Hi All
I'm Navo from Newcastle, Australia.
I have been working on my own cablecam for about 4 years now. I got inspired after watching one of the earlier new World Disorder Mountain Bike vids where the camera follows the rider off the edge of a road gap. Another place I have been watching the evolution of camera techniques ( other than every web site I could find, only just found yours - Sorry) is at the Bathurst 1000 V8 car racing in Bathurst, Australia. Basically V8 touring car racing on a wide open race track. look it up on flycam.com 2004 bathurst video. Anyway they have a Flycam on the main straight doing 160kmph.

Sorry went off track a bit there. I am upto about my 5th or 6th generation cablecam now, sort of losted track. I have pretty much tried everything you guys have been doing then moved on to bigger and faster. So if you have any questions I am happy to answer them. The reason it has taken so long is, funds and only doing it parttime ( also my urge to constantly want to improve my design, even before I have the previous one running)
Here are some pics of my 3rd / 4th generation cablecam being tried out in the park down the road from my house.

I'll see if i still have the test footage from this day. Some of it was ok. a bit jerky a times. If I can find it I might post some.

Thanks has to go out to my bro for all the assistance he has given me over the time setting up the rigs. Oh and also taking these photos.
off topic a bit, i have posted a video of the earlier version in action.

And before you ask, I had a motor on this rig but it was mounted on the drive rope at the end of the run. 12v Bosch drill motor ( ditched that idea too weak ).








The trolley was on a bit of a lean as i still had to get the weight balance right.
I will post some images of my newest setup as soon as i can finish the bits and take the photos.


Navo

Wow, great job. Looks like you have the ability to see what the camera is filming there with that remote screen! I just upgraded mine with a 2.4 ghz camera system and small screen. Need to go test it out for sure..

Keep us updated on your progress!!

Thanks navo!

Now I've got a bunch of questions...

What is the silver case for?
How are you driving the the cablecam?
How fast can it go?

Thanks for the reply guys.
I will have to rig up my newest rig and take some photos. It looks a lot like the version in the above photos but with a different pan tilt head.

I am pretty new to these forums, so I don't really know when to put quotes from people in replys. Would it be in bigger threads? Also should I start a new thread in the building section with more details or keep going in this one?

DPC
To answer your questions.
The Grey case on the trolley in the above photos houses the 7.2 A/hr SLA battery, 36mhz 5 Channel radio receiver, 2.4ghz video link transmitter, battery indicator leds, remote relays controller, servo power supply.

Since these photos I have changed some of the internals internals. Instead of using the 5 channel hitec rx i will use an 8 channel serial servo controller with a pair of radio modems, instead of using sail servos on the pan tilt /head, I am using two gearhead motors with a dual channel motor controller ( which accepts a standard servo signal ), the 7.2A/hr battery will now be mounted in a seperate box on the outside ( ran out of space inside ).

At the other end I was using a Hitec flash 5 tranmitter, which I have now modified with a custom interface to use a radio modem for the transmit bit. I was using one channel on the flash 5 to control another 555 hitech receiver and then connect to a 12v marine esc and a bosch 12v drill motor at the end of my ropes. For safety i am now connecting my motion control for the trolley back and forth movement by wire. ( I had some issues with failsafes not doing their job and the whole thing taking off by itself).

The 12v bosch motor could move the trolley at maybe 2 m/s ( 6 feet/s ) unloaded ( no camera or pan /tilt ) but when I loaded it up with more weight the motor couldn't handle it and was tripping the circuit breaker. So i had to run it at 1/3 that speed for my test. My new setup will go about approx 4 m/s ( 12 feet/s )hopefully when I test it out.

I have included some more action shots which just dug up. Some are from the filming day at the mountain bike event - see video section. and the others are from the test day at the park.
The motor hanging the tree was modified for the park test. It was mounted in a frame, had a bigger drive pulley 5" and was located on the ground with heaps of weights on it.

