Not much about my rig is “out of the box” any more. After much testing and failure I’ve replaced a lot of pieces so that the system is a lot more reliable.

The tilt/pan head is made by Brooks Leffler, it was a gas to put together, and does work well, but the various screws started falling off pretty quickly. A standard part of my kit was a screwdriver and wrench. After almost loosing a couple of pieces, I replaced all of the screws and nuts with some surplus allen head stainless stuff I acquired in a game of chance along with an appropriate smattering of lock washers.

The legs, which are carbon fibre tubes, are still a problem. They fall out far too easily and the aluminum clamps that hold them in place are not plastic enough. The clamps deform on landing, and the legs eventually fall out - again.

The rotational servo has been replaced by a 360 degree servo from Parallax. More importantly, the gears have been replaced by some better quality units from Servo City.

The tilt servo has been replaced by a GS-1 from Scott Armitage of Dunehaven Systems. This servo incorporates a gyroscope that counteracts the swing that the rig is exposed to.

This is the servo that caused me a lot of grief. After sending up the kite and snapping photos for an hour, I would bring down the kite to find that the shutter servo had shifted and I had exactly zero pictures. Much modification ensued and finally I loaded the CHDK program into my camera and built an electronic switch to trigger the shutter.

The electronic switch takes the PWM signal from the radio receiver and, through a bit of JPBM (just plain black magic) sends 5VDC to a mini-USB connector plugged into the camera. The camera is programmed so that, when it sees 5V on the USB connector, it will start taking pictures.

Modifications to the radio are pretty minor. I installed a long handled momentary switch onto the forth channel input. This switch controls the shutter servo. When pushed into the “clicky” position, the shutter “servo” (now electronic switch) energizes the USB, CHDK takes over and starts shooting pictures until the switch is released.

The kite that I am using to loft my rig is a 60 square foot “Mockform” parafoil. Originally designed by Don Mock of Washington State, I made one at the 2008 Fort Worden Kite Makers Conference. Mine is appliqued with a design reminiscent of the stained glass window called “The Tree of Life” by Frank Lloyd Wright 1909 for the Darwin D. Martin house in Buffalo, New York.