Pinball Lifters

[flyer666]

I got the Princess Auto model when it went on sale for 50% off earlier this year. It basically came down to the same cost as the CT model but it is much more sturdy. It may be overkill, but I was happy to have the 660lb rating when I was moving around my TZ

I cut the bottom 3" of pipe off the handle and reconnected it with a 45 elbow. This keeps the original locator bolt holes in the right place and allows me to get under games very easily. The handle just pops off and lies on the bed and easily slides under a game for storage.

They just went on sale

 

[DRANO]

Sweet!
$179 on sale and these are VERY solid. Easy to modify the handle too!

 

[frolic]

I bought the princess auto lifter! Thanks Drano and flyer666 for the tips.

 

[frolic]

Drano, can you explain what you did with those elbows. Just some standard pipe?

 

[flyer666]

Drano, can you explain what you did with those elbows. Just some standard pipe?

45 degree copper connection.....looking the plumbing asle... i would guess 1 dia.

 

[DRANO]

Drano, can you explain what you did with those elbows. Just some standard pipe?

45 degree copper connection.....looking the plumbing asle... i would guess 1 dia.

This!
I thought copper might be too soft, but these elbows were super beefy and fit around the exisitng tubing.
If I had time and patience I would have found a better way. I'm sure the steel elbows would work and might even be a tighter fit... if you wanted to file down the threads.

I drilled them through and voila! instant bend. I only use the handle to pull around and position the cart when empty. Once the machine is up I push on the cabinet. Just place some anti-splip material on the bed. It's pretty smooth and machines tend to slide.

 

[Pharoah007]

Here's the one from princess auto.
It's got a 660lb rating and nice big castors that make moving pins around a dream. The wheels on that bike lifter seem awefully tiny and low to the ground.
I used a couple of elbows to get the handle out of the way and it pops out easily for storage.
The unit is more expensive, but goes on sale every so often for 50% of the price.

Where did you get these elbows?

EDIT never mind...I red the rest of the post

 

[Hammerhead]

Here's the one from princess auto.
It's got a 660lb rating and nice big castors that make moving pins around a dream. The wheels on that bike lifter seem awefully tiny and low to the ground.
I used a couple of elbows to get the handle out of the way and it pops out easily for storage.
The unit is more expensive, but goes on sale every so often for 50% of the price.

Looking at the photos the game is supported from the bottom. Structurally this drives a high shear load from the cabinet bottom to the sides, and I'm thinking the connection between the two has not been designed for that type of load. I would think it would be better to support the cabinet directly under the cabinet sides; no shear transfer and the sides act as a large diaphragm to transfer the loads better.

 

[Chris Bardon]

Ah, the free body diagram You're right in that there will be less stress on the sides, but I suppose it depends on how the bottom is actually fixed to the sides (I've never checked now that I think about it). What is the strength of the wood and the fasteners? I'd probably feel more comfortable with something like your right hand option for longer term lifting, but to pull a game out temporarily I you have to consider whether it's "strong enough" for a quick move, and more convenient in that it can slide in between the game legs (and not from the side). Another way to look at it-the wider the box on the top the more distributed the load is on the dolly vs a couple of points. I'd probably want something that's the maximum width that will fit between the legs, and as long as you can without being unstable/unwieldy.

 

[Hammerhead]

With any box constructed (unless you add plywood to the top), you are still resting the bottom of the cabinet on a few pieces of 2x4 which would not get you a fully distributed load that you're looking for. Also remember any bump or joint in the floor will transfer an impact load through the lifting system.

What I've done is used the CT lift with a box built on top narrow enough to fit between the legs. Once in position, I loosely fit two 4x4's wider than the cabinet to pick up the sides; as long as the cabinet is centred over the 4x4's, there is no issue with uneven load distribution. One thing you have to watch with my approach is to make sure you don't locally crush the particle board when the cabinet rests on the 4x4's (I took the rubber from the jack and fastened it to the 4x4's).

