3D Printed Elevator

Years ago I made a simple wooden 5 stop elevator. It was gigantic, heavy, not easily portable, controller weighed almost as much as the elevator. I was limited at the time to make micro size working equipment like you can with a 3D printer and tiny micro controllers that fit in the palm of your hand like Arduino and Raspberry Pi boards. This previous project became exciting again when I realized I could make tiny functional moving parts like a working door operator and worm gear drive.

There is incredible resolution and accuracy with a filament FDM printer like I used to print the elevator. Precision like .1mm resolution with FDM and with resin SLA printers as fine as .01 resolution. FDM uses a spool of filament to print with.

With SLA printers a tub with a clear bottom is filled with a liquid resin and the build plate is lowered into resin and to the bottom surface of the tub. A special UV ultraviolet screen is underneath the tub and an image is projected on the transparent bottom of the tub that creates a full layer exposed to the UV. The UV hardens on the build plate where the resin is exposed. The build plate then lifts for the next layer and the UV image is projected and builds onto the previous layer. Layer by layer the print emerges out of the tub of resin as layers are printed on top of each other and the build plate lifts out of the resin and the print appears to grow out of the tub.