Like it happens to most 5th gen owners, the backup camera either dies completely or slowly becomes hazy until it's essentially useless/dangerous ([you can see how it looks here](https://www.reddit.com/r/FordExplorer/comments/1smbsrp/the_sad_state_of_backup_cameras/)). An OEM replacement costs anywhere between $300 to $500 which is insane. I put a generic one in for like $25 which is far from perfect but does its job.

So I wanted to inspect the old camera mostly to understand what fails. Bear in mind these things are NOT serviceable, everything is glued together or friction mounted so the moment you try to take things apart, be clear you won't be reusing the camera.

Picture #1 shows the circuit board with the camera sensor right in the middle (the tiny rectangle), the back of the housing with a thermal pad, the lens gasket, outer lens element and the front of the housing with the middle lens elements.

Picture #2 shows the same parts flipped so you can see the other sides.

Picture #3 is what I believe to be the problem, the middle lens. My suspicion is that very fine dust, moisture and other contaminants find their way through the rubber gasket and get sandwiched between the lens elements. As time goes on, it degrades image quality until you can't see a damn thing. There's a computer keyboard on the other side of the lens. If you zoom in you can see how blurry it looks and the lack of contrast. The sensor seems to be perfect as well as the outer lens.

So chalk it up to Ford for not sealing up the camera properly. If you buy a replacement, it will happen again as it's clear from the part numbers that the camera hasn't been revised. 

It's a shame Ford didn't use screws here, otherwise you could just take the factory camera apart, buy a Chinese clone and simply swap the lenses while retaining the original sensor.

Destroyed my 5th gen factory backup camera, for science