I edited this because the strut-mount is no longer what I want to do. I have an extra wingtip fairing laying round and I'd like to mount a small digicam to it. My post below expounds on this.

If you use a radio control you may pick up stray signals from many miles away.This will activate the camera at any time.

I had a liteweight 1-2 lb aluminum mount welded to attach to 4 screws at the wingtip fairing. Used two circular pieces of 2" aluminum rod cut at a 30 degree bevel, with a bolt drilled through both of them. By adjusting the two triangular pieces of aluminum rod at different angles the mount would allow for any pan/tilt, when mounted in a fixed position.

Ended up using a fixed cable secured by 100 m.p.h. tape from the cockpit.

Cost about $5.00 plus a 26 oz, for the welder.

Phil,

You have photos of the final product? I'm having a hard time visualizing what your described. When you say "cable" do you mean a long cable release for the shutter, 100 mph-taped down the strut or the wing?

I think some sort of plexiglas housing would be cool too, to avoid having your camera peppered with bug guts.

Were you able to get any cool shots? Post em if you did.

Z

I'm dredging up my own thread from yesteryear because I have a spare wingtip fairing to play with.

1) Does anyone know of anything already in existence that would be easy to model off of?

2) What are the legalities of mounting hardware to your wingtip? This plan is all hypothetical of course, but humor me.

The newer RC stuff is almost impervious to extranious signals, legality? you can put anything on an airplane with a field approval

Wanna do it all legal like? FAA form 337 and a buttload of engineering data to back it up these days. You need a large wallet full of dead presidents and a good DER.

Contact this guy about RC equipment. Mac is a "real" pilot as well and retired crop duster and farmer. Make sure you click on the link of the B-29. We fly full size airplanes up there and land at his hobby shop all of the time.
http://www.hodgeshobbies.com/

Zane,

If you want to do this legally, from the FAA's standpoint, don't necessarily give up on the notion of getting a field approval. We've done things sort of like this in MN based on field approvals, and it was a no brainer. Told em what we wanted to do, the weights involved, etc, and submitted a 337. I would contact your friendly local IA after you sort of develop a plan, and ask HIM to contact the "right" person in the local FSDO.

If you're lucky, he'll know someone who will be reasonable. On the other hand, if you are not in the "right" district, they'll say no. Now, that may be the time to go visit another district,,,,, . They (the FAA) don't like people "shopping" for cooperative FSDO's. But, if you find an IA who can get this stuff done on a field approval, go there. It would then be legal, and the guys in your district would essentially be powerless to rescind your FA.

It can be done, and it can be done without a load of paper or a DAR.

MTV

The camera I am interested in is this one:



It is quite tiny. I couldn't find the dimensions, but the display on it is 2.4" diag.

Zane- A friend up in Canada has a SeaBee with a camera mounted on the wing....in a little dome like the security cameras. There is a little joy stick that controls the camera position. He does charters out of Port McNeil in BC. You can purchase the video of your ride with some Yani music in the background....just like your flight. The quality looked fine on a monitor and I don't know how good the camera was....this was some years ago, too. Now with image stabalization and HD, I'm sure it is better. Whether or not you could adapt to that style of mount, I don't know. It might fit in an inspection cover...you could fish the control cable down the wing into the cabin, weather proof, easy to clean.

Hey Zane. If your 170 is still at Grants Pass check with Steve from Steve's aircraft at Beagle about a camera installation. He has a bunch of good STC's, mostly for Pipers but if anyone can get a mod pushed through legally he's your man.

Also check your insurance policy. Mine has a specification that I'm not covered if doing any aerial photography. I assume this shows up because of folks doing moose stalls and the like, but if you have a camera mounted to the airframe and have some sort of incident, it would be a tough one to explain that you weren't taking any pics, and an easy excuse for your insurer to walk away.
How common is this insurance exclusion? Anybody?

Matt 7GCBC wrote:Also check your insurance policy. Mine has a specification that I'm not covered if doing any aerial photography. I assume this shows up because of folks doing moose stalls and the like, but if you have a camera mounted to the airframe and have some sort of incident, it would be a tough one to explain that you weren't taking any pics, and an easy excuse for your insurer to walk away.
How common is this insurance exclusion? Anybody?

This is an interesting consideration. I'll have to dig into my policy to see if there is anything along those lines.

I talked with a guy named Cameron Lawson, who is a professional "adventure" photographer. He said he uses a suction cup to attach the camera to the wingtip. Sounds a little sketchy to me, but it certainly could never be considered a "permanent" modification. It would suck to see your nice camera tumbling into space.

If you go the suction cup route, be sure to have an idiot cord as well. Then you get to watch it beat your wing to death instead of just watching it fly away.

Zane, doing this legally sounds like a huge pain in the ass, so I'll not even address that part. Suction cup??? I had a thing for suction cups for a while, and I'd have to say that after diligent searching I never found anything that I would trust for this job.

The low-tech solution is made by Ram Mount. I used some of the larger ram-mounts to attach 35mm cameras to motorcycles and triggered them with a long cable release. I think it would be pretty easy to do a similar thing with the wing strut. Actually, I think you could mount the camera in about ten minutes with a couple hose clamps, though a more elegant solution is probably out there.

As far as the bugs go, I just kept a filter on the lens and didn't worry about the rest of it. Some of my cameras would be so bug covered you could hardly see them, but it doesn't seem to be a big deal. A bit of masking tape will protect any sensitive areas from bug guts. If you really want to go wild put a plastic bag over it and poke the lens through.

Oh ya, that digital camera you have a photo of might work, but if it won't shoot without the display screen open I'd be leery. The slipstream is going to grab hold of that screen and wreak havoc.

What's wrong with just cobbling up a mount to put the video-cam on the glareshield? Less risky, easy access, as long as the image isn't degraded by shooting thru the plex. You can also narrate the audio side of your video. Better if you're solo, that way the pax's view isn't obstructed.

Eric

zero.one.victor wrote:What's wrong with just cobbling up a mount to put the video-cam on the glareshield? Less risky, easy access, as long as the image isn't degraded by shooting thru the plex. You can also narrate the audio side of your video. Better if you're solo, that way the pax's view isn't obstructed.

Eric, take a look at the thread title. Wingtip, baby! Mainly I'm trying to get that inflight vanity shot of my bird.

zane wrote:I'm dredging up my own thread from yesteryear because I have a spare wingtip fairing to play with.

1) Does anyone know of anything already in existence that would be easy to model off of?

2) What are the legalities of mounting hardware to your wingtip? This plan is all hypothetical of course, but humor me.

I believe you can still get external load permits in Alaska, don't know if that's an option in the lower 48.

Phil

zane wrote:

zero.one.victor wrote:What's wrong with just cobbling up a mount to put the video-cam on the glareshield? Less risky, easy access, as long as the image isn't degraded by shooting thru the plex. You can also narrate the audio side of your video. Better if you're solo, that way the pax's view isn't obstructed.

Eric, take a look at the thread title. Wingtip, baby! Mainly I'm trying to get that inflight vanity shot of my bird.

And here I was about to suggest replacing one of your landing light bulbs with a camera. Not sure how much distortion the landing light lens woudl produce though.

What about one of the clear wing tips used to cover and streamline nav lights and strobes?

Techno challenged here and tried to post and ended up sending Anticub a PM.

Try a lipstick camera. They use them in helmet cams and it feeds directly into the video camera or a computer. Very small, about the size of a large lipstick tube. I've seen one mounted on a strut with the cable zip- tied down the strut and up under the door. Much less drag than the one in the photo on Zane's post.