The Deeper Blue "Ultra Submariner" Project.

[ReefTroll]

So, we've all seen the wonderful video posted by FoxFish, http://forums.deeperblue.com/beach-bar/88417-home-made-space-craft.html#post825713

So, I was thinking it's time we started a Deeper Blue community project. Lets head to the depths as was suggested in that thread.

Something with a camera that shall sink, drift, film, and when it reaches the depths manages to change state and resurface.

So lets get ours heads together!!

 

[podge]

Well Reefy me old mate it all sounds a bit like witchcraft to me, but what else floats….

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrzMhU_4m-g"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrzMhU_4m-g[/ame]

 

[foxfish]

Great idea but, what would be a challenging depth?
Posted via Mobile Device

 

[Magpie]

My first thought is a usual camera in a waterproof case, with one of them keyrings that pops a gas canister into a balloon when in contact with water: 7dayshop.com - Online Store

Of course you need to stop water getting to it for a length of time so you put the keyring in a disolvable pva bag like carp anglers use. Korda Solidz PVA Bag System | www.reelfishing.co.uk

Drop the whole caboodle in, with enough weight to sink it, when the bag disolves the keyring pops and brings your camera back to the surface. Want it to go deeper? Put more pva bags around the keyring so the water takes longer to get through.

You'd also have to strap a deoth guage of some sort to the package.

 

[foxfish]

OK but at what depth could you inflate a balloon with a little gas cylinder?
Can we go 1000'?

 

[trux]

I believe that simpler and safer would be a system built on the same principle as the sled of Herbert Nitsch. I'd put a camera into a strong floating case, attach a heavy weight, sink it and then (at the bottom) release the weight, letting the floating case escaping to the surface unassisted.

In a rudimentary low-tech version, the weight could be attached by some cord or a wire that will give up after a few hours or days. The freed sphere will pop up on the surface, where it then starts sending a GPS signal indicating its position for a recovery. You would just need to attach a bigger battery to the GPS phone, so that it has some power even if the bathyscaphe remains underwater a bit longer than planned.

In a little bit more complicated version, there could be a very simple mechanism attached to the bottom of the weight releasing it when it touches the bottom.

And in a high-tech version, there would be a timer releasing the weight after predefined time.

I believe it is not unthinkable to go even to Marianna's trench with a simple sphere built by amateurs, but if you want to use a commercially available camera case, then I still believe you can find some that you can sink deeper than their rating, and can perhaps go to couple of hundreds of meters.

 

[foxfish]

OK thanks, so you are suggesting 500 - 600'.
That's a start then....

 

[Jon]

One of my professors back in college told about how they would send instruments down attached to weights. The only thing securing them to the ballast was a bit of hard candy. The ocean eats away at the candy over a period of time and then the (positively buoyant) package would float back to the surface.

He also mentioned another professor used the same system in a FRESH water lake and the candy never dissolved- so they lost everything!:head

Jon

 

[trux]

Excellent! Perhaps you could hang the weight on a bar of salami (Italian, of course, Spaghetti!) - once the deep water monsters start chumming on it, the capsule shoots up.

BTW, I think that constructing an amateur housing would not request that much skill - just a piece of a pipe big enough to keep the camera, phone and batteries, blinded with an thick acrylic glass could work to pretty big depth. You do not need any extern controls for such experiment, so no connectors, buttons, or other openings. You could weld or glue it all together, hence having little risk of leaking.

 

[trux]

Perhaps using an old scuba tank as a case could work - cutting off one end and blinding it with a plate of acrylic glass. That could be pressure resistant to several kilometers. It would be necessary to test whether a GPS phone close to the opening would have suffiicient GPS and GSM signals on the surface.

 

[foxfish]

I quite like the idea of straight down straight back up rather than waiting hours or days for the capsule to be retrieved - what about a light source? - do we need to actually film something, some object?

 

[trux]

Of course, you need lights if you want to catch all those monsters of the depth. Or at least a stroboscope / flash for taking series of snapshots. That should all fit into the case, though of course to avoid light scattering, having the lights more apart would be better. We do not need to make hi-res movie though, so perhaps keeping it all in the same housing would be sufficient.

 

[DivingDane]

So we have?

-Go Pro camera set to take 1 photo every 10sec
- 12L stell scuba cylender (shorty) cut and a perspex port added
- weight held on by 4 hard candy loops (lifesavers)

sounds like a plan.

now where to drop the camera for some good viewing?

 

[foxfish]

I quite like the idea of straight down straight back up rather than waiting hours or days for the capsule to be retrieved - what about a light source? - do we need to actually film something, some object?

That's what I was trying to say - an objective...

That's me off to bed so hopefully the night shift will have some fun posting some more ideas.

 

[trux]

now where to drop the camera for some good viewing?

I suggest this location:

​

 

[Mark Lamont]

I think they have been around for a while (since 1977 that I know of). ROV (remote operated vehicle). A little pricey though.
Sit in a vessel and look through a video screen, move the joy stick and explore.
I like the candy idea. But probably a demand valve like in a diving regulator piston and spring would allow an air cylinder to release air into a bag and surface at depth. The spring would just have to match the depth requirements. Having rethought this I think it would be an adjustable overpressure relief valve.
Not so uncommon. House hold uses might be a water heater or for minute adustment a toilet water tank.
What is this for???????

 

[superdude171]

You can get things which are on life rafts on boats which release the raft when they sink by cutting a cord, think they are called hydrostatic release units. they are set to cut the cord at certain depths. these could be used to cut the weight off.

Greg.

 

[trux]

Filling a liftbag is really not a good idea. With the growing depth you would need a huge cylinder to get some lift at the depth, and you would still risk losing the air on the way up. Floating incompressible vessel will have the same lift force at depth as at surface, and dropping a weight is way much simpler and more reliable than opening a valve.

 

[Mark Lamont]

Mmmmmmmmmm well, I think that a standard scuba tank would get one well over a mile down. And the bag concept is only differential pressure at maximum on a BC is 1.5 psi. because of the overpressure relief valve.
It seems to me that the real challenge is how to overcome the pressure differential of real depth for the "housing". I don't know of any electronics that can operate in clear fluid but there might be to use a non compressible medium in a more standard camera housing idea.
A section of petroleum pipe might be fitted with a sealed thick glass insert to overcome the pressure. O ring seals are surely not a problem.
Light for the video is another key issue.
Anyway it's a fun idea.

 

[trux]

Why would you complicate it by adding so much complexity with bringing an extra scuba tank for taking just a small housing do the depth, and using some complicated system for opening the valve? It could easily fail. In contrary, releasing a weight is trivial, cheap, rather fail-proof, and can be done by an amateur easily.

All electronics can work in fluid as long as it is not conductive. Oil is often used to cool down transformers and electronics. That's not an issue. The optics is - you can't fill the camera with fluid without changing the optical properties.

Using a scuba tank for the housing is much easier accessible for amateurs than a piece of a petroleum pipeline, and would also better withstand the pressure due to the shape. You would just need to open one end, and close it with a window - still less work than closing two ends at a pipe.

Light is no big issue. You simply put it together with the camera in the housing. Not a good solution for professional UW photography, but perfectly sufficient for documenting such deep dive.