An Ad-Hoc camera mount for this weekend's riding

Funny how one thing leads to another in terms of farkle for the motorcycle.

It all started when once again I got the bug to get an accessory shelf for Maria. The one I had finally settled on was the BMR Shelf for an R1150RT. I had spotted this shelf on a RT at the West Bend Rally in Wisconsin:

This is not Maria, but shows the shelf I wanted

Some shopping around and I found the price to be $135 from the manufacturer. So out go the postings on the various bike forums and mailing lists I am part of. The very next day, I get an email with an offer to sell the shelf at a good price and I snapped it up. It should be here early next week! Can't wait!

So, what's this got to do with this weekend you ask? Well, while shopping around for the BMR Shelf, I had found another site where they made shelves for Big Mak tankbags. They only made them for the shorter bags (up to 3" in height), not the big honker like the one I have though. However, a look at their pics and I was able to replicate their design but taller to fit my tankbag.

Here's what gave me the idea from the Manic Salamander Website:



I did a proof of concept on it before I bought the BMR shelf too, it proved that with my Nokia N800 GPS unit in place, it blocked my view of the telltales and I did not like it. My tankbag is too high you see, the bag above is only 3" tall. My bag is closer to 6" tall!

So there I stood today, with what I thought was a useless metal shelf for the tank bag. Then lightning struck, I recalled an email exchange I'd had with a fellow rider about taking pics while riding. I dug out my small camera tripod, secured it onto the front of the metal shelf I'd created and voila, camera mount for Maria while moving!

Took her out and found the mount, which rests on the tankbag's support frame and platen, shakes quite a bit. I'll have to work on reducing the bouncing but as you can see, it takes pictures within the bearable range:



Why do this? Just doing a proof of concept as to usability of the metal shelf I fabricated for my tank bag, and to see how easy and safe it will be to mount the camera on my incoming BMR shelf next week for a more permanent type solution. I can see some real potential for this metal shelf in addition to the BMR shelf which will be permanently bolted onto Maria's cockpit.

Here's some pics of the metal shelf, holding the tripod, on my tankbag and motorcycle:




So, this metal shelf will suffice until I get the BMR shelf next week. After that, who knows, perhaps it'll serve as supplemental farkle parking space. Perhaps it'll join the other items I've bought for my motorcycle which did not quite work out. That's half the fun though, isn't it?