On board cammera.
 

I have a nice brand new towwer hobbies trainer airplane. I thought it would be cool to put a camera on the plane and then hook up the reciever to a portable dvd player and controll the plane as if in a simulater (cockpit view). I bought a 39.99 dollar wireless camera at Fry's Electronics. I have a few questions.

How can I extend the range? Can I just sever the small antana and add another longer one? The range is 300 ft. (100 m.)

And how do I power the camera onboard the plane. The obvious answer is a batterie but It needs 8 volts. Will I break the camera by providing 8.4 volts or would it be better to under power the camera with 7.2 volts?

Could I fly the plane just off the camera or does anyone think that It will be footage with too much of a delay? (I haven't tested the camera yet to know)

Thanks in advace to all
Electrolight

RE: On board cammera.
 

I wouldnt try to take-off or land with it. Test it in air. A buddy box would be a good idea too. Have someone take off, then have you as the student, so he can take over if something goes wrong.

RE: On board cammera.
 

That has been done before and probably by several people. We had one situation where the plane had the camera and the person on the ground had a virtuality reality helmet on and flew the plane as though he was in the cockpit. It was pretty cool, to say the least. He took off with it, flew it around, and then landed it, all the time with the helmet on and facing backwards to the flying field. We captured the video in real time to a VCR recorder (this was about 8 years ago, by the way). It was pretty slick.

Ok, what you have to do is try your current setup for distances. See what it will really do as far as range is concerned. The system you currently have may not be able to do the range no matter what you do (short of replacing the transmitter downlink with one with more power). I've seen them for sale at aound $200 on - line, so somehow, I don't think your $40 setup will do as you hope it will do.

For the first trial flight, the owner had the system setup so a servo, attached to an auxiliary channel, turned the camera on after airborne, then another servo attached to another auxiliary channel to turn on the transmitter. That downlinked the video signal to a receiver on the ground that was hooked up to a VCR. The VR helmet was connected to a separate port on the VCR, as I recall it. That way both the VR helmet and the VCR got the downlink.

One thing you will really have to watch out for is if the transmitter inteferes with your receiver on board the aircraft. And, not to mention the weight of the whole on-board setup to make sure you have enough power to do what you want to do.

There is a whole forum here on RCU that has all sorts of information on this, with how-to's, where to get equipment, what they have encountered as far as problems are concerned, all sorts of information. I suggest you go there and do some reading to see what's going on with this. It's not that simple a task.

CGr

RE: On board cammera.
 

A longer one may be of NO help and could actually hurt things.

Antennas have to correspond to the wavelength of the frequency used.

The more efficient antennas typically have elements that bring the length up to exactly the wavelength.

To save space 1/2 wave or 1/4 wave antennas can be used or misc lenths with a coil of wire that acts as if the antenna was/is the full length of 1 wave.

If you are dealing in the shorter wavelengths ( which is likely ) the antenna is probably alread at 1 wavelength.

The way to increase the range will be to increase the transmision power, which a ) is not legal and b ) is not easy.

I purchased a small self contained video camera that records to SD cards for this purpose, to avoid trying to transmit the video signals.

It depends upon the on board regulation and voltage tolerance.

Find out from the manufacturer what the camera will tolerate.


Not only is this NOT legal ( you will be piloting a UAV if you attempt to do so, and the FAA has much to say about this! ), but it is impractical.

The viewpoint of the camera is quite restricted, so you would have a hard time telling the attitude of the plane... it would be a recipie for disaster.

RE: On board cammera.
 

Thanks for all of your inputs. I'm not sure I will do that now but It was just an idea. I thought It would be cool. Thanks for your input.


Quote:

ORIGINAL: apjose

" Not only is this NOT legal ( you will be piloting a UAV if you attempt to do so, and the FAA has much to say about this! ), but it is impractical. "


Will the FAA still get mad If I were to fly on/over private property?

Thank you
Electrolight

RE: On board cammera.
 

Yes this is illegal in the U.S. as you are technically operating a "remotely piloted vehicle".

It's also not very practical anyway.

Better to fly the plane line of sight.

RE: On board cammera.
 

I saw a video on youtube were someone did something like what cg said. Execpt the camera would move somehow corisponding with the camera

RE: On board cammera.
 

