Camera Battery Adapter

I built this adapter in order to add larger battery capacity for prolonged time lapse shooting, it will work for adding battery hours to your camera or anything at a fraction of the price of commercial options. 

Be aware that messing around with electricity can be dangerous to you and your equipment, if you are not comfortable with this, do not do this.

Step 1: What you need

You will need just a few things to build this device.

- 1 battery for your camera.  search on ebay or amazon and buy the cheapest one you can find, it doesn't have to work well it just needs to fit in your camera.

-2 DC to DC step down. Ebay again, just a few dollars. I used this one. http://www.ebay.com/itm/250954119681?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1438.l2649

-3 Small enclosure for the step down.

-4 One DC power jack

-5 One DC barrel plug

-6 12" of 1 pair wire or a couple strands of hook up wire.

-7 Shrink tube

-8 Glue

Tools,

Screwdriver

Soldering iron

Multimeter <------ THIS IS A MUST!

Comments

[dwosullivan]

Well Done!
as an aside how good are those 12v lithium batteries hey! for the $20 ish you pay for them there are super powerful. I have used them for everything form arduino projects, killer bike lights, super high capacity usb chargers etc etc.

[DerekMellott]

They are awesome! I have several of them.

[motleypixel]

Oh man...I would be very nervous about doing this. I have a firm understanding of basic electronics/electrical and this is a great way to save money and really prolong your shooting. I think for the 5DMK2 the LPE6 packs are 1800mah and at about $60 each now and with a battery grip (after-market at about $40 or OEM at $130) you are talking some serious dough to get 3600mah of juice.

So for me, I have to use my after-market grip and two LPE6 batteries and I've yet to run out of juice for any single time-lapse capture. It's when the next day comes around and I want to shoot more that kills me. I often do night time-lapse in a remote location so by the next day my batteries are drained.

I'm confused on your build, why the drill battery and a 12VDC battery pack?

I think you could go with two 2S 7.4VDC 1800mAh wired in parallel to achieve 3600mah of juice w/o the need of the DC-DC step-down (which is the single area I would be most concerned about). I would hate for a component of the step-down to go south, aka die, and then cause irreversible damage to the camera.

[DerekMellott]

The drill battery is just showing another thing you can use to power the camera.

I do not recommend anyone do this if they are uncomfortable with it.

[hanlin_y]

That's a nice idea. You should hot glue the potentiometer so it isn't easy to mess around with it.

[DerekMellott]

That's a good idea, I've added it.
Thank you.

[astroboy907]

great idea!!! I was thinking of selling my extra battery but now I might not.. Offers a simple explanation and a great result- Jut might want to go into more detail about the step down for novices

[DerekMellott]

Thank you!

Do you mean more detail on how it works, how to use it, how to connect it, or all of the above?

[astroboy907]

just more detail on making sure to match the batteries voltage (or maybe a bit lower), just as a reminder so people don't make the mistake of plugging it into the camera without dialing it down first ;)

[DerekMellott]

Done.