Small Camera Stabilzer

By ApacheXMD

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Small Camera Stabilzer

This is a small camera stabilizer in the style of the Tiffen Merlin. The body is made from pieces of hollow 8mm (.317") fiberglass epoxy tubing. A cheap universal joint from an RC car and two flanged f605zz bearings for the "gimbal".  Counterweights are simply 1/4 bolts holding some common steel washers.  I printed the parts in natural ABS at .2mm layer height and 20% infill.  You may need to play around with the openscad files to get the holes sized correctly for your printer and rods. The baseplate is sandwiched by two flanged [F605ZZ bearings](http://www.ebay.com/sch/f605zz). The universal joint slides into the two bearings and is held in place with an M4 nut. The universal joint I used is HSP part number 106015 and can easily be found on [ebay for about 6 dollars](http://www.ebay.com/sch/hsp+106015) for a *pair* (you only need one). I used a hacksaw to cut off the tip of the "dog bone" to slide it into the handle.  The upper fiberglass rod is about 125mm long, the lower is about 160mm. These can of course be customized to suit your needs/camera. I purchased my rods at [Tap Plastics](http://www.tapplastics.com/product/plastics/plastic_rods_tubes_shapes/epoxy_tubing/144). They sell a 0.317"OD x 0.266"ID rod for about 4 dollars for a 32inch length.  You will need to glue a nut to the bottom counterweight mount. I scuffed up the nut with sandpaper and glued it in place with Gorilla brand super glue.  You will aslo need three 1/4-20 bolts each about 1/2" to 3/4" long (depends on the washers you use).  If you search the interweb on merlin style stabilizers, you'll find lots of info. My favorite is [wsclater's collection of works.](http://www.diycamera.com/stabiliser/index.html).  Some reading on stabilizers will also reveal that getting them balanced can be very very tricky. It took me a solid 2 hours of playing around with various combinations of washers and camera positioning to get it close.  Also note that this is for SMALL cameras. Don't try to balance your expensive DSLR on this.  
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