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DIY 3 Axis 360° Rotaion Brushless Gimbal

Posted by Sérgio Domingos on September 27, 2013 at 1:23am

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I just spotted on RCTimer's new items page a new brushless motor for gimbals - GBM5208-SR.

What's good about it is that instead of normal shaft it has a tube shaft with a 12.7mm hole, they include a Slip Ring of the same size with it, this makes it easy to rotate 360° in all axis, for most people 360° rotation on the yaw should be enough. Also, due to the big shaft/tube size, i suppose the motor should be stronger, with a shaft like this and those big bearings applying direct weight to the motor should be no problem.

I already build a 3 axis gimbal for my Canon EOS M with the 4114 motors, now it's time to start prototyping Version 2.

My plans are to make it rotate in all 3 axis using the slip rings, they have 12 wires, which is enough for my project.

Here are some details:

Pitch Axis:

IMU - 4 wires
IR Remote Switch - 3 wires
Video Out - 2 wires

- Sharing GND and 5V it will be reduced to 6 wires only.

Roll Axis:

Pitch Motor - 3 wires
IMU + IR + VID - 6 wires

- So i use 6 wires for the IMU, IR and VID, i still have 6 wires left for the pitch motor, the slip ring is rated at 2A per wire, with the 6 wires i'll connect them in pairs to the motor, which i believe should give enough power to the motor.

Yaw Axis:

- This axis will hold the Controller Board and an Sbus Decoder. I don't want to add more weight so i'll use power from Aircraft main Lipo.
- With the Sbus decoder i will only need to pass 4 wires to the aircraft, which are GND, 12V POWER, VIDEO, SBUS SIGNAL. 2 wires for Sbus and Video, which leaves 10 wires, 5 wires for GND and another 5 for 12V should be ok i think.
- Yaw Motor and Roll Motor don't need the slip ring, since their leads are in the same axis, so i just can connect them directly to the Controller Board.

I can't wait to start this project, what do you guys think? Cheers!

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Comments

  • Nicholas Witham September 28, 2013 at 7:54pm

    Days have a similar brushless gimbal motor

    http://www.dys.hk/ProductShow.asp?ID=226

    They also have a 3axis gimbal, which you can buy with or without motors.

    http://www.dys.hk/ProductShow.asp?ID=220

    Rctimer also have a 3axis gimbal, with the GC included

    http://www.rctimer.com/product_976.html

    Im sure it won't be long till both companies are selling gimbals with the continuous rotation motors (the ones with sliprings) built in already.

  • Shawn Thorvilson September 28, 2013 at 4:45pm
    Not sure what he has for a tracker, don't know a lot about them. I would imagine an RC car esc would have the reverse option. Not sure how else you could get it.
  • MD September 28, 2013 at 4:42pm

    Good idea about the antenna tracker. Which one are you using? I don't mind about the feedback, just being able to move it freely on the pan axis. How would you set up an esc with forward and reverse? Programmable esc?

  • Shawn Thorvilson September 28, 2013 at 1:06pm
    It wouldn't work like a servo until it had a feedback loop. Servos know what position they're in by using a potentiometer on the output gear. Also these motors are low on torque. Its interesting that you bring this up. A friend of mine and I are currently trying to implement them on an antenna tracker. He wants to mount a camera along with the antenna so that he can track and record his multirotor when alone.
  • MD September 28, 2013 at 12:57pm
    Thanks. I'd like to use it essentially as a 360 servo with a slipring in it as opposed to hooking it up to my controller board. Size here is paramoumt. Great idea about the brake, wonder if its programmable and if it would be strong enough to hold position.
  • Shawn Thorvilson September 28, 2013 at 10:36am

    It might be possible to set up a brake on the esc...if you need it to hold position. 

  • Shawn Thorvilson September 28, 2013 at 10:33am

    Im not sure what you're looking to do MD but if you set up an esc with forward and reverse you could turn the motor one way or another. I don't think you would be able to hold a position with the motor though, like a gimbal control board would do. I believe they energize different phases like a stepper motor does.

  • Craig Burden September 28, 2013 at 1:29am

    Very cool! I have been wanting to build a 360deg gimbal but since nothing had a tube shaft I was going to put the controller below the yaw motor. This "simplifies" things! 

    Awesome

  • MD September 28, 2013 at 12:13am
    How do you connect this to an esc to bypass my gimbal board. I'd like my transmitter to control this directly. Possible?
  • Jesse September 27, 2013 at 5:57pm

    That's an awesome find!!  I am waiting on a couple of slip rings at the moment to make a couple of gimbal's for my rover... these might be better, and the price isn't ridiculous either... (tho they're not what I'd call cheap either)

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