Phantom 1 Gimbal Rebuild for SJ4000 Action Camera

thingiverse

There are times when I wish I could just purchase something and use it exactly how it was meant to be used without modifying anything at all. Then again, tearing things apart and making them better is a huge part of the fun for me. This project that I'm currently working on is an excellent example of this sort of mindset in action. Initially, I bought a pretty inexpensive camera gimbal for my Phantom which seemed like a good buy at first glance, but unfortunately it turned out to be very heavy and greatly reduced my flight time to only about 3-4 minutes. Given that I'm the kind of person who likes to tinker with things, I took apart this little project so I could see how it all works internally. Upon tearing everything down, I was surprised to find that it would actually be cheaper for me to purchase a brand new gimbal from scratch rather than try and salvage any individual components. As you might have guessed, my first thought when I discovered this fact was "no big deal, I can just trash the entire thing" and be done with it but then something clicked - perhaps because of my tinkering nature I felt more inclined to repurpose some lighter 3D printable components that could fit perfectly in place of those heavier parts that were weighing everything down. Now you see before your very eyes what has transpired as a result of this rather creative decision: so far, I am really thrilled with it - it is incredibly sturdy now and even the balance seems a heck of a lot better compared to its original version.