problems with steadicam

[cody carson]

Okay, I decided I wasn't in quite a good enough mood last night to be posting, but anyway, today I feel a little less bad for myself as my friend just left his hdv camera in the rain and killed it before we shoot part of a project tomarrow.   Anyway, my steadicam is finally "done" in theory but not quite in actual use.   so heres my couple problems.  if anyone can help me out with any, that would be great, so just give me a tip on one of the problems if possible.

heres the part that the sled handle attaches to.  I don't know if i did it wrong, but the angle iron bends some times, so maybe i need to weld on some triangular supports or just move the bolt in closer to the arm?


here is the part of the belt that is having problems.  as you can see i needed to reinforce the steel chest plate connector because the only steel i could get right now was too thin so i used angle iron. it works fine, but the waiste plate which is 1/4" aluminum is torquing between the angle iron and the socket connection.  it could be because i just realized that the force is not distributed well on the waist belt.  I attached the waist belt behind the plate with screws in the middle.   there are 4 bolts accross the waist plate that go thru the belt but they are in the middle of the plate, therefor when the force pulls the plate forward, the belt isn't doing much to stop this.  i figured if i attaced the straps to the front (away from my body) of the plate, then it would help to prevent the forward leaning problem and possibly the bending of the plate.  what do you guys think?


i think the whole belt needs to be way stronger.  its just duck fabric that i sewed together with padding in it, and its strong but not super rigid.  what can i do to make it real rigid, because right now it would never fly at all (without the chest/back straps) without leaning waaaay forward and digging into my stomach.  i'll post more pics of the other 2 problems a little bit later.  Thanks!

[Charles King]

Some pics would be very helpful.

[cody carson]

i revised the original post, so that shows a couple of the problems.

[Charles King]

I'll look through the pics and read it over and post later, if someone else doesn't beat me to it.

[cody carson]

alright, well, while i'm waiting for that, i might as well ask a couple more questions.

its probably not a problem, but it seems like i should have gotten lighter springs up front because all 4 are the same causeing the first arm to sink lower than the 2nd arm(closer to sled) due to the amount of weight on each section (obviously there is more force going down on the arm closer to the body)  is this totally fine?

The last 2 problems are probable directly related, but it seems through poor craftsmanship (most likely the case since it was my first metal project ever)  but it seems that each joint gets more and more unlevel.  for instance if the belt hinge is level, then the elbow is slightly off axis, and the pin for the gimbal handle is even more unlevel.  is this really a problem other than the sled running away if i let go on accident?

this last issue might be caused by the previous, but when walk fast or have excessive movement in the arm, the hip joint swings back and forth and hits the best sometimes and the elbow joint will buckle (the elbow screws will hit the ends of the bones of the arm).  sometimes they smack around and its kindof denting up the ends of the bones, its probably not an issue, but is this an error in operation, or most likely uneven cuts and drills that i'll have to live with?

thanks in advance for any help with these issues, it would be much appreciated as i would love this year and a half, $650 project to work just a hair better.   It is working pretty good so far, and since i use a hvx200 i don't need to buy a seperate monitor!  so i  just space the weights away from the center shaft for lateral movement stabilization.

Thanks!

[Charles King]

I'll answer your first sets of question you had in your first post. The iron bends simply because you have more weight at the end of it than it is capable of supporting. I see you're using two screws to attach the angle bracket to the end of the arm. Are you sure you are loading the arm according to Cody's specs? It won't help moving the screw stud inwards as you proposed.

As for the vest, please post a full view of the vest. It helps to get a perspective of the vest as a whole. Post a full view of the arm as well.

alright, well, while i'm waiting for that, i might as well ask a couple more questions.

its probably not a problem, but it seems like i should have gotten lighter springs up front because all 4 are the same causeing the first arm to sink lower than the 2nd arm(closer to sled) due to the amount of weight on each section (obviously there is more force going down on the arm closer to the body)  is this totally fine?

The arm closer to the vest has to carry the weight of both the second arm and the complete sled. Getting lighter springs will not help. A good suggetion would be to get stronger springs in both arms that will support the weight you intend to carry, this is usually the minimum weight you intend to have on your sled.

The last 2 problems are probable directly related, but it seems through poor craftsmanship (most likely the case since it was my first metal project ever)  but it seems that each joint gets more and more unlevel.  for instance if the belt hinge is level, then the elbow is slightly off axis, and the pin for the gimbal handle is even more unlevel.  is this really a problem other than the sled running away if i let go on accident?

That question was already answered in my first reply.

this last issue might be caused by the previous, but when walk fast or have excessive movement in the arm, the hip joint swings back and forth and hits the best sometimes and the elbow joint will buckle (the elbow screws will hit the ends of the bones of the arm).  sometimes they smack around and its kindof denting up the ends of the bones, its probably not an issue, but is this an error in operation, or most likely uneven cuts and drills that i'll have to live with?

The elbow joint connecting both arms has this side effect on most of the commercial rigs. One way to reduce the noice is to put stoppers on the ends of the arms.

this last issue might be caused by the previous, but when walk fast or have excessive movement in the arm, the hip joint swings back and forth and hits the best sometimes and the elbow joint will buckle (the elbow screws will hit the ends of the bones of the arm).  sometimes they smack around and its kindof denting up the ends of the bones, its probably not an issue, but is this an error in operation, or most likely uneven cuts and drills that i'll have to live with?

pics pics

[Bjoern Vogelsang]

this last issue might be caused by the previous, but when walk fast or have excessive movement in the arm, the hip joint swings back and forth and hits the best sometimes and the elbow joint will buckle (the elbow screws will hit the ends of the bones of the arm).  sometimes they smack around and its kindof denting up the ends of the bones, its probably not an issue, but is this an error in operation, or most likely uneven cuts and drills that i'll have to live with?

The elbow joint connecting both arms has this side effect on most of the commercial rigs. One way to reduce the noice is to put stoppers on the ends of the arms.

this last issue might be caused by the previous, but when walk fast or have excessive movement in the arm, the hip joint swings back and forth and hits the best sometimes and the elbow joint will buckle (the elbow screws will hit the ends of the bones of the arm).  sometimes they smack around and its kindof denting up the ends of the bones, its probably not an issue, but is this an error in operation, or most likely uneven cuts and drills that i'll have to live with?

pics pics

I myself solved this problem by adding two little springs between each side of the elbow and the both arms. Works very smooth now, because in every situation when the elbow is tending to "swap" and hit one of the arms, it is softly hold back by the little springs.