First video housing with some slight modifications

Hey Empty V,

 

Just curious... are you interested in making another modified backing? It looks great!

Hey Ben thanks for the compliment. I might be interested, what are you looking to do and what do you have now?

Billy

Hey Ben thanks for the compliment. I might be interested, what are you looking to do and what do you have now?

 

Billy

Billy,

I have the Pro 10 - it is a little larger than the 8, but the first thing I wanted to do when I saw it was upgrade the monitor, and I really like your countersunk setup. Critical focus is the main reason for the new monitor.

What was the cost of the upgrade?

Oh, and have you re-tested the rig?

Cheers,

Ben

Billy,

I have the Pro 10 - it is a little larger than the 8, but the first thing I wanted to do when I saw it was upgrade the monitor, and I really like your countersunk setup. Critical focus is the main reason for the new monitor.

What was the cost of the upgrade?

Oh, and have you re-tested the rig?

Cheers,

Ben

Hey Ben, focus is the same reason why I upgraded. With my camera shooting in 24P disables the auto focus, which I probably wouldn't use anyways.

Monitor - $100

Acrylic - $30

One battery pack - $35

Control knob which isn't necessary - $45

Some of the other things that went into the cost are the battery charger $70 and the acrylic polish which was $28 I think. It was really hard to find a battery charger that could handle a homemade 12V battery pack so I found this universal one and had to solder on the female version of the connector I used for the batteries.

After testing the camera locally on a beach dive at 120fsw I deemed it diveable for a trip I took to Hawaii last week. I put 6 dives on it and wow. I brought 2 battery packs for the monitor but only used on for all 6 dives without recharging. I should test it to see how much juice is left. In theory one of those high capacity battery packs will power my monitor for about 6.5hrs and should only take about 3hrs to fully charge.

There was also a lot involved with polishing, writing the program for the C&C Router, polishing, buying the right router and drill bits, polishing, and some soldering.

What's the diameter of your housing? Mine is 8" and I put in a 5" LCD. I'm not 100% stoked on this monitor in particular because it still looks a little soft but it's not too hard to dial it in. I'm sure a higher res monitor would be a lot more.

Billy

Well everyone I finally put together my first video shot with this rig. Please check it out here: http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=23514

Thanks!

Billy

Nice job Billy!

Stainless steel next to aluminium causes galvanic corrosion due to the difference in electric potential of the 2 metals. Sea water is a great electrolyte. Stainless steel screws will not go rusty or be affected but the aluminium will go white and powdery and finally disintegrate. Gates fit thick zinc sacrificial washer to the bottom of their housings to try and stop this happening between their stainless steel latches and aluminum body.

There's a chart of electric potentials of metals here. What you want is the smallest difference between the 2 metals. Unfortunately it doesn't show stainless steel, which is cathodic compared to aluminium, but you can see that titanium has a very different potential from aluminium so you will still have a corrosion problem.

Anodising or coating may help but does not solve it as those electrons are sneaky buggers and can find their way through.

In the meantime you can make a temporary shade out of black DVD boxes and black gaffer tape. Tape it to the housing or use sticky-back velcro. I get a lot of dives out of the ones I make for my Bluefin.

Thanks Nick! The links are very helpful and what a cool little fix to the sunshade problem. My fabricator has fallen behind and I was thinking of going powder-coated stainless with stainless screws. This reinforces this decision, thanks!!! Unfortunately my rig will be dry for another few weeks due to travel to parts of the US void of ocean, so this should give the fabricator ample time to create this monkey.

Billy

Nice job Billy!

 

Stainless steel next to aluminium causes galvanic corrosion due to the difference in electric potential of the 2 metals. Sea water is a great electrolyte. Stainless steel screws will not go rusty or be affected but the aluminium will go white and powdery and finally disintegrate. Gates fit thick zinc sacrificial washer to the bottom of their housings to try and stop this happening between their stainless steel latches and aluminum body.

 

There's a chart of electric potentials of metals here. What you want is the smallest difference between the 2 metals. Unfortunately it doesn't show stainless steel, which is cathodic compared to aluminium, but you can see that titanium has a very different potential from aluminium so you will still have a corrosion problem.

 

Anodising or coating may help but does not solve it as those electrons are sneaky buggers and can find their way through.

 

In the meantime you can make a temporary shade out of black DVD boxes and black gaffer tape. Tape it to the housing or use sticky-back velcro. I get a lot of dives out of the ones I make for my Bluefin.