Ian in Cheshire

Posted by Steve W-O on 26/04/2012 08:33:06: Unless it is running on a very smooth surface, I don't think you would notice any slight movement. I used cheap servo testers to supply the signal, and move the camera, could easily have used a pic8 similar to your suggestion. My trial was a camera mounted on a long pole. The surface is smooth, but undulating. I suppose another way of keeping the camera level would be top have some form of self-levelling suspension but putting that on a model car sounds harder than controlling two servos. Ian

Steve Thanks for your input, I am sure what I want can be done but maybe not as simply as I hoped (2 gyros, 2 servos and a few other bits). I built a quadrocopter for a friend recently and that had a camera mount that kept the camera level as the copter tilted side to side (as plane dips one wing). Another servo tilted the camera up and down and that too was driven by a gyro so the tilt angle stayed the same relative to the ground. My application is actually on a wheeled vehicle and was hoping to make it self contained so it would not need any of the Tx/Rx channels, Once setup I could feed it constant PWM signals from a small micro. This one shows the sort of thing I am looking for. http://hackedgadgets.com/2007/09/17/gyro-stabilized-camera/ Thanks Ian

Steve I will use fast good quality servos, its whether the gyros I have are suitable that I was wondering about. Drift should not be a problem. as its on a pan and tilt compensation for drift will be done by switching off every now and again when not recording video. The sort of result I was hoping for is how cameras on UAVs keep the horizon level. Ian

I have two new unused Robbe 8065 gyros and would like to use them to make a self levelling or at least stabilised mount for a video camera. The gyro instructions say it can set to be 'normal' or a 'heading hold' operation, the instructions to change over are as clear as mud though, and I'm not sure which I need anyway. I have temporarily fastened a gyro to a output lever, connected two servo testers to the gyro inputs and it 'sort' of works. I can see some movement compensation taking place but its only just noticeable and if I increase the gain it becomes unstable. Is my plan doomed to failures? Ian