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DIY Grip Cart Design


Joseph Tese

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I sometimes find myself going through the rabbit-hole of design, mostly for grip organization.

I've searched endlessly for models of grip/taco carts, head carts, and other variations online. There are only two suppliers/manufacturers, which you already know of - and for probably good reason! They provide the perfect already thought out cart for the industry.

But to my surprise, I can't find many people inquiring or even going about their own endeavor on creating their own carts. Luke S. on YouTube (MTG) has made some great modular carts. I had a kick out of watching his build.

Obviously the advantage (and where my boat lies) to creating your own is design ownership, but most importantly affordability (if you have the skills to assemble yourself).

Attached pictures are a C-Stand card I welded with a friend. It's totally overkill, but I love it.. It was my first endeavor into welding, and I like the design we came up with, as it allows the stands its ability to rest on the bottom, have all the knuckles and set-screws free, while maintaining the user individual access to each stand.

If I could redesign, I'd find a way to slide a milk-crate in the middle, but the narrow sort of "over-lapping" design is a plus I think.

Anyway, onto my second endeavor, a small grip cart. The attached PDF (Vector) design is fairly simple, but I want to make sure it's the best it can be.

I started out with a slimmer and slightly less long dimension of 40x26. but that required the 4 families of apple boxes to be shared across two shelves. So, it's now 44x28 (more or less) to accommodate all 4 families on one shelf. My only concern now is if it's too wide.. Most "cart ratios" I see from StudioCarts or BS seem to be tall and narrower. This feels like somewhere in the middle, which made me have to think of how to utilize the wider space. For the 5 shorties, I plan to use the same system as the C-Stand cart, using those clips to hold the column, and then bungee all of them. For the grip cart, the frame is out of 1" angle steel, which provides each shelf to be lipped. The bottom mainly for sandbags, and maybe some MISC electric (Lunchