Building a skateboard dolly

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

A skateboard dolly is a platform that uses skateboard wheels to move along a track. It’s used for “dolly shots” in film and video. I’ve decided to make one.

I’m starting with this wheel kit. It’s quicker and easier than making them myself, although I’ll probably make some of my own at a later date. These are some nicely made wheels! Thanks to answers to a question I posted in GQ (which I can’t find, since the search function seems to work differently from before and I haven’t figured it out yet) I know that standard track is 62cm wide. Now I know where to mount the wheels.

Yesterday I bought some 3/4" plywood. I had the hardware store cut two 30"x40" pieces out of a 4’x8’ sheet. (Actually, they cut it 29-3/4" wide; but I’m not going to sweat it.) A little while ago I drilled some holes near the middle of the sheets and used a plastic drywall spatula to completely coat the unfinished side of one sheet. After putting the other sheet back on top, I fixed it with four brass screws arount the middle and two brass screws on each side. Now I have a 1-1/2" thick platform, nominally 30"x40". It should easily hold two people, the tripod and camera.

Tomorrow (probably) I’ll sand around the edges so that they’re nice and smooth.

(To be continued…)

2

I thought you had already done it.

How smooth do those wheels turn? Can you get a repeatable performance out it with no jerkiness? I assume you have someone either pushing it or pulling it, right? I realise, of course, that a lot of the repeatability comes from it being on a track, but how much do you have to depend on another person for speed control? Can it be motorised, or is that overkill?

Is 30" wide enough for full spread on the tripod? Or are you using a stand?

Sounds like a fun and useful project, I just want to know some specifics. :slight_smile:

3

The wheels are very smooth. I was a grip on a film that used a skateboard dolly, and got to push it. It only had eight wheels (two per corner), but it was very nice. This one will be smoother and sturdier.

“Repeatability” is as good as the dolly grip who’s pushing it. No, you wouldn’t want to put a motor on it. This is just a basic, lightweight and inexpensive piece of equipment. I’m doing it the expensive way; using thick plywood that’s finished on one side instead of thinner unfinished plywood, buying the wheels already made instead of making them myself, getting “wing walk compound” instead of not having any non-skid, and buying a new can of spar varnish instead of using what’s around. Should end up costing about $300, plus the push-handles, which I’ll probably have welded out of aluminum tubing. Anyway, it’s not really a sophisticated piece of equipment, and repeatability is dependent on human factors.

30" is fine for the tripod. There are even a few inches to spare. I’m using a Bogen 3192, but any tripod should fit. I’m going to put a folding ring near the middle of the dolly for tying the tripod down. Of course, I can just put a sandbag on the spreader.

It’s a fun project, but there are other things competing for my time. Fortunately, it’s pretty quick. Now where are my jib-arm plans…?

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I had an old Manfrotto (same as Bogen) tripod dolly (pretty lightweight) that had this sort of clamp system for locking the tripod on it using the screw out rubber stops on the feet. I lost it a long time ago, so my description is lacking, but I’m sure something like that exists on the higher end.

When you’re all done, I’d like to see some pics. Photo/vidoe is still a major hobby for me, even tho I haven’t done anything pro in years.

How’s the WA film community? Oklahoma is supposed to be getting a film commission sometime soon. I might look into seeing what’s around for a carpenter/grip type guy. (Inthe 80s, I produced low budget commercials and training films. Should’ve stuck with it, but some legal super bad shit kind of knocked me out for a bit.)

5

I typed up a long post last night; but naturally, I got one of those “database errors” that happen all the time since the message board was changed. Anyway…

I don’t have a garage (yet) or a proper workspace. My dad’s drill press is down in San Diego, and the platform would be too unwieldy anyway. I got a Lowe’s gift card for Christmas, so I bought a 12v Black & Decker drill and some bits. Then I went to Sears. I was hoping to find a “Portalign”*, but they seem not to exist anymore. I ended up getting a miniature Crafstman drill press.

I drew parallel lines 31cm from the centreline on each side. That’s where the wheels go. It was awkward drilling the holes with the mini-drill press, but it was the best I could do. The places I wanted to drill were close to the edge of the platform, and the base of the press wouldn’t fit on the it. I used a metal ruler to level it. I managed to drill 17 holes successfully. There should only have been 16 holes, but I drilled into a false mark. After drilling the first four (well, five :o ) holes, it was time to try the wheels.

Oops. I’d forgotten about the 1/2" deep piece of channel aluminum that holds the trucks. My bolts were too short. I went down to the hardware store and got new ones. While I was there, I picked up two 10-foot lengths of 1-1/2", schedule 40, ABS pipe to use as tracks.

The wheels went on nicely. And whaddya know! The dolly runs very well and very quietly on the track!

But about those bolts… I don’t really like the nuts protruding from the surface of the platform. I think I’ll go back and get the shorter bolts and contersink the holes in the top of the platform 1/2 inch.

