Build Your Own Underwater Video Camera - Underwater Projects ...

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Camera Housing To fabricate the camera lens buy a sheet of clear acrylic cut it with a 1 7/8 (48 mm) MASTER MECHANIC circle cutter . You'll find one of these at True Value Hardware Stores , in the USA. If you can not find one of these where you live, try cutting your circle with a jigsaw. To cut the lens using the circle cutter you'll also need a drill press, as these circle cutter will slip ruining your piece. You'll need a section of PVC pipe about 1" , a trap adapter, and an end cap. Glue the end pieces together in the order shown. Drill a hole in the center of the end cap, and slip the down wire through. Secure it by looping a wire tie and pull it tight. Using marine grade goop squeeze a bead between the wire and the end cap. This will make the housing water tight. To ensure against any possible leakage mix together 5 minute epoxy and pour it inside the end cap. Using a 1 1/2" circle cutter cut off two circles from the same acrylic sheet you used earlier for the lens. This circle cutter can be any brand, unlike the one used for cutting the lens. Next place the two pieces on top of each other, drill two holes diametrically opposed. Then take one of the parts and bore a larger hole using the center hole as a guide. This hole needs to be large enough for the camera lens to portude through. By now you must have picked up your LED's. Depending on the amount of LED's used drill a radial pattern on the same piece. If you are not sure which drill bit to use for this get a hold of a drill guide. Insert the LED's so that the leads line up long to short to long... and solder them following the wiring diagram on top. In the center of this array you should have soldered a resistor, you can place it anywhere but placing it here makes your project look neater, and less prone to short circuit. http://freepistonjetengine.741.com You spy cam should have included a bracket like the one in the picture on the left. Cut two slits on the part you set aside to acomodate the bracket. at this time drill a hole big enough to insert 5 conductors through. Take a red and a black solder them to the LED array follow the wiring diagram. Black should be soldered to the short lead. Using two long screws and two sections of tubing as spacers join the two acrylic disks as in the picture. Last solder all the wires following the scematics below. Insert shrink tubing in all exposed wires and seal them by applying heat on the tubing. Thread the adapter cap using pipe compound. You are now done.
The camera was suspended by it's own power cable. A bracket was manufactured out of a 3 1/2" corner L brace for this purpose. The brace was cut off approximately 1 1/2" from the corner. The short end was bent up and the sharp edge filed smooth, the same was done to the edge on the sawed off piece. The small straight piece was then bolted to the bent up end of the L piece. Next two holes were drilled on the small piece. Two hose clamps were slipped over the housing and the bracket was inserted under both, (the long side of the bracket lays flat against the housing) and fastened by turning both screws . Two wire ties were inserted in the small holes drilled in the movable part, and the wire was attached by looping the ties around the cable and pulling the ends tightly. Enough slack was left as to allow the movable part of the bracket to be adjusted in any direction, this enables the camera to point up or down. An alternative would be an aluminum strap bracket. To build, cut it, and bend it to wrap the PVC housing snugly, drill a hole on the top end and get a length of the same material and drill 3 more holes on it, two at both ends. You next insert a bolt trough the strap and flat bar, tighten with a nut. The remaining holes are for wire ties you'll need them to secure the down wire to the bracket. At this point you'll drill a hole in the PVC housing large enough to insert the down wire. Look at the next picture for details. PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER Electronics If you find these blueprints intimidating go on to my next project. It uses a power adapter. Your finished camera should look like this! The white wire on the threads is the microphone cable not used for this project. As tested this camera did not need any extra weight to sink. I did have problems with leaks and future projects used a fixed window and a cleanout adapter to access the camera. See tyco camera for details. First start by building your PVC housing. Then drill a hole slightly larger than the downwire. Next insert the downwire through the hole LED Array Disregard this section if you intend to use an external light source, such as sunlight, flashlight... Flashlights are much easier to use and provide more more light. Underwater Kinetics has several inexpensive watertight flashlights at reasonable prices. These camera are perfect for our project as they come with two places where one can loop hose clamps and attach it to the underwater camera housing. Wire ties may also be used to secure the flashlight. http://freepistonjetengine.741.com
Page 1: Build Your Own Underwater Video Cam
Page 5 and 6: Lug 1 Not used Lug 2 +12v Power sou
Page 7 and 8: Top left: Shows the finished produc

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