Anyone want to join forces to get photos of space?
- Thread starter mrk
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Soldato
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Well, you may lose the camera but as long as we protect the card it's fine
Do you reckon Canon's 1Ds MKIII weather sealing is actually Re-entry sealed?
I can just seem them doing it for the MKIVs
Blackvault
Interesting. I've got a final year project to do at uni for my electrical & electronic engineering degree. I might see if I can interest a lecturer in supervising a project like this It'd (hopefully) produce some fantastic results for the final inspection.
It'd (hopefully) produce some fantastic results for the final inspection.
Soldato
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http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI....akeTrack=true&ssPageName=VIP:watchlink:top:en
Maybe something like this to transmit the data back during ascent/descent so no need to collect the memory card.
Maybe something like this to transmit the data back during ascent/descent so no need to collect the memory card.
I'd be up for this. Could be interesting 
I think the radio might have bandwidth issues - how long does it take to send a full res over that radio link? Memory card has less to go wrong and seems simpler. I'm happy to donate a bluetooth GPS device to the cause (for finding it after it lands), then we just need something that can connect to the GPS and broadcast the coordinates over GPRS, some sort of cheap PAYG phone.
I think the radio might have bandwidth issues - how long does it take to send a full res over that radio link? Memory card has less to go wrong and seems simpler. I'm happy to donate a bluetooth GPS device to the cause (for finding it after it lands), then we just need something that can connect to the GPS and broadcast the coordinates over GPRS, some sort of cheap PAYG phone.
Soldato
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I'd be up for this. Could be interesting
I think the radio might have bandwidth issues - how long does it take to send a full res over that radio link? Memory card has less to go wrong and seems simpler. I'm happy to donate a bluetooth GPS device to the cause (for finding it after it lands), then we just need something that can connect to the GPS and broadcast the coordinates over GPRS, some sort of cheap PAYG phone.
Well if you limit the shot to about 1Mb (shoot jpg), then that is 17KBps to download the shot in a minute (set the continuous firing to 1 minute per shot). The problem with having to retrieve the memory card is that we are right under the gulf stream, and even if you launch on the west coast, it is likely to land somewhere in Europe by the time it lands.
Soldato
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One of the guys here at work has just told me about this;
http://www.baycom.org/
A cheap radio modem that can send data over TCP/IP and can be made for about £3. Need to look at the specs though.
Edit; http://www.digi.com/products/wireless/xpress.jsp Want!
line-of-sight range up to 15 miles, 1.5 Mbps RF data rate. $499 though.
http://www.baycom.org/
A cheap radio modem that can send data over TCP/IP and can be made for about £3. Need to look at the specs though.
Edit; http://www.digi.com/products/wireless/xpress.jsp Want!
line-of-sight range up to 15 miles, 1.5 Mbps RF data rate. $499 though.
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If the range of the transmitter is only 15 miles though, you've practically got to be underneath it the whole time? Maybe we could start in Ireland?
Acutally, the distributed nature of forumpeople means that we could eaily man a launch site and a recovery site...
Soldato
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lol just what i was thinking, im pretty sure when folk release like 1000 small ballons they have to inform air space people so surely a balloon travelling very high you would need to. if i was in a 737 i wouldnt want a slr sucked into my engine lol.
sounds great fun though dudes, if it lands in norfolk i'll gladly collect it.
Soldato
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Not sure about the UK/Europe, but it seem that in the US you are fine as long as it under a certain load.
Road trip to France/Germany to launch it?
(Semi-serious suggestion!)
If someone else can drive then id be up for it.
Soldato
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how about you send a pigeon up with it carrying the camera and taking pictures with wing tips and then it can fly the stuff back to base. done deal.
im considering a less hardcore version of this, not so high and maybed tethered so i dont have to chase after it. how do you get a standard digi compact to take photos say every 10 seconds?
im considering a less hardcore version of this, not so high and maybed tethered so i dont have to chase after it. how do you get a standard digi compact to take photos say every 10 seconds?
Not sure about the UK/Europe, but it seem that in the US you are fine as long as it under a certain load.
If someone else can drive then id be up for it.
I'd be happy driving, I've got a 2 seater car though so could only take 1 other person. There's always budget airlines too, might be cheaper...
I was just thinking, if you had spent £300 on electronics to transmit the photos, there's a chance it might not work anyway and it might get destroyed or be unrecoverable (land in the sea or rough terrain).
Other option would be to travel somewhere where you are more likely to be able to recover it with the £300 and leave the photos on the card. The added bonus is you get a free holiday out of it
http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/CHDK on a cheap canon p+s, should be able to set it to shoot on an interval setting.
Also Randall from XKCD has done something similar with a kite - http://xkcd.com/kite/
Not sure about the UK/Europe, but it seem that in the US you are fine as long as it under a certain load.
If someone else can drive then id be up for it.
I'm pretty certain you would need CAA approval in the UK.
I'd love to do this if it gets going (in Herts), got nothing better to do with my time at the moment!
As for beaming the photos down to us, i'm thinking it's unlikely to work, otherwise the others who did similar things would have done the same. GPS and hope is probably the best way.
There was a thread in GD about something similar recently, they lost theirs, don't know if they found it again...
As for location, the gulf stream isn't always over the UK, so picking the right time would let us do it here, however the best place near(ish) us I reckon would be somewhere like the Sahara, flat and easy(ish) to get anywhere...
As for using fishing line, remember you have to add the weight of the line to the package, and the force the balloon would exert as it was being pulled back down, as well as the force of the wind on said balloon, all in all probably far more force than the breaking strain. Also the weight of the line would have to be taken into account when working out the max payload of the balloon, which wouldn't be much. Finally, 90,000 ft of line is going to be preeety tricky to look after (who's got the responsibility of tying the knots
) and I don't know if the CAA would approve of it either.Weight is the important thing, hand warmers are heavy (comparitively) and electronic ones could be an issue, the less batteries the better.
Overall I reckon some kind of box (light weight yet strong in case of crash landing, can anyone get hold of carbon fibre
) with a small piece of plastic for the lens to see through, that's waterproof and reasonably insulated (possibly even bouyant), attached to a parachute?Also I think James May did exactly this as well that was shown on TV a few weeks ago I think?
(Just brainstorming, not trying to put a dampener on it! I've wanted to do something like this for ages.
)EDIT: No, it wasn't james may, I think it was the program "Bang goes the theory" on BBC1?
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