Mountain x event

old rig
close-up shot


my controller hiding under a camo rain coat to protect it from the rain



newer rig
Park test day
close-up of controller



close-up of trolley



will post more new pics soon

Thanks Navo!

Do you have any pics of the drive system? Currently my design has everything onboard, but when using a larger camera like the HVX... it's just too much weight and the battery life becomes an issue.

You mentioned 12v bosch motor.. As in "cordless" drill motor? If you're drive system is OFF the cablecam then you might want to check out some of these motors: http://www.robotmarketplace.com/product ... _main.html

Thanks for the motor info DPC.
I have a bigger motor already. Its a 24vdc Baldor 0.5 Hp. The top rpm of 1700 is probably a bit too high. haha.
So i am gearing it down a bit ( about 1:2 ) so i should get about 850rpm on my 8" drive pulley and more torque.

The 12v Bosch motor is pulled out a battery drill. A bit of an experiment which didn't really work very well.

I will try to take some pictures of the current drive system tomorrow. I will also get some pics of the previous drive system , which would have been okay except for it not having enough torque.

I originally tried to have the drive system on my camera trolley. but it ended up going too slow and the batteries did not last very long. so after working out i needed a bigger motor then a bigger battery to run the bigger motor it all started to get too heavy and there just wan't enough roomm on it for a big battery.( was wanting to use two 7AHr batteries or one 12AHr)

I started off trying to do things on the cheap but then realised why the pros use all the gear they do and save my money and do things properly. Being able to custom design most of the electronics helps to keep the cost down.
I can't believe how expensive some of the pro movie remote heads and radio systems cost!

Thought you guys might like to see some of the latest pics of my rig. It looks pretty rough at the moment as I am still working on it. This is just a quick set up in my backyard. Normally I would mount the ends of the rope much higher up on some decent trees. The black boxes under the two big drive pulleys have my two big 12V 100AHr deep cycle sealed lead acid batteries ( similar size to large car batteries). You can see a hose reel in the background which I use to roll up my double braid high strength sail rope. ( works really well). The cart with motor and batteries was my first welding project and took a lot of work. It is going to weigh a bit when it is finished.( maybe 80kg - 176lbs) But it much easier to move than having seperate boxes for the batteries - I just wheel it around. and there is also a green wooden launch ramp up against the wall

Wow, very impressive drive mechanism! What is the Horsepower of the drive motor? Are you basically using a VFD as a speed controller?

Thanks

The motor is a Baldor 0.5HP 24VDC which draws about 27 Amps under full load. I probably could have gone bigger, but cost was a factor and also current draw. The motor alone cost $550 australian.
Below are some photos of the speed controller I am going to use. yet to wire it up and run it. It was from the same supplier and was recommended by the motor manufacturer.
The speed controller is a PWM output up to 48 volts and 40 Amps max. It is made by KB Electronics (Model KBBC) and is designed for battery use. It is big but has many features inc accelerate/decelerate. Both motor and controller are industrial models.
There is also a photo of the control panel I have made for the speed controller. It has a big red kill switch, direction, speed, speed mirror (for when you switch to standing on the other side of the ropes, direction switch is then very natural) and indicator leds.
I decided not to go with radio control due to safety. There aren't many of the more pro setups which use radio for the drive motor control. I have experienced a small motor of radio control go hay wire and deceide to go full speed in one direction jamming up the rope in the pulley mechanism then burn through my rope using just friction. All this in just 5 seconds, before I could get to main power switch to turn it off. Not pretty.

I have been watching the Olympics and looking up stuff on the net about it. It appears they are using the Flycam at the rowing and the Camcat double wire system at the mountain biking, bmx & some others sports

Navo... The latest design look SIIIIIIIIIIIIIICCCCCCCCCKKKKKKKKKKK!

The drive system looks clean and the controller is very pro looking! I love the huge STOP button! What kind of RC remote were you using when you had your misshap?

Any new pics/footage or/from the latest design? It's look'n siCk! oh wait.. I already said that..