Hi Guys,

About a year ago I bought a FlyCamOne2 and enjoyed getting video from my planes. Sometimes, when we had two or three aircraft in the air at the same time, I'd get some video of them flying, but usually very brief and pretty random. We made several attempts to fly slowly and around the same orbit, but the results were less than satisfactory.

3 weeks ago, my flying buddy Bob Gaver started towing a small missile around behind his plane, which was a hoot! It got me thinking, "Why couldn't I tow a camera sled around behind my plane and get video of it flying?"

I looked around on these forums and didn't find any advice or previous videos that were similar, so I set about building one of my own. The first was an utter failure! The second showed some promise.

The video below is the second iteration, 3rd revision of the AVS.

I think that a larger block camera or HD unit could be easily towed, given correctly sized AVS and some good video could result.

Let me know what you think. If enough people are interested, I'll be happy to share build details and some of the principles I've discovered along the way.

Simon

Aerial Video Sled AVS (Towed Chase Plane) (2 min 10 sec)

Pretty cool! Shat exactly is a video sled? Show us some pictures of it!

Thanks, QB, here are some pics of the tug and the AVS.

Simon

I've thought about doing the same thing but using one of those small walmart styro gliders and a keychain camera.

Originally Posted by randall1959

I've thought about doing the same thing but using one of those small walmart styro gliders and a keychain camera.

You should try it! As long as the wing loadings of the two vehicles are quite close it should work.

Simon

That actually was pretty cool. I think maybe you should use fishing line as the tow line. That way it doesn't show up as much in the video. Not sure what strength to use though.

- Jeff

That was crazy cool!

Originally Posted by zirt57

That actually was pretty cool. I think maybe you should use fishing line as the tow line. That way it doesn't show up as much in the video. Not sure what strength to use though.

- Jeff

Thanks, Jeff
What you see in the video is a lightweight music wire bridle, which is attached to about 10' of Fireline 10# fishing line attached to the tug. I tried it with fishing line all the way to the tug and it showed up worse under certain lighting angles. Plus it made the yaw oscillation somewhat worse.

Simon

Originally Posted by qualcity

That was crazy cool!

Thanks QC!

That's really creative! I like it.

Originally Posted by AtomicPunk

Thanks, Jeff
What you see in the video is a lightweight music wire bridle, which is attached to about 10' of Fireline 10# fishing line attached to the tug. I tried it with fishing line all the way to the tug and it showed up worse under certain lighting angles. Plus it made the yaw oscillation somewhat worse.

Simon

Ah yes, I see that in the pictures. Wow, the tow lines look so much larger in the video than in the pictures. Is that metal fishing line I see attached to the pylon? I was thinking about clear filament line but maybe that's what it is. Either way, this is one of the best, new ideas I've seen in a while. (They need more smileys, I really wanted to put a thumbs up here.)

- Jeff

I was just thinking, what if you attached your lines to the wings? Same fashion as you are doing but it gets the attachment points wider in order to still the oscillations. Maybe experiment with different attachment points. I do think you've got the right idea though of having two attachment points on the sled going to a single line coming from the tow plane.

- Jeff

I wonder if it would be possible to add gyros to it somehow to dampen the oscillations?

Originally Posted by AtomicPunk

Hi Guys,

Let me know what you think. If enough people are interested, I'll be happy to share build details and some of the principles I've discovered along the way.

Simon

I think that cool, I'm definitely interested.

Thanks

Wow! Super smooth video. I like it. I've been experimenting as well. My rig is a Super cub, w/ a 2 ft glider, and key chain cam.

I'd like to build a tow plane like yours, got Directions?

Here's a video I made w/ the above rig...

Hobby Zone Super Cub towing small glider w/ onboard camera (4 min 38 sec)