UW housing float

[smellzlikefish]

I have been experiencing some elbow pain that I believe is associated with my T1i/Ikelite underwater camera system which is pretty heavy both in and out of the water. Someone on another forum suggested that attaching floats to make the camera more buoyant would help with these aches. I'd love to see some ideas on how/what kind of floats some of you have tried.

 

[Interceptor121]

STIX floats produced by 4th generation design fit ultralight arms and similar
You can also buy devinyl cells (spelling error here for sure) and cut them as you like
This will resolve the issue in water but of course not outside!

 

[Akimbo]

This is more of a rant than a suggestion:


What the heck is wrong with manufacturers? There is no reason in this day of solids modeling CAD/CAM software that every housing is not neutral to slightly positive in fresh water — especially strobes. It is a lot cheaper, easier, and more compact to add lead than syntactic foam!

OK, it is safe for small children to come back in the room.

 

[Interceptor121]

Good one akimbo some brands like sea and sea have strobes that are near to zero with batteries in water
For camera housing in aluminum it is not possible unless you have a lot of space around the camera as the housing itself is not neutral either...

 

[bvanant]

This is more of a rant than a suggestion:


What the heck is wrong with manufacturers? There is no reason in this day of solids modeling CAD/CAM software that every housing is not neutral to slightly positive in fresh water — especially strobes. It is a lot cheaper, easier, and more compact to add lead than syntactic foam!

OK, it is safe for small children to come back in the room.

The problem is (and I think you know it) that to make a neutral housing you need lots of air. Cameras and lenses and arms and focus lights are all heavy. It is easy to design a box big enough to be neutral (with a single choice of port) and in fact many high end video systems need lead to balance them out. BUT most housing buyers don't want giant bulky Ikelite looking boxes but rather want the much smaller and sexier looking housings that have minimal space around the camera. "Fits like a glove" is a common description of the new housings which is another way of saying sinks like a brick. If I were a housing maker I might try to offer two versions, the small sexy one and the much larger but neutral one and see how the sales go. With travel restrictions being what they are and systems already being so bloody big, a much bigger box wouldn't do it for me.

Bill

 

[Akimbo]

...For camera housing in aluminum it is not possible unless you have a lot of space around the camera as the housing itself is not neutral either...

Once you build a parametric solids (computer) model, it is amazing how easy it is to tweak the design to add extra volume that is barely noticeable. The added internal volume is almost always useful in making controls less expensive and complex — to say nothing of easier camera installation.

In any case, adding air volume to a housing is far more compact and cost-effective than adding the same buoyancy in syntactic foam until you get into the 500+ Meter depth range.

 

[Interceptor121]

It depends on a large camera it is not that difficult, on a compact you may need to double the size to make it neutral. Nobody wants things bigger than needed and a few floats that weight nothing to no arm and take little space

 

[diversteve]

Stix also sells two different float belts that wrap around your port.
http://www.bluewaterphotostore.com/stix-fb-10
Stix Large Buoyancy Float Ring for Straight Port (FB-12) | Bluewater Photo & Video

 

[archiebald]

This is more of a rant than a suggestion:


What the heck is wrong with manufacturers? There is no reason in this day of solids modeling CAD/CAM software that every housing is not neutral to slightly positive in fresh water — especially strobes. It is a lot cheaper, easier, and more compact to add lead than syntactic foam!

OK, it is safe for small children to come back in the room.

The housings and strobes are not necessarily the main issue. It is the arm system and lenses that add up.

My simple camera (Canon S95 plus WP-DC38) is positively buoyant. I added some weight first time out.

But then I added an INON base and strobe so it is slightly negative right now. (Actually the strobe itself is quite close to neutral)

Soon I will be adding lens adapters, wet lenses, arms, another strobe and who knows what. I did a check of the underwater weight and it will be going up alarmingly next time out. (The Inon UWL-H100 28LD is 530 grams on its own)

So, I am carefully selecting INON float arms to keep the whole rig as close to neutral as possible.

INON Arm System [Arm]

AFAIK, the ball ends are standard between manufacturers, so there is no reason why you couldn't mix and match float arms with other gear.

 

[Akimbo]

The same design software works on strobe arms and ports. Sure there is variation between lenses you put behind the port, but we are taking grams not kilograms. Balancing weight and displacement by component results in better balance.

That is why I suggested biasing designs to the positive side. Adding weight is easy. In the end, most people probably want the whole system about a pound/½ Kg heavy. As you suggest, it isn't hard to get there.