 

[Grauwulf]

And conveniently, this is going on sale for 64.99 this weekend:

http://www.canadiantire.ca/browse/produ ... 4138324404

For those that have modded one of these, how wide/tall did you make the box...

Chris, this CT lift looks virtually identical to the Craftsman model referred to by Grauwulf earlier on in this very thread.

All the mod details are on this page http://www.jeff-z.com/pinball/dolly/dolly.html

I actually ended up using the CT one instead of a craftsman one. I picked up the bigger wheels at Princess Auto.

 

[DRANO]

The lift I use came with a matching wooden panel that sits on top. Just before I touch the bottom of the cabinet I slide it in sideways so that the weight goes to the cabinet sides.
In the pic I posted that was an empty cab, so nothing to worry about.

 

[Chris Bardon]

I ended up grabbing one of the CT jacks and modifying it like this:


The wheels that came on it were definitely no good for carpet, so I tried putting the entire jack on a new base with some swivel casters that I had lying around. Then I made the height extension and bolted it directly to the frame. As you can see from the picture, it mostly works...it's at least a first attempt anyway. Issues so far:

-The T bar that came with it won't work. Not a big deal, but would have been nice to have. The whole jack needs to be moved too far underneath the machine to get it up.
-I may want to angle the top of the box to match the slope of the bottom of a game cabinet. Not sure on this one though-right now it definitely lifts the front of the machine first, which may actually make positioning a machine easier.
-The wheels still seem to stick on carpet. It's not going to damage the carpet like the original wheels would, but I found it really hard to get a game moving from standing still. Might be nothing I can do about that.
-Related to the above, I was actually getting the machine sliding on the lift rather than the lift moving, which again has to do with the wheels not rolling under load. Adding the original rubber pads to the top of the platform seems to have mostly fixed this, but again, might limit the usefulness of this long term.

Anyway, I'll bet this thing would work amazing on wood/concrete, and having the different wheels on there means that you can move in any direction, which should be really handy. I just need to see if I can find something that's better for carpeted floors-it's not like I have a high pile or something, but the carpet does have some give to it, which is part of the problem. Anyone built one of these that has a carpeted floor in their gameroom?

 

[QN]

Chris, As Drano mentioned, you might want to think about adding some cross member to pick up the load on the side panels of the cabinet rather than having it push up on the bottom.

 

[Chris Bardon]

Yeah, I have some spare boards that I could slide in for that if I wanted, and I actually toyed with the idea of making the box on top of the lift rotate 90 degrees once it was between the legs to get it to lift at the sides. Way too complicated though-I'll just slide something across if I ever think the bottom of the cab isn't to be trusted.

 

[Menace]

Yeah, I'm thinking the penguin dollies don't go out to the edges of the cabinets either... Where that's a commercial proper pin lift, I'm pretty sure it's ok if the game isn't supported by the sides. (just my thought anyway)

Obviously this is only intended to be used to lift / move the game for short periods of time, so I wouldn't leave it on any lift for any length of time unless it was supported by the sides

D

 

[ThunderStorm]

or just get one of the real ones, this is what i bought, and i ended up stripping it / repainting it, works like a charm, except my basement ceiling is too low, so i can't really raise them up without lowering the backbox, doh!

 

[Chris Bardon]

Just in case anyone else is looking to build one of these, the CT lift is on sale again this weekend for 1/2 price (http://www.canadiantire.ca/browse/produ ... 4470711240). The one that I built has worked out OK, and it definitely does what I need it to do. If you have carpet, you're a little more limited with options for wheels though-I think the issue with mine is that if the casters aren't swivelled the right way when I start to move a game, it's more likely to slide. On the plus side though, I can get full range of motion on a lifted game (including sideways), so that's a big plus. Not having the bar on the actual dolly is a bit of a problem though-again, it means that I'm moving using the machine and not the wheels, which again means fighting friction. I tried a mod with a flagpole mount on the base, which would have worked in theory, but ended up breaking pretty easily since it wasn't designed for that kind of shear. Maybe a stronger bracket would work-something to keep my eye out for anyway.