ALCS 4-speed Universal Crystal motor for Kinor16, Eclair ACL, etc. cameras

[Aapo Lettinen]

I am working on a design which is compatible with ACL, Kinor and other cameras with 1:1 drive axle. Wanted to make it as compact as possible and relatively affordable. Just speeds of 16fps, 24fps, 25fps and 33.333fps and works at 14.8v so vlocks work fine for powering these. Other camera motors and items are for scale.

3d printed first draft, the final motor body will be cnc machined aluminium with aluminium control panel.

Price 650usd without mounting parts (but cad files for Kinor and ACL mounting parts are included) or 850usd with one set of mounting parts for either Kinor or ACL camera. Let me know in April2025 if wanting to order these, I will make one batch in May2025 to use the rest of the parts I have in stock and likely these won't be available later. DM here on the forum or on Instagram (aaplet14).

 

 

Edited March 29 by Aapo Lettinen

[Aapo Lettinen]

[Aapo Lettinen]

Control panel design. Sent these to manufacturing yesterday.

 

[Aapo Lettinen]

I will add 48fps and 50fps to the 4-speed Universal Motor! So it will have a total of 6 crystal speeds now: 16fps, 24fps, 25fps, 33.333fps, 48fps and 50fps.  
it will have the same user interface, I will just add the extra speeds in between leds so that they light up differently when 48fps or 50fps is selected. there is no room for extra lights which is why I originally made this 4-speed as there is only enough room for 4 leds, but I determined now that it is not too confusing to add the two extra speeds in between of the existing ones to have the requested 48fps included for the same price.

Over 33.333 will need 18v battery, the other speeds work at 14.8v if needed. The price will be the same (650usd without camera specific axle and mounting parts, 850usd with the mounting parts and axle adapter included).  I will send the motor body to cnc machining in late May, if wanting to order these let me know asap. Possible to pay in two parts if needed (50% when placing the order, the other 50% in mid June. The motors will ship in late June).

dm here or on Instagram (aaplet14). Facebook messenger does not work.

 

[Okto Simaia]

Nice work! On the original Kinor motor, it looks like it doesn't stick out as far, and the grip appears to be attached to the motor housing, is that correct? Does it use a right-angle drive?

[Aapo Lettinen]

44 minutes ago, Okto Simaia said:

Nice work! On the original Kinor motor, it looks like it doesn't stick out as far, and the grip appears to be attached to the motor housing, is that correct? Does it use a right-angle drive?

Thanks!

The original Kinor motor has integrated handle and is quite large sized compared to this motor. The original is also "more thick" with the handle... even with the inching knob guard ring the 4-speed is thinner. The 4-speed uses direct drive motor whereas the original Kinor motor has angle gear drive and has two generators along with the electric dc motor (pilotone generator and separate generator for speed reference measuring). And large-ish electronics box attached on top of the motor. This explains why the original motor is so much larger than the 4-speed system, I think the original is about 5x the volume of the 4-speed motor at least.

The 4-speed has to be fully ambidextrous and as small sized as possible which led to the current design. Can be mounted to the camera left or camera right side without any modifications as the panel can be read both ways and user can change the rotation direction by internal jumper. it has a really small main circuit board, a bit smaller than a matchbox and minimal parts used to make the functionality, this both makes it as compact as possible and allows lowering the price.

Some people have asked if the 4-speed motor could have some kind of integrated plate on it to allow screwing on battery mounts and handles etc. but I have commented it is not a good idea to mount anything extra on the motor as those heavy extra items easily shift the motor on its camera mounting plate just a tiny bit when operating which may hugely affect sound levels of the motor and causes unnecessary extra stress to the mounting system. If someone would need extra attachent points and specifically wants them to be from the motor mount instead of (the more ideal option) of attaching to the camera body itself elsewhere.... then one could make a separate "Aapo's 4-bolt Motor Mount"-to-Kinor adapter which has this extra "mounting arm" integrated into the design and the attachment point is part of the motor-to-camera intermediate adapter and not attached to the motor itself.

