over video baluns. CAT5 may not always work because it is not as shielded as the RG59. RG59 is shielded with a thick poly-urethane cover to prevent UV rays from interfering with video. There are many other dangers to video interference, but statistically it is due to the wrong cable been ran across other electronics, lights, signals, or equipment that messed with the video clarity and poor craftsmanship when installing the BNC connectors to the RG59 or RG6 cable. Make sure you know your cable run environment! Not all cable will work in the same environment conditions as others. Secondly, make sure you pull the frayed copper wires away from your main copper wire! If any of those frayed wires touch the main copper line, it will interfere with the video signal and cause poor video feeds. If you take these two precautions you can 99.9% avoid signal interference and improve the clarity of your video.