DIY Motorized Skater Dolly with Pan Tilt Head

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sinapps

Well-known member
This item is for sale in the correct section. Since a question was asked about construction, I'm creating a post here to discuss details.

Servocity PT785-S Pan Tilt head converted to Stepper motor drives for smooth real time motion as well as timelapse. Mated to a custom skater dolly, also stepper driven.

The skater dolly is made from 1/4" Delrin with metal 1/4-20 screw inserts for accessories, pan/tilt head mount, and ball head mount. Steppers, pulleys, and belts are included. 2 front wheels are locked in position. The rear drive wheel can be turned 90 degrees for circular shots. Lasers are included on front and rear wheels for alignment.

The pan/tilt head can hold a large camera (up to FS100) and can rotate full 360 degrees when mounted on the dolly.

This is a DIY project that I don't have time to complete. All mechanical work is done. Only needs to have steppers wired up and connected to a controller. The dolly stepper motor has been wired up and tested.

For Sale here: http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?320216-CONUS-Skater-Dolly-and-Pan-Tilt-Head

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Thanks for creating the post. I'm interested in the motors and belt drive that you ahve for the pan tilt. Did you buy that from servo city? How does it work? Is it wobbly?
 
I bought the motors from Phidgets. http://phidgets.com

The large pulleys came from ServoCity
Pulley( http://www.servocity.com/html/timing_hub_pulleys.html )
Clamp( http://www.servocity.com/html/1__bore_clamping_hub_c__545356.html )

The small pulleys and belts were from http://sdp-si.com - you can use their belt length calculator to get the ratio you want and the stepper distance.

The stepper mounts came from eBay (http://www.ebay.com/itm/NEMA-17-Mou...226?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2ecf11b2da)
 
Great! Last question. does it move side to side, up and down by hand or is the tolerance very tight? The servo city stock head is very flimsy and you get a lot of unwanted motion out of it. Hoping that this hack can make it super snug and only move with the motors.

-R
 
R0bertAngel0 said:
Great! Last question. does it move side to side, up and down by hand or is the tolerance very tight? The servo city stock head is very flimsy and you get a lot of unwanted motion out of it. Hoping that this hack can make it super snug and only move with the motors.

-R
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It is pretty tight. it was not loos even when I had the servos installed. I did not like the low speed performance of the servos and Servocity even said that they did not intend this head to be used for video, only rough positioning for stills.
 
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