Sight glass camera?

James · Sight glass camera?

I was thinking, on Poppy, I ain't going to know when the boiler needs filling up! So I thought I might be able to get a little camera, sit it on the footplate looking at the water level, and have it send the picture to a hand held/portable TV.

Would this be possible?

IndianaRog

James,

Sounds like a complicated way to look at water level...why can't you let it run for 5 minutes, then stop the loco by hand and LOOK at the water level??? With experience you will know how many minutes it can run before needing a fill.

While camera's have been miniaturized to incredibly small sizes and as you note can re-broadcast to a hand held or larger TV. If I had the money looking for a need...I would somehow mount the camera facing FORWARD, so you see what an engineer in a real loco would see from the cab. Perhaps camera could be mounted on top of a tender right behind the loco so it doesn't get toasted.

Fun to think of the possibilities though.

Rog

Mamodman123

Yes I agree with Rog, that would be amazing!

V8Nick

^^^ Excellent idea about a "Driver's eye" view!

How about some kind of level sensor, and a warning light?
I can see problems finding a sensor straight away.

:cheers Nick

steamyman

James,

dunno if this is any help-

http://www.freepatentsonline.com/6964278.html

SillyBilly

Hey,
This is what you want!!! You could put the batrey pack in the tender. We have one on a railway I volunteer at, I've never seen it work though. www.tuxcraft.com/shop/item.asp?itemid=96 quite expensive.

Perhaps you want to look at:
1. New boiler
2. A Titan gauge glass.

tmuir

We had a few of those at my last job.
We had people pretend to fall down escalators a lot and threaten to Sue and they often got an out of court settlement for several thousand dollars.

It was going to be 6 months before the permanent cameras went in so we installed several of those for a grand cost of $1500 including labour and hire of a scissor lift. Connected them to a VCR and let it record over night so we could check light levels and that evening someone 'fell' down the escalator and threatened to sue.
After they were brought in and shown the video footage of them going down the escalator looking left and right to make sure there was no witnesses and then quickly laying down at the bottom and then yelling for help they quickly dropped all talk of suing.

Instead they got a court appearance.
In a matter of hours the cameras had paid for themselves several times over.

James

Wow! Thanks guys!!

I need the tender, for the RC

SillyBilly

When I find the one at the railway I volunteer at, I'll mesure it for you.

James

Cheers mate!

mc_mc

This website has loads of cameras and related surveillance gear.

http://www.inesun.com/products.asp?lx=small&anid=9&nid=273

The cost of everything is in US $ and includes international postage.

I bought a network tester from them and it took 5 days to arrive so not bad at all.

This package doesn't look bad for £44 ish.

http://www.inesun.com/list_1.asp?id=2670

SillyBilly

Looks quite reasonable.