DNewill wrote:
I am looking for any club or airport that has installed a (set of) web
cam(s) for online viewing of the airport and weather. It would seem that
with webcams becoming so very low cost, and used computers nearly free, that
other than the cost per month of the connection ( aprt of phone line costs?
DSL =~ $20 / month) this would be a good investment for clubs to have.
Members could see hangers for security, activity on airport ( "is anyone
else out at the field?") and local actual weather - especially important
when you have to drive over an hour to get to the field.

I recently installed a web accessible camera at our airport. You can see
it at

http://rldcloudcam.viewnetcam.com:50000

The ideal location will be in a heated/cooled indoor location with
Internet access and a window looking in the desired direction. A $30
webcam and a minimal computer puts you in business. You can connect
another webcam looking in a different direction, too. I didn't do it
this way, so I can't help with the details of getting the pictures onto
the web, but the camera software might take care of that.

Unless it's an expensive camera, it will need protection if the sun will
enter it's field of view. My experience and analysis is a number 3
welding filter (~12% visible light transmission) is more than adequate.
The camera's automatic exposure and white balance seem to handle the
loss of light and green tint well.

No good window? Mounting it outside means you need weather protection.
There are nice boxes with heaters, fans, sun shields, and adjustable
direction mounts for $50-$100. They won't fit every camera you might
choose, and they don't do any cooling below the ambient air temperature.
The cameras typically have a max operating temperature of 105 F, but
they will go somewhat above that before they stop working
(temporarily/permanently - depends on the camera and temperatures). You
also need to get power and the Internet to the camera. Wireless access
eliminates the network cable, but you still need the power cable for the
camera, heaters, and fan.

Another approach is to use a "network camera", like the one I use: it's
a Panasonic BL-C10A (info at http://tinyurl.com/hkvfa). ThIt's less than
$200 and connects directly to the Internet without needing a computer.
It produces the web page you see when you access it, and all the
settings are done over the Internet or a local network. Panasonic
provides a free service (viewnetcam.com) lets you connect using a name
("rldcloudcam" for mine), instead of needing to know the IP number, and
there are also other similar services, some free.

The network cameras are more costly, but having a computer at the
location I used wasn't practical. The Panasonic is very easy to set up,
unless your DSL/Cable/whatever modem has a built-in router, then you
have to disable that - not hard if you know it's there.

The unit I use pans and tilts (a "PT" camera), so I could cover a 160
degree swath with one camera instead three. You can connect several
network cameras to your Internet connection through a router and put
therm in different locations. You can also get cameras with
pan/tilt/zoom (a "PTZ" camera), but these seem to start about $400, and
one acceptable to me is over $600. Cheap zoom = lousy image, I found.

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA
* Change "netto" to "net" to email me directly
* "Transponders in Sailplanes" http://tinyurl.com/y739x4
* "A Guide to Self-launching Sailplane Operation" at www.motorglider.org