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Touring Motor Gliders Association (TMGA)

Power for a camera on the tail


Eric Greenwell

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I want to mount a Go-Pro style camera on the tail of my Phoenix, but there isn't any power back there to power it. What's a good way to get power to it? Running twisted pair or a shielded pair to the tail somehow would be ideal, but may be awkward. Another thought is USB output power pack of 1000 mAH or so that could be secured in the fin, with a cable coming out under the stabilizer that a charger or the camera could be plugged into.

In the meantime, I'll try the camera on the dash, looking over the compass, and perhaps under the canopy sill near the canopy latch, or under the fuselage on the gear (a flat USB cable could be run out the the right side from a USB charger in the power socket).

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The GoPros offer 2 hours of battery use or 1 hour if the wifi is turned on.  Andres Fernandes and I flew from Key West to Columbia, making about 5 hour legs.  Andres mounted a GoPro on the wingtip and controlled it from his iPad in the cockpit.  He was able to turn it on and off as desired during the 5 hour flights.  So with the right equipment, I don't think you will need additional power unless you are doing a very long video.

Urban Air put a battery in the tail which could have been a factor in the broken tails of the Lambada.  Phoenix Air decided this was not worth risking in the Phoenix.  The tail battery produces a large moment arm which can cause additional torque to the tail in a tail strike or flutter situation.  I don't think they will approve a battery in the tail.

A wire can be run to the tail but it will involve drilling a hole in the internal tail bulkhead.  You would have to remove the rudder to access the bulkhead and drill the hole and run the wire.  There have been two cracked bulkheads, so this is a very critical structural component.  I don't know if Phoenix Air will approve drilling a hole in the bulkhead or not.

You can see some of the factory videos with a GoPro mounted on the tail of the Phoenix, so obviously they see nothing wrong with doing this.  But the camera did not have an additional battery or wiring.  Your best bet is probably just to go with the adhesive stick on mounts which stick on so well that they sometimes must be cut off with fishing line, and control the camera remotely.

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My "FauxPro" (GoPro knockoff) only lasts about 40 minutes with the Wifi on, thus the interest in external power for a tail mount. Running a cable for power sounds problematic, so a battery at the tail is a better choice. The battery type I'm thinking of using is the "phone charger" style: a Li-ion battery with USB outputs and is available in 3000-10000 mah capacity. A 5000 mah one is smaller than an iPhone 6, weighs about 4 oz, and should run the camera continuously for about 7 hours, unless it's really cold. The camera could be mounted on the battery, and the assembly taped to the tail for a total weight less than 10 oz. That should be safe enough, and I'd use my iPhone to view and control it.

Here's a link to the kind of battery I'm considering:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01KUVLMPK/_encoding=UTF8?coliid=I127X0AGTNSKNR&colid=2RMXPWCF0XLLG

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Hi, Eric -

Here's an alternative idea. I think it's worth considering what you want the videos for before choosing a mounting spot. To be honest, I don't really care for the tail and wing mounted videos all that much. The great value I see, as an educator, is being able to replay a flight and think about what I might have done differently if I could do it over. The videos that I like the most are those with in-cockpit visibility of the instruments and, even better, a narration to capture the decision making processes by the pilot. Bruno Vassal has several of these as good examples of ride-along teaching videos.

Here's how I mount my GoPro. It uses 2 RamMount items that mount to the canopy at pilot eye level, just near the canopy handle. I also use a cable from Nflightcam which allows audio from the headsets and extra power from a USB battery pack. Note, however, and Nflightcam is very clear about this, you cannot use ship's power, only a USB battery pack. I spent several hours trying to filter the onboard DC with all sorts of audio transformer filters, and it is just impossible to remove the whining ground loop. I don't know of anyone who has successfully done this,  but since I'm just a ham radio operator and you're an official electrical engineer, you may have more luck.

Here's a video snippet of practicing a no-spoiler approach to let you see the angle. The camera is mounted midline. I've since moved it to the right a bit. 

Ed

GoPro test.mp4

IMG_0730.jpg

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I just mounted the camera slightly to the right of the canopy latch plate, on the canopy sill (fuselage, not the canopy). I can run power to it from the power socket on the right side of the shelf. It will take a flight to know if it can see the panel well enough. I'm using my iPhone to control it and monitor the video. The iPhone is mounted on top of the ClearNav flight computer, where it's easy to see. The next location I try will be under the gear or cowling, withe field of view (FOV) set to 70 degrees, which I hope will let me see dust devils as I approach them.

My FauxPro does not have an audio input, just HDMI and USB connectors, so I can't use the NFlightcam cables you did. The camera's microphone will pick up the vario, and if I continue to use the cockpit location, I'll mount a small speaker next to the camera's microphone, then run the intercom output to the speaker.

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Gents, you might like the VIRB camera by Garmin. You can pick up the VIRB elite cameras very cheaply now since they are no longer the latest model, but they function very well and offer the advantage of altitude, speed, and route info on screen from the unit's own internal GPS. They can be managed from a smart phone.  A Garmin cable interfaces with your headset and the camera to block out engine noise if desired.  It's internal battery gives long run time. The free software, VIRB Edit, is ok for video pudknockers like me but not a world beater...quite simple to use though. I have put a suction cup mount on the interior canopy with good results and have now mounted 2 stick-on base plates for the camera's cradle on top of the glare shield. In that way 2 cameras can be looking at different views. Next spring I'm going to make a camera mount rig to screw into the wing tie down hole. The editing software allows for rotating the image into the upright position.  Attached see clip from flight from Princeton, NJ to Bar Harbor, ME. In this one I have the camera in my hand and show the mount. Note the sophisticated airconditioning unit and controls in right canopy vent. 

 

VIRB_39n_to_bar_hrbr1.mp4

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  • 3 weeks later...
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The VIRB is a nice unit, but my main interest was a camera with about a 70 degree field-of-view (FOV) mounted underneath (by the gear, say), which is needed for seeing dust devils in flight, and even for "taxicam" use. 120-170 degree FOV cameras make the dust devils too tiny to see well, and you have to be surprisingly close to hazards to see them when using those cameras while taxiing. My camera FOV can be selected as 70 or 110 degrees, and it's supposed to allow 160 degrees, but it doesn't.

For cockpit and external "scenic" mounting, the wide FOV are definitely better.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Here's an very inexpensive camera that I purchased on E-Bay to use as a taxicam:

http://vi.vipr.ebaydesc.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItemDescV4&item=382072377120&t=1493298335000&tid=10&category=149976&seller=extra-partss&excSoj=1&excTrk=1&lsite=0&ittenable=false&domain=ebay.com&descgauge=1&cspheader=1&oneClk=1&secureDesc=0

My plan is to drill a small hole in the front of the lower cowling and then use the Dynon video interface adapter to display the image on the Dynon display.

I haven't actually had any time to work on this, so I don't have any results to share.

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It's worth trying, but I had issues with a similar backup camera:

  • the field of view (FOV) was so wide, it was hard to see smaller objects that still might be a problem to to taxi near. Even piper cub didn't look close until it was REALLY close!
  • the cables seemed to bring RF noise into the cockpit that sometimes caused noise in the headsets
  • the heat where I mounted it (just behind and below the firewall) may have caused it's slow death after a few months. Inside the cowling is likely even hotter.
  • it was worthless for looking for dust devils and other interesting things ahead and on the ground, a big reason for having the camera - that wide FOV problem.

Getting the 12 v power from the engine area means you only need to bring one cable into the cockpit, and that might avoid the RF noise problem. I don't recall trying ferrite cores around the cables - that might also work.

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