Good morning from northern Minnesota! I'm in the early stages of a GoPro build (my first) using a Silver 3 (not 3+) with help from Daryl and parts going to be coming from Ralph for the main portions of the build. I plan to utilize Ralph's safari board and an in-progress wireless light controller that he's currently testing. I notice that different components of these builds require different voltage inputs and singificant work (and space) goes in to getting the right power to the different elements of the cam trap. For a gopro video setup these included (if I'm not missing anything);
-Board
-Cam (not sure if this is accounted for through the board when using the bus connector from Ralph)
-Lights
It is my intention to power the entire setup with a single 6V or 12V AGM power source. I currently utilize UB6420 Batteries for my fleet of 5 Spartan GoCam cellular cams and get about 8 weeks of winter usage out of this setup. The cams are taking and sending approximately 150-700 photos per week (at feed sites for deer).
Here's where I get to the detailed questions for the experts! Keep in mind, I'm trying to simplify the internal setup, both from a space and complexity standpoint. I don't like the idea or PIA of charging multiple sets of AA's or 18650's and also don't like the idea that one part of the cam may be dead due to it's unique power supply while others are still functioning. It's too much guessing vs just knowing that there's either power available to all or nothing.
1) Can I use devices like those in the attached photo to "distribute" power to whatever needs it?
2) Is there a "switch" that I can put between the battery and the setup to shut down the power when it drops to the lowest that is recommended for discharge of the battery?
3) Any advantage to using a 12V, 22 Ah battery vs a 6V, 42 Ah battery (similar capacity) from an electrical standpoint if the power converter idea works? One thing I noticed on the power converters was that the suppliers note that the output voltage must be greater than 0.4-0.6 volts different from the input voltage. That makes me think that 12V might be better than 6V if any of the output voltage is near 6V. Howwever, I would guess there's more efficiency loss going from 12 to something below 5 than from 6 to something below 5 (I could be totally wrong on this).
Please provide any/all input and knowledge that you can!!!!
I'm hoping that this might help others to gain cleaner and more open builds, reduce the size of the containers necessary and help increase the field runtime of their camtraps as well!
Feel free to email me at
mark.fuller@freeberggrund.com as it's sometimes more simple.
Thanks in advance,
Mark