Home made Gimbal Head (Finished)

Approx £120. Some of the bits I bought came in packs so if I make another, which I probably will, I will already have some items. I think now that I could make one for approx £80.
 
Superb ingenuity there Gaz, and looks very smart.
Just wish I had a setup which could make use of asking if you'd knock me one up.
I don't know if I'd bother using different bearings - nothing wrong with over-engineered stuff.
At least it's likely to work well into the distant future.
 
Thanks. Im looking at ways of making it lighter. It's 2 lbs heavier than the current wimberley Mk II. The MkI weighed 4 lbs. it doesn't bother me and I know if I make the L bracket out of lighter stock I could save a decent amount of weight. The L bracket is made from 10mm steel which is all I had to hand. It's complete overkill for that and probably 6mm would be ok.
 
I would say that there's about 10-12 hours work in it. Could make it quicker now. Next one will have the L bracket made of lighter material and I won't round off all the corners with a file as much.

The lens mount is a manfrotto unit that I had lying around. I prefer them to the arca type as the manfrotto has an automatic latching mechanism that stops the lens slipping out of the mount. I believe that arca have something similar now but I think the manfrotto is a better design. It also gives several options for mounting to the L bracket without having to modify it. You can see that I've mounted it at the front to compensate for the lens & camera being front end heavy. I don't actually need the long plate to achieve perfectbalance and I will be changing it for a shorter one when I can find it.

The next one I will make the knobs myself. I couldn't come up with any way of making scalloped knobs with the tools I have so bought one. Sods law dictates that as soon as I bought one I thought of a way to do it
 
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No I won't cut it. Might need it for my next project which will be a bit easier that this one.
 
That's where the lens mount came from. I think they're good value for money.
 
Hi Gaz, awesome job on the homemade Gimbal. I myself do not want to spend what Wimberley is charging for a unit and I'm interested in making one myself. Did you make the pan spool and tilt shaft yourself or where these something that you purchased? I can't seem to find these anywhere. Also can you tell me how long that tubing is that you used for the main upright?
 
The main tube I bought already bent. It's 33mm diameter. You need a hydraulic mandrel bender to bend it smoothly. All the other parts I machined myself including the spindles. Making the spindles was very straightforward. The trickiest part was machining the internal housings for the bearings.

If anyone is interested I will put some drawings on here. If not I won't as I'm not very good at drawing. All the sketches for this were done freehand just to give me something to work from.
 
Hi gaz.. would yours work inverted?

I know it sounds crazy but bear with me..

I'm disabled and stuck in bed all the time, I cant manage much weight now but didn't want to give up shooting the birds in my front garden so in typical heath robinson fashion I can up with the idea of fixing a hide clamp to the hanging pole over my bed using a centre column with a pan & tilt head to hold my camera and an old nikkor 300mm.

I'm having problems though getting smooth and easy transitions from the head, thinking about it a gimble head would be ideal but I'm not sure if the loading on the bearings would cause an issue if it was inverted.

I figured a well balanced gimble head would let me move the camera and lens with ease whilst staying where I put it as well.

I'll get my brother to take a shot of it all when he visits next week so you can see what I mean.
 
Hi Ian

Yes it will work inverted. It doesn't make any difference to the way it supports the camera. If you look at the manfrotto 393 some people suspend the camera underneath it.
 
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Gaz J said:
The main tube I bought already bent. It's 33mm diameter. You need a hydraulic mandrel bender to bend it smoothly. All the other parts I machined myself including the spindles. Making the spindles was very straightforward. The trickiest part was machining the internal housings for the bearings.

If anyone is interested I will put some drawings on here. If not I won't as I'm not very good at drawing. All the sketches for this were done freehand just to give me something to work from.
Click to expand...

Hi Gaz,

I'd be very interested to see the drawings! This is a project I've occasionally thought of having a go at myself.

Your finished product looks very professional indeed!


Cheers,

Jez.
 
A very interesting read i may well have a go at one myself.
Regards
Richard
 
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