# This year's elevator



## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

This will be my last big haunt for a while. I was never 100% happy with my past elevator simulators so I am going to try it one last time. Here is one element.


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## BioHazardCustoms (Aug 5, 2009)

That is amazing! the bug scared the crap outta me!


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## Just Whisper (Jan 19, 2009)

Love the whole thing. The bug is awesome. How long did it take you to train him? LOL


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## RoxyBlue (Oct 6, 2008)

Make sure the Orkin man does not visit your haunt this year. Be a shame to lose such a talented insect

I really like the old fashioned look of the dial.


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## Hairazor (Mar 13, 2012)

Pretty cool!


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## CreeepyCathy (Mar 28, 2009)

great job on that!


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## fontgeek (Jul 24, 2006)

Forget the Orkin man, I can just see someone trying to squash him.


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## [email protected] (Aug 25, 2012)

The roach was a great touch. I was definitely caught off guard.


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## Lord Homicide (May 11, 2012)

Do you keep the guts behind it a secret or can we peek?


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## Sawtooth Jack (Apr 9, 2011)

Great look. Love the roach, it has huge impact for something so tiny!


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

The roach is going to disappear into a crack between the wall and ceiling so he will be safe from the squashing. I kind of want to give him a friend who runs in a different direction, but that might overload the system and I have other things to work on.
I'll snap a picture of the back later tonight. It is a surprizingly simple mechanism.


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## Lord Homicide (May 11, 2012)

I'm sure it is GOT. Since I've joined, I can't believe how simple some of this stuff is.


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## scarrycher (May 30, 2012)

that was soo cool, i concur with the bug!


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## MommaMoose (May 15, 2010)

I hate roaches but that was pretty cool.


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

Here are the pictures I promised.


























The magnets are neodymiun and are strong enough to attract through the 1/8" plywood. The metal brace dangles freely and rotates on its own when the servo push/pulls on it. Friction and torque. Very simple. The other servo works the dial arm.


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

Update. After a few false starts, I have my dropping mechanism. When the elevator simulator first starts, it will drop the TOTs about an inch (onto springs so it is sudden but not jarring). I bought two electromagnets off of e-bay ($15 each) that claim to hold 55lbs. I figured with a little physics/leverage, these would do. So, I made a couple of levers to lift the elevator platform and made sure the fulcrum was eight to one. 55 x 8 x 2 = 880 lbs. Plenty for four people + a large wooden box. I put the electromagnets under lever and attached a metal plate to the underside of the lever to hold it down until I was ready to drop it. Didn't work at all. The magnet could hold even my own weight. I almost gave up on the idea (I don't have room to make the lever longer) until I figured out that I can apply the multiple pulley trick to the lever and get another 4x of leverage (http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Pulley_force_diagrams). This works great. I think that holding the metal plate on a rigid surface was also hurting me as any shearing angle would break the magnetic force. Anyway, here is a picture of the setup.


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

OK, I am excited. Twice before I have made an elevator simulator and twice I have tried and failed at making a rotating wall. This year, I think I have got it. This is (part of) the scenario I am attempting. I bring the kids to the elevator entrance. I slide open a thick outer door, then a smaller inner door with windows. Everything looks fine when the kids walk into the elevator, but when I close the inner door, they see a "HELP ME!" scrawled on the inside of the door in blood. I then look at them through the window with an evil grin and close the outer door. The elevator starts with a fall/bump and they see the outer door move up out of sight, then brick wall moving past the windows, then another door. The elevator stops and both inner and outer doors open automatically. They are now in a completely different room. I will describe the room change later but here is my approach for my third and hopefully successful attempt at the rotating wall panels. I have found that, for sliding doors, hanging them from an upper rail works much better than having wheels on the bottom. My outer door will have a hard side, which faces out, and a fabric side that faces the inner door. Things look solid from the outside when the kids walk in. The other side of the door, however, is a 14' loop of fabric with painted batting attached to make it look like the door and brick wall. I have a motor and roller at the top to make the fabric loop move and a small magnetic sensor glued to the fabric to tell my Prop-2 controller when to stop the rollers. This project is no where complete and, as what has happened before, real-life details may still kill me. Things do seem to be working, though. Here are a few pictures.

My hangers for the outer door and rail...

















The motor and roller without fabric loop...









The inner and outer door rails...









And here is the fabric, which I am just now turning into a brick wall with 1/4" batting...


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## The Halloween Lady (Aug 18, 2010)

OMG, that bug totally puts this over the top! Love, love that!


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## GOT (Apr 17, 2007)

The full tutorial is here http://www.garageofterror.com/2012elevator.html


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