Elevator Simulator 3.0 - of dials and bugs

In past years, I used LEDs for floor indicator lights. Indicator lights didn't seem to fit the crypt. I thought an old fashioned elevator dial would be more appropriate. I bought a circle of styrofoam from Hobby Lobby and, while I was there, picked up some arms for a clock (they sell clock kits and clock arms) and some gold plastic stick-on numbers. I cut the circle just past the halfway mark and used my Dremel to carve out the central portion. I then spray painted the circle with a textured stone spray paint (Rustoleum American Accents Stone).

 

I made a back for the dial with photoshop, printed it out on some thick photo paper, cut it out and glued it in place.

The above picture is saved as high resolution so if you "save target as" you will get a much higher resolution picture.

Now, to attach the clock arm to the servo, I had a couple of 1/8" setscrew hubs I got from servocity.com and cut a short piece of 4/40 threaded rod. I used one hub to attach to the servo and the other hub to attach to the back of the dial. I used the set-screw of the servo hub to clamp onto the threaded rod. The other hub I kept loose so that the rod could rotate freely. The function of this hub it just to act as a guide and may be unnecessary. That hub is attached to a small, thin metal plate I glued to the back of the styrofoam. Anyway, I drilled a small hole through the plate and styrofoam and attached the clock arm to the threaded rod by using a 4/40 spacer and a short 4/40 screw. Sorry, I just have pictures of the finished product.

The bug was surprisingly simple. I just hot-glued two small neodymium magnets (1/8" cubes) to my plastic cockroach and put two more neodymium magnets (1/4" x 1/8" cylinder) on a straight brace. I used two clevises and an 6" piece of threaded rod to attach the brace to a long servo arm so that both can pivot freely. The plywood backing is only 1/$" thick so the magnets can attract each other easily through this. You can get the magnets cheap here. Just a bit of caution, though. Tiny magnets like these can kill a person if they swallow them so be real careful if you want to do this. I caught my cat playing with the bug one evening and that could have been disastrous for him. So, here is the setup. The servo simply pulls and pushes on the rod and friction does all the rest.

 

Now for a video...

 

Next Page

 

Home

Copyright © 2012 Garageofterror.com