Now I need to sand the edges of the platform. The guy who cut the plywood was not very accurate, and one edge is 1/4" too wide at one end. This is a heavy piece of wood; and, as I said, I don’t have a proper means of supporting it and making it true. Or do I…? I have a little Craftsman disc/belt sander. I have a platform with wheels on it, and track. It’s supposed to rain today; but I’ll bet I can put the sander on the deck when it’s dry, and set up the dolly and track next to it. Then I can move the dolly across the disc. That should work. I’ll also have to dig out a depression in the middle of the platform so I can flush-mount a ring pull.

A quart of grey wing walk compound (non-skid stuff) is on its way from Sporty’s Pilot Shop. I have a quart of spar varnish. After I sand the platform and mount the ring, I’ll remove the hardware and apply the spar varnish to protect the wood from this wet environment. Next I’ll apply the wing walk compound to the top. After the wheels and ring pull are put back on, there’s only one more thing I need.

The push handles. There are various handles I can make: PVC, iron pipe, one upright, two uprights… But I want this to look good as well as to be functional. I need to find someone who can weld an aluminum handle for me. I want two uprights with a crossmember 2 inches from the bottom. I’ll bore holes in the platform to accept the uprights, and the crossmember will hold it in place. I’ll have a longer crossmember on the top, to which I’ll attach handgrips. If I’m really feeling tricky, I’ll get some plumbing fixtures (1-1/2" long metal pipe with a little flare on one end) to line the holes.

A skateboard dolly like this costs about $600 if you just go out and buy it. Mine will end up being about $250. I did buy some tools, but I’ll use those for other projects so they don’t really count as part of the cost of the dolly. I could have gotten off cheaper if I had built the trucks from scratch, but I didn’t want to mess with it this time.

*[sub]A Portalign is a disc about 4" in diameter with a large hole in the middle. The disc has two vertical rods on it. There is a “butterfly” device that fits onto your hand drill. It’s a pair of tubes with an aluminum web that joins them. These tubes fit over the vertical rods, allowing the drill to be moved up and down perpendicular to the object being drilled. That is, a Portalign is a handheld drill press. [/sub]

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Of course there are many productions in Seattle. I assume you’re talking about Whatcom County?

Here’s a link for the Whatcom Film & Video Group. It started very small, but has grown quite a bit. One of the guys who started it thinks it’s become too big and has lost its original intent. He is starting another group where filmmakers can exchange ideas. I haven’t been to meetings of either group yet.

I know a guy up here who has made a film called Beat Angel, about the spirit of Jack Keroak returning to change the life of a cynical writer.

My best fiend shot Night for Nixie, a science fiction/political satire, in Bellingham. He’s also writing an historical drama about a First Nations tribe in Canada.

Another guy I know is working on a film called *The Immortality Machine. I don’t know him very well, and his website is unavailable. He shot much of the footage for a trailer on his Arri 35-2B. The idea was to shoot a trailer to get investors interested in financing a feature-length film about the Battle of Chapel Hill. Appropriately, the film is to be called Chapel Hill. With Cold Mountain in distribution, I see this as going one of two ways: Either there will be interest in seeing another Civil War film and Chapel Hill might be made; or people will think that there is already a Civil War film out there and we don’t need another one.

This same guy took his old Bolex H16 up to Mount Baker to shoot footage for another guy’s B&W historical drama. The story is about nine(?) women who lost their lives on Russia’s Mount Lenin in the early part of the 20th Century. Looks pretty good.

There’s a guy in Mount Vernon who made a comedy called Counseling Day. I haven’t seen it, but I noticed that he’s selling copies of it on eBay.

There are two film festivals in Bellingham. “Projections” is the one put on by Whatcom Film & Video Group. The other one was called “Rejections”, since it consisted of films that were rejected by “Projections”. It’s now called “FlickFest”. I saw the “FlickFest” screenings last month, and some of them were very good. Some of them were very bad. IMO the ones that were good films technically. had pretty lame stories.

So there’s quite an active little filmmaking community up here. I’m hoping to meet some of these people soon. I have an Éclair NPR kit, an Arri 16S and a Bolex H16-M5 (with reflex lens), all with crystal motors and 400’ capacities. I have lots of lights, and I’m building the dolly. I have the Bogen tripod, and I have a set of wooden baby legs on the way.

And I have my short film script, Somebody.

I just need to “get known” around here.

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Portalign revisited or reborn: The General Tool Drill Guide

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Thanks for the link, gotpasswords! It’s the very thing. A bit expensive though. (My Craftsman mini drill press was $39.95.)

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This is the press I bought. Mine has a hose clamp instead of the thing they show in the picture.

Sears actually does have a “Portalign” thing, here. I like the looks of the one gotpasswords linked better though.

