Mach+ GearCam HD Mounting Ideas?

[Scott Evil]

Just received my new GearCam HD Cam in the mail from the Fathers Day Sale (VERY nice product, thanks Art!)

I bought this for my L3 cert build because it's a lot more rugged than the keychain cam that I have.

The 7.5" rocket that it's going on can "Potentially" hit mach 1.? for a couple seconds on an N5800.

A few thoughts to mount it internally but I'd prefer to mount this camera "parasitically" (K.I.S.S.). A couple big hose clamps
come to mind...but not very photogenic if you know what I mean.

Anybody have some more smarter-er ideas?

-S

[G_T]

I do not know where you are launching from (altitude and base temperature), but I get a stagnation temperature of close to 160 degrees C.

http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/BGH/stagtmp.html

Are you sure the body of your camera is not thermoplastic? Many thermoplastics will have a glass transition temperature below this value (semi-crystalline plastics) or soften by this temperature. The lens is likely plastic as well and may soften or melt.

You'll also be adding some drag just clamping it in place - which might or might not matter for your application. Can you make a shroud?

Gerald

PS - Sorry, I read your 1.? as 1.7. Plugging in something like 1.2 instead gives a low enough value that likely your plastic will be fine. I'd suggest making a RasAero sim of your rocket and using your expected launch site altitude and real rocket mass to get a good estimate of burnout velocity. Plug that velocity and the burnout altitude into the calculator at the end of the link above to get a good estimate of the stagnation temperature. If that is getting into the upper range of the service temperature for some thermoplastics then IMHO you are fast enough to need a shroud.

[Scott Evil]

Thanks for the link and info Gerald, looks very interesting.

RockSim and Open Rocket both have me roughly @1.4 mach with a CTI N5800CS loaded. I'll check out RasAero when I'm done here.

The GearCam itself looks a lot more like an aluminum flashlight than a camera. The blunt end cap unscrews and exposes the SD card slot USB port directly below it so I can see heat being an issue on faster (than mine) rockets.