Show choir rising drum platform

[odoyle]

I would love to have my local show choirs drummer rise on a hydrolic or pneumatic lift. We would like it to be as inexpencive as possible but also very safe. It would be a very short period of time (one song). We also need it to be as quick and quiet up and down. Thanks

 

[Raktor]

Cheap, safe, functional. Pick two.

 

[derekleffew]

[-]Cheap[/-], safe, functional:

Hydraulic Lifts by B and R Scenery

 

[DuckJordan]

My suggestion, just don't do it spend the money else where possibly better equipment. the effect is nice but its not really note worthy as far as an audience goes. I have to work with show choir quite a bit with my high school (unfortunatly... I won't go into why). From what I've seen the most ohs and ahs come from the parents watching there kid do a dance or what have you. the whole rising of the drummer is done quite often and has lost its aw factor.

 

[erosing]

Does the drummer have a solo or is this just one of those, "Hey that would look cool and distract people from the [cheesy holiday ] singing," effects?

Either way, why not just paint him with some color? Instead of spending oodles of money on a professional lift.

 

[lighthouse]

why not just paint him with some color?

Oh... you meant paint him with colored LIGHT!

I'll put the brush down now

 

[Footer]

A hydraulic scisor lift is the way to go with this. You could also use an electric actuator in place of the hydraulics. The hydraulic lift has the benefit that you can put the pump in another room. That will decrease noise greatly.

All and all, this can be done, but it is not going to be cheap. If you want to build a simple lift its going to cost at least 3k. Give your local rental shops a call, you might be able to locate one for rental. Many staging houses have something like this. I had one at my last job that was just sitting there rotting.