Stock Revolve/ Turntable Thoughts and Plans

HomeGrown

Member
I know, another revolve question, but bare with me. I couldn't find a similar situation on the boards anywhere.

We're looking to have a revolve built for us to have in stock that can be:

-Light weight (built out of something like an aluminum frame)
-quiet to operate
-Easily taken apart and stored and the reassembled
-Easy to repaint/ re cover/ drill scenic pieces into

We've toyed with the idea of of having it be an adaptable single- double turntable, but thats very much not something we necessarily need if its cost prohibitive.

We're thinking about renting or buying a creative conners package, We know for sure renting one for the run of a show whenever we need a revolve is enough in out budget. However, if anyone can recommend a better or more affordable system thoughts are much appreciated.

We don't want to cut corners with this. We've decided we'd rather build a nice revolve that can last us a decade as opposed to several down and dirty ones we'd have to rebuild every time we want one.

Any plans, thoughts, cost estimates would be much appreciated.

Thanks for all the advice!
 
My Original, really old plans are on here somewhere. They are for a reusable, all wood, design which is lightweight, reusable and relatively inexpensive.
 
Why not call the guys at Creative Conners to talk about purchasing one of their rotate motors and use that conversation to discuss their experience with what has and has not worked in the past as far as the physical structure goes? I have not had any direct experience working with them as a vendor, but my understanding is this is kind of their specialty. You can use their drive systems to ensure portability, repeatability, and safety and build the physical revolve structure that works best for your space and needs.
 
My college had a stock turn table 16" diameter. Made out of rolled 1x2 Steel and a 3/4" Ply Deck. 3/4" Ply rings on the underside to ride on wheels up casters. Overall thickness of 2 1/2". Bolted together at the steel, so longevity of connection points wasn't a worry. Useful feature was that at center, the deck had a 2'x2' plug which could be removed for access to the center pivot. Drive was a rubber tire under the edge powered by an old motor/gearbox combo. Low tech control, operator had to be right at the motor (integral control box) to ramp up the speed. In the 4 years I was there we used it at least once a year, and never had to do maintenance on it. Steel Structure helps when you need to bolt a big heavy piece of scenery down.
 
My college had a stock turn table 16" diameter. Made out of rolled 1x2 Steel and a 3/4" Ply Deck. 3/4" Ply rings on the underside to ride on wheels up casters. Overall thickness of 2 1/2". Bolted together at the steel, so longevity of connection points wasn't a worry. Useful feature was that at center, the deck had a 2'x2' plug which could be removed for access to the center pivot. Drive was a rubber tire under the edge powered by an old motor/gearbox combo. Low tech control, operator had to be right at the motor (integral control box) to ramp up the speed. In the 4 years I was there we used it at least once a year, and never had to do maintenance on it. Steel Structure helps when you need to bolt a big heavy piece of scenery down.
"Overall thickness of 2 1/2" How high from the deck surface to the surface of the revolve once your casters and drive were under it?
When you typed "a stock turn table 16" diameter", I trust you meant 16 feet rather than 16 inches.
Toodleoo!
Ron Hebbard.
 
my bad, yes 16 feet. OAH from deck to revolve deck varied depending on the scenic design. Beauty of wheels up is that you can easily throw some wood boxes together to raise the casters up to the desired height.

OP another thing to ocnsider: HOW TALL IS THE SHORTEST DOOR THIS WILL HAVE TO PASS THROUGH? I designed a revolve once for travel. It fit through the loading doors just fine, and thankfully I caught it before it was built, but the door at the bottom of the stairs into this weird space was 6'-8". I had designed it to break into 2 pieces, 8' tall each. remember the 5 P's. Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance
 
I am sure we could build you a stock revolver with aluminum framed decking that can be built and broken down easily. We can even sell you the motors and control system too. Whether it fits in your budget is another question entirely. I'm sure our sales folks would be happy to talk to you about your needs though.
 
I'm the biz developer at Creative Conners. Definitely give us a shout to talk through some ideas. We've can provide just the automation bits and pieces or a complete automation+turntable package.

More often than not we recommend a wheels up design. More and more we're seeing the need to run some cables beneath the turntable and wheels up lets you do this easily. We've also found that leveling the table is a bit easier with wheels up than wheels down. That being said, some people absolutely refused anything but a wheels down design.

Depending on your budget, framed or frameless turntables have their pros & cons. When we rent turntables, more often than not we will use a frameless design with a lid made of two-layers of plywood and an aluminum band around the edge. It's quick to assemble the plywood lid and easy to finish with Masonite or build additional scenic on top.

Of course we can custom design something for your specific needs. We recently started working on a self-contained simple turntable that folds in half for easy shipping on a touring show.

Give us a shout or drop us an email to chat through your project in detail.

If we're not the right fit to provide the turntable itself, we can also recommend several scene shops that can do the fab work and mate nicely with our system.

Pete Veal
401-289-2942
[email protected]
 
We just built one for a theatre, using the Conners drive (hi, Pete!), much as he describes above. I think next time I'd prefer to frame it rather than the unframed plywood and edge band. At least in a long-term, rep-able situation where simply screws connections won't hold up over time, the process of making all the blind threaded insert connections was painstaking. For a one-off, or occasional use, unframed is probably easier.
 

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