Lifting heavy rolls

[john maughan]

What do people use to help lift and move the heavy vinyl rolls?

I've got on on my media storage rack and the roll is sliding up the core when I try to lift it of. It got me thinking, the must be an easy way to do this on my own.

 

[netsol]

Funny you should ask...
This month's project is adding a holder for a second roll on our 54" eco sol printers
I will post a couple pictures in a week or so (we are still arguing about how to do it)
I can move a full 54" roll myself, but it is getting more difficult.

I thought about wall mounting 5 rolls behind the machine & just doing changes that way, but the alignment problems make more issues than we could possibly fix

Oce' printers hold 2 or 4 rolls and do their own roll changes (aqueous printers, though)

 

[balstestrat]

I still like this style of storage the best. Yes it takes space but you don't have to flip the roll, just lift it out and into the printer.
We have few that are more robust and have long tubes and can be filled full of 60" rolls if needed. You can ask your local school metal shop to make one.

You could get one of those battery powered lifters. Although it's maybe a little overkill for small rolls.

 

[netsol]

i really want to go to rahway & watch how wyld bill moves the 120" rolls on those hp's

 

[kcollinsdesign]

I still like this style of storage the best. Yes it takes space but you don't have to flip the roll, just lift it out and into the printer.
We have few that are more robust and have long tubes and can be filled full of 60" rolls if needed. You can ask your local school metal shop to make one.

You could get one of those battery powered lifters. Although it's maybe a little overkill for small rolls.

View attachment 156431

View attachment 156432

Wha...? No school metal shop would touch that with a ten foot pole because of liability concerns! There are professional solutions like the ones you pictured, but you will need to pay for them.

 

[balstestrat]

Wha...? No school metal shop would touch that with a ten foot pole because of liability concerns! There are professional solutions like the ones you pictured, but you will need to pay for them.

Must be a 'murica thing then. Here you can drop of the drawing to the vocational/technical school and some student can make it. Teacher follows the work and inspects it and everyone is happy.
Price of the materials and some for the work to school.
They also do car repair, woodwork, electrical work, haircut, food catering etc.

 

[victor bogdanov]

Couple of gym sessions per week help me lift rolls

 

[Boudica]

I can manage 54" rolls fine, but the 8ft banner requires 2-3 people. The bar alone for the Annapurna weighs about 100lb.

 

[Notarealsignguy]

Why don't you grab the roll from the bottom too?

 

[Gene@mpls]

I built this 5-6 years ago from 80/20 extrusion for our first RF-640 [this is our second one, and we have a second one coming]- the rolls were salvaged from a scrapped printer and the two lower rolls are media not often used [60" banner on the lower rung]. We use a lot of different medias and leave our main roll on the printer holder and switch out the rolls which feed over the main roll. Works very well for us [general sign work/wraps] and I will build something similar for the one that is in transit. The takeup roll is a HD rotiserie motor driving a roll with rubber friction tape on it and lift up on the near end to slide the roll off for laminating- again, not pretty but has worked for years.

 

[kcollinsdesign]

Must be a 'murica thing then. Here you can drop of the drawing to the vocational/technical school and some student can make it. Teacher follows the work and inspects it and everyone is happy.
Price of the materials and some for the work to school.
They also do car repair, woodwork, electrical work, haircut, food catering etc.

Wow. I'm in Illinois. The colleges often have contractural relations with end users. The vocational schools usually do not have the liability coverage to offer services to the general public. They do have contracts with local businesses to develop prototypes and provide sevices in the development phase.

I agree it might be a 'murica thing. A lot of people are simply unaware of how tort law works. In most cases, their blissful ignorance pays off. Once you are aware, however, it becomes a responsibility to protect your family, employer, community, etc. You can't go back!

 

[White Haus]

I built this 5-6 years ago from 80/20 extrusion for our first RF-640 [this is our second one, and we have a second one coming]- the rolls were salvaged from a scrapped printer and the two lower rolls are media not often used [60" banner on the lower rung]. We use a lot of different medias and leave our main roll on the printer holder and switch out the rolls which feed over the main roll. Works very well for us [general sign work/wraps] and I will build something similar for the one that is in transit. The takeup roll is a HD rotiserie motor driving a roll with rubber friction tape on it and lift up on the near end to slide the roll off for laminating- again, not pretty but has worked for years.

That's some impressive rigging you've got going there! Well done sir.

 

[WYLDGFI]

i really want to go to rahway & watch how wyld bill moves the 120" rolls on those hp's

LOL>....hey, Im in Linden...not rahway! We use a couple of small moving dollies actually. To get them into position its team lifting...or an ATV-Motorcycle jack for the really heavy bastages!

 

[netsol]

we have the ATV jack as well
i just modified our one eco solvent printer so i can keep 3 rolls in place, (it isn't the threading/unthreading we object to)
that should eliminate a lot of the complaining on our end

 

[gnubler]

Manual hydraulic scissor lift, they are not expensive.