Im not sure I understand what you mean seemefly?

Thanks opjose.

Electrolight

RE: On board cammera.
 

the camera would move somehow corisponding with the camera ??? Gibberish! Try again.

RE: On board cammera.
 

i saw the video . When the guy looked left with the Virtual Reality Helmet the camera looked left. If was really neat to see but I would like to see the setup more

RE: On board cammera.
 

bob5429 got it right sorry for that

RE: On board cammera.
 

The camera is most likely a 2.4 GHz. Like opjose said, a larger antenae won't help. Look on ebay for digital 2.4GHz recorders. They capture the image from your camera and record it to a Secure Digital card. Also the way it works with the VR helmet is by using the trainer port on your radio and selecting a couple of channels to be hooked up to a gyro on the helmet. This moves 2 servos under the camera and can pan/tilt with the movement of your head.

RE: On board cammera.
 

For $39.99 for a wireless camera with a 300 foot range, you've wasted $39.99. The power output of that camera is too low to be useful for aerial video. Look in the Aerial Photography forum for a whole lot of advice regarding cameras, transmitters, high gain antenna, etc.

I tried a little higher end system a few years ago that was advertised good to 1000 ft line of site. I quickly discovered that the max distance is only under perfect conditions, stable platform, no vibration, etc. I've since upgraded to a higher power (1 W), and am planning on getting my FCC Technician license so I can legally operate it. I have FPV capability, but I still fly it within the AMA safety guidelines (line of site). Its cool, but if you don't spend the money, you'll be very disappointed with the results.

Brad

RE: On board cammera.
 

Helihobby has the VR Goggles and camera with servo mounts to do the same thing, and not to try to prove you wrong opjose, but i researched and even called several people including a friend who works with the FAA and the only way it is illegal is if the model has over a mile range or is carrying a payload exceeding 3 pounds, if you type in Civilian UAV on yahoo you can find it, anyway here is the site. http://www.helihobby.com/html/eyetop.html

RE: On board cammera.
 

I'll refer you to other threads here where the actual regulation passages are cited and the instances where even local police have been cited for trying to operate their own remotely piloted vehicles.

The FAA took the Police departments to court... if I recall correctly.

Search the heli and plane threads about cameras and UAV's for more info. It was there I read up on all of this.

---

According to the information on those threads:

While "line of site" control is legal, remotely piloting the craft when it is NOT in line of site is definitely not.

In turn piloting the craft remotely while it is within line of site, is not practical, as if you can see it anyway you are better off visually controlling it.

I didn't see ( or don't remember? ) anything about payload, but 3 pounds is typical for a video camera setup used in Helis.

RE: On board cammera.
 

I ended up purchasing a cheap $99.00 Aiptek Digital Video Camera that records 70 minutes of 720p video to an SD card.

See: http://www.aiptek.com/

I mounted the 6 oz camera ( weight with batteries ) just in front of the wing on my .60 big stick, using a small light tripod head.

I had thought about putting in another servo to rotate the camera in flight, but I didn't find this was needed.

I disliked the "tearing" caused by shooting forward through the prop, so I later simply mounted the camera on top of an extension tube made for regular cameras, to move it above the prop.

I've flown this setup about six times thus far w/o problems.

The Aiptek camera's only problem is that the camera "door" must remain open for the camera to be powered. It tends to close in flight due to air pressure.

I ended up disabling the door switch to solve this problem.

A cheap solution which works very well, and I still use that little camera for other purposes too.

RE: On board cammera.
 

Well i was talking about something more along these lines:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...MEWA:IT&ih=004

This one is nice since it has a lower profile and the rechargeable battery is integrated. You can see the video on the ground at the same time you record it. I have a camera like the aiptek that i am going to use but i would like to try the ebay one.

RE: On board cammera.
 

That looks pretty good. I wonder how it will fare with both the range and interference with the radio and engine.

Otherwise it's an excellent small package with none of the hassles of the now "older" systems.

RE: On board cammera.
 

The issues regarding legal use of UAV technology don't kick in until you start doing it for commercial purposes. A hobbyist operating a radio control model within the confines of the Advisory Circular is fine. As soon as you ask someone to pay you for it, you fall into commercial aviation, and that's what RCAPA is trying to work with the FAA to address.

Brad