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Sled Upgrade


Brandon Ziegenfuss

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It's not that difficult to drop an HD line directly down the post and terminate it in a connector on the base somewhere. The only drawback is it wouldn't be coiled with the rest of the cabling, but if you give yourself enough slack, you shouldn't have any issues with telescoping.

 

The AB mod is simple. Just swap the battery plate and reconnect the wires. Mounting it securely will be the biggest hurdle, and that's tiny.

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Hey Brandon. Look up Aaron Brown. He has Afton's old heavily modified Master Series sled. Aaron is in NYC too. I'd give you his number, but since you posted a topic with the word "sled" in the tittle in "General Discussion" instead of [duh!] "Sleds," making me clean up your mess, I'll let you find it on your own. Nice sled though. Take good care.

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  • 5 weeks later...

Brandon - I don't mean to jump onto your post, but I also have a similar project I am looking at - also involving upgrades to a Masters Series...

 

Alec - Do you know if Aaron does bigger customization projects? Basically, I have a Masters Series that I bought second hand (actually, I think it was fourth hand to be specific...) a little less than three years ago. To make a long story short, I have been struggling with the video down the post for a long time. I recently heard about a jumper cable that would bypass the distribution amplifier / frame line generator (thinking that might have been the issue), ordered it from Tiffen, installed it, and somehow screwed up all the power to the top of my sled in the process.

 

I'm looking to have the guts completely ripped out of my Masters Series so I can start from scratch with a "dumb sled" - a couple of home run lines of HD along with the power lines built into a harness - and possibly have some newer generation power ports installed. I would also like to see the bottom half of the rig chopped off and replaced with a simple "project box" type housing instead of the monster Masters Series chassis that's down there now.

 

Does anyone know of any brave souls out there who might approach a project like this? I'm also from NYC, so I would prefer someone in the area, but I would be willing to ship it out if it means I could finally have this system all buttoned up after all this time.

 

Thanks all!

 

- Phil Fleisher

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Hey Phil,

 

That's essentially what I did with my old rig. See here:

http://www.steadicamforum.com/index.php?showtopic=13314

and

http://www.steadicamforum.com/index.php?showtopic=13607

 

I too wanted to lose the K section - and I know people that have before me. The reason I didn't has to do with the length of the post. The two sections in the Master series post aren't terribly long to begin with. A full size camera flies nicely on the sled because of the K section providing a decent amount of length and counterweight down bottom. If you remove that, you'll likely have to operate with a fully extended post most of the time, and that would be with a "normal" size camera setup (Alexa or similar). If you ever went heavier than that, and needed more counterweight, you might end up in a bit of a predicament - not having any more extension left in the post. My suggestion would be to live with the K section. Embrace it. Hide all your messy wiring and pornography down there.

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His passport expired in March but no worries- he's been using a tunnel that runs from Greenwich to Mamaroneck. Brilliant and timely !!!! :D

 

I agree with the thoughts that leaving the K Section in place is wise. I've been mulling this over the last few days, and really have had a change of heart. Formerly advocating pulling it off, one must now run 3-4 batteries to load enough weight down below to overcome the loss of length from stage to sled bottom. Better to make use of the framework that exists.

 

Sled Bottom Porn. Sounds very Dark Net to me...

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