5 Hour External Battery for DV camera

Step 5: Neoprene battery cover

Now that I can run my DV camera for 5 hours on external battery power and another 40 or so minutes with the provided battery, I needed something to put my new battery pack in so that it looked cool. I didn't want people to see me with AA batteries dangling from my camera.

I wanted it to be black like all good photographic equipment. I also thought it would be nice to have it a little water resistant. Just in case it rained or someone tried to spill Coke on it.

Neoprene was my thought. Some thin neoprene. I had never worked with neoprene before. I figured there must be a good way to glue it together. After all, they make dry suits out of the stuff and they don't leak.

I found some stuff on-line but it cost too much and I would have to wait for it to arrive. I already had my neoprene. I took an old mouse pad and pealed off the fabric top leaving me with a nice thin piece of neoprene.

I cut my pattern out of the neoprene and used contact cement to glue it together. It worked great! Once it was all glued together, I added some Velcro to keep it closed and I was done (for now. I need to add a clip or belt loop to it.)

8.4 volt, 2500mAh external battery pack for my DV camera.

Comments

[CB2001]

I like this tutorial. I myself have a JVC with a battery that isn't holding the charge as much anymore that runs on 11 volts (Output 11v-1A according to the charger) and I happen to have the same Energizer Rechargable with the 2500 mAh. And since they give off 1.2v per battery, according to my calculations, it'd be 9 batteries to power the camera (and the amount of voltage isn't even enough, as the volts per battery on the lab states 1.2v, but with 9 batteries, it'd make the amount of voltage put out at 10.8v, and 10 is 12 volts). Kinda makes me wonder if JVC did it to avoid people like us from constructing our own battery packs (as their replacement rechargeable batteries for the GR-D30U are still being sold by JVC at $29, which only holds a charge for one hour).

[numademan]

Great Idea, this will work on other project too. thanks for the wonderful and well done instructions. will work great in strange countries and just plug it in to a car recharger system in any country. Great! numademan : )

[AT]

It turns out that this plug for my DV camera is the same as for my portable ham radio. And the power requirements are similar. So, I can use it for both! BONUS!!! Now, if a person was very creative and had more extra junk around, they could put a multi-prong adapter on the end so it would hook up to many things.