When purchasing this 4-speed motor, one gets access to the cad file of the motor-to-camera mounting adapter and can thus just take it to a cad program and design extra stuff attached to it if needed, then get it cnc machined. If it is a good design it would be nice to share the file with others using this motor but at least we want to see photos of mods if nothing else 🙂 

Edited May 12 by Aapo Lettinen

[Aapo Lettinen]

ANYONE NEEDING THE 4-SPEED OR 10-SPEED UNIVERSAL MOTOR FOR KINOR16, LET ME KNOW ASAP.

dm here or on Instagram (aaplet14).  I am ordering Kinor specific mounting parts soon and need to know how many are needed.

Additionally will order the motor bodies for the 4-speed system in the next 7 days, thus needing the exact amount needed. If missing out it can take months to make another batch of motors so please let me know before June 15th !

[Aapo Lettinen]

cad designing the 4-speed motor's aluminium body. will 3d print a test piece of out plastic to ensure dimensions and motor drive fitting, possibly this version can be sent to cnc machining already but we'll see 🙂

(circuit board cad model intentionally altered to not show all the details. I already have the final circuit boards and working on the software at the moment)

[Aapo Lettinen]

Final Kinor adapter to mount the 4-speed and 10-speed motors to the Kinor16 cameras!

cnc machined aluminium. one can order the motor with this mounting adapter and axle adapter or get the bare motor and use the included cad files to make these adapters elsewhere. Or if you want to make some super special "add a huge cheeseplate to the adapter with v-lock mount and integrated light" then you can use the cad file and just add to it the stuff you need 🙂 

 

[Aapo Lettinen]

16 hours ago, Aapo Lettinen said:

cad designing the 4-speed motor's aluminium body. will 3d print a test piece of out plastic to ensure dimensions and motor drive fitting, possibly this version can be sent to cnc machining already but we'll see 🙂

(circuit board cad model intentionally altered to not show all the details. I already have the final circuit boards and working on the software at the moment)

the 3d printing test was ok and I ordered three of these motor bodies in aluminium now. Should receive them in the end of next week. Because I have tons of other projects at the same time, I need to make smaller batches of these than originally intended. The June2025 batch of three motors is already sold but if you want a motor from the Late July / Early August 2025 batch let me know asap and I will order another batch of parts in mid July.   Will need to know how many motors needed, if you need mounting parts or not and which mounting parts for which camera. usually I only stock one or two kits of mounting parts so will need to know 3 weeks beforehand if more mounting parts needed.

DM here or on Instagram (aaplet14)

[Aapo Lettinen]

Finished Kinor16 axle adapter and mounting plate, testing with my 12-speed Eclair ACL motor. I will make 10-speed and 4-speed Universal motors for my own camera, it was just quickest to check with my old 12-speed system because it has same mounting and was immediately available 🙂

So all the mechanical parts are finished now. Will wait for the 4-speed motor bodies to arrive and will then start assembling. Works fine with the Kinor

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66tdXrgfXXc&list=PLXvIUtmF3OxswaCvqLMXPKLQsvMZx9zpo

 

 

[Aapo Lettinen]

Final 4-speed motor aluminium bodies arrived today! Will assemble these first 3 next week. There is one test motor for me and the other two are already sold, but if needing a motor like this I will make more in August2025 and you can order from that batch 🙂 

 

 

[Aapo Lettinen]

a short video about the aluminium casings and other stuff  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gl5IMaj5WIY

[Aapo Lettinen]

Testing the prototype unit with Kinor and fine tuning the software for best stability and response. Assembling the final motors later this week but will need to test the software with ACL camera too before can lock the final version and fully assemble all the motors in the batch

[Aapo Lettinen]

motor working with Kinor16, testing the crystal sync software version. this version was running about 0.015fps underspeed and corrected the difference in later versions. The final one is running very exact.

 

[Aapo Lettinen]

2 hours ago, Aapo Lettinen said:

motor working with Kinor16, testing the crystal sync software version. this version was running about 0.015fps underspeed and corrected the difference in later versions. The final one is running very exact.

 

longer video with some talking about what I am doing

 

[Aapo Lettinen]

final software version and how the speed presets are arranged etc.

the front panel is not final on the prototype, the final panel has larger hole for the button so that one can use it with finger easily

 

Edited Friday at 04:03 PM by Aapo Lettinen