More Improvements

I've been spending a good bit more time on the production trailer finishing up the planned upgrades. It's cleaner and neater than ever. We discovered that there was actually carpet under the pile of cables that had accumulated.

I fixed the tripod rack I had built by adding some steel corner brackets so it actually holds together now.

I installed a junction box (a breaker box scrounged for $15 from Skycraft, our wonderful local electronics salvage store) that allows all the cable runs to the trailer to be connected externally.

There are chasis plugs for four power circuits, three triax camera jacks, six audio jacks, two intercom jacks, and room for much more. And my favorite, a little light that comes on with the other lights inside. (look in the upper right of the box)

The original power wiring was minimal and not thought out very well. It's all redone. The four chasis jacks go through duplex recepticals on the side of the junction box on their way to the left side outlets, right side outlets, front air conditioner, and rear air conditioner. The four circuits can be cross energized by patching between these outlets. The lights are all patched to any circuit using these outlets. This is convenient as the number of circuits supplying the rig can vary from job to job. Sometimes everything needs discrete circuits. Or it might just have one for overnight or whatever and you may want one AC unit running and lights and one set of outlets. Now it's easy to configure it for whatever you need.

On the inside the connections on the back of all the jacks are shielded by a guard. The black plastic panel slides up in a set of grooves in the wood sides to allow access. (the triax jacks are really deep so the camera cables stick out and have to be undone to slide the panel up)

A work light behind the racks is a little thing but experience has taught what a pain it is to have to trace a wire or patch something with a flashlight.

And it's so easy to take for granted a simple thing like a door latch. The former ill-conceived non-solution required either locking out everyone outside, or locking in everyone inside, or having the door hang open letting all the cool air out - a terrible choice for a doorway where multiple people must go in and out often. Installing a lock set in a trailer door is a good bit harder than it seems it should be. It is assumed that one only wants to lock stuff in it, not that one might be inside wanting to get out. There are a good many things different from a house door. But, with some time and ingenuity and determination we now have a proper door knob that works the way God intended - from the outside or the inside.