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I tried building a dolly once. I was trying to make it interchangeable between skateboard wheels, and road wheels. I tried to make all the trucks myself without any plans, which is really hard to do, and never quite got the tolerances perfect. Plus the machanism I created to switch wheels added about 8 inches of heighth which only magnified the wobble and made it unusable. Soon after that one of my friends got a job where he had access to borrow real dollies for free, so I abandondoned my creation.

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I thought of building a dolly with normal wheels. For shots, it’s just as easy to lay down some track as not. For carrying stuff though, wheel dollies are handy.

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Assuming you can scrounge together a track as long as your shot. :slight_smile:

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That’s the nice bit. 1-1/2" schedule 40 ABS costs about $5.00 for ten feet. I can get some connectors from Long Valley Equipment for $99 and $50 for the ABS, which will give me 50 feet of track. If I don’t feel like carrying a bunch of 10-foot pipes, then I can buy it at the location and just carry the connectors with me.

14

Today: Countersunk the 16 holes for the undercarriage bolts. My nuts are no longer protruding.

Chiseled out the depression for the pull ring. I did a better job than I thought I would. Plywood makes it easy.

15

I caught a break in the weather. Yesterday afternoon there were icicles hanging off the patio roof. Today it’s approaching the mid-50°Fs. I’ve sanded the edges and rounded off the corners. Sanded the top and bottom of the platform. Put a coat of spar varnish on the bottom and edges.

Will it dry in this cool weather? Time will tell.

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Much to your partner’s dismay… :smiley:

but seriously… It sound like the dolly’s coming along nicely.

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I gripped dollies and cranes for a while before becoming addicted to all things Steadicam.

The PVC is a dandy idea. Here are two things we used to keep around.

  1. Furniture polish. Gets squeaks out of rubber on rubber or rubber on PVC that’s not absolutely true in it’s lay.

  2. Baby powder. When you have a length of metal track joined to the next and you have a ‘tick’, you rub in baby powder to make the joint clean. Might work with PVC as well.

Also- the sticks will want to amplify harmonic vibrations. By that I mean, don’t just lock down the legs securely at the contact point. Run ratchet strapping from the mid-points of each leg AND from the tiedown knuckle under the ball. You will eliminate sway and vibrations that way.

Man, you have fun up where you live. I wanna come play.

Cartooniverse

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Cartooniverse: I’ve done the furniture polish and baby powder things. I did buy an eye bolt, which I sawed down to attach to the threaded hole on the tripod, and I put a pull ring in the centre of the platform. (Incidentally, I bought more 1/4" bolts so I can really make the ring secure; and I looked at ratchet straps but decided to buy one at a cheaper place.) But I didn’t think of tying down each leg. I’ll try it with just the sandbags, and with the sandbags and the strap, then see if I need to tie down each leg. Thanks for the tip.

Come on up! Bring a script and a small budget. :wink: We’ll have to look for a sound recordist, but I know there are a couple in Bellingham. I have everything else.

19

Looking through my old bookmarks, and I found this thread!

The dolly turned out great, although I haven’t had an opportunity to use it yet. It’s sitting on schedule 40 ABS pipes, and it’s quiet and smooth. The top is covered with wing walk compound, which I obtained from Sporty’s Pilot Shop, because it can get a bit damp up here. There is spar varnish under the wing walk compound. I’m using a ratchet strap to hold the tripod, and there are three sandbags on the spreader.

The handle is made up of 1¼" square aluminum tubing. Nymysys’s husband put me in touch with a guy who could weld the handle, but he couldn’t get round tubing in such a small quantity. It has two uprights with a tube across the top. The welder rounded the edges a bit. There is a crossmember 2" from the bottom of the uprights. Here’s the weird part…

I picked up the handle from the shop that makes automated gates. I was talking to the boss, and he offered me a job. It doesn’t pay well, but at least I’m working. I started at the end of March. Anyway…

One of the guys cut two 1/8" aluminum plates for me, and put square holes in them. After drilling the holes in the 1½" thick plywood platform for the uprights (kept from falling through by the lower crossmember) I filed them square. Then I drilled holes and bolted the plates to the top and bottom of the platform. A little work with a Dremel tool, and the handle fits nicely.

I’ve moved my film equipment into the small bedroom. It fills about half of it! I have a couple of 2K Colortran fresnels, and one of them was missing a barndoor bracket. I took one of the others off, and the welder at work made a new one for me. Works like a charm. I have a pair of very nice Bogen light stands, but the sockets are too big for the spuds on my 4K and 2K Cyc lights (which are currently mounted with the C-clamps for rail mounting). I’m going to see if I can find some round aluminum bar stock and drill it and tap it for mounting the Cycs and the fresnels on the Bogen stands.

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KARMA !!! You’ll wind up owning a small grip/ lighting truck. It’s fated. Then, you will shoot low budget features with it, get a camera package better than what you have now, and become the doyenne of The New Northwest Wave !!!

You heard it here first, " J.L. "

:smiley:

Cartoon - " I Steadicammed for J.L. back in the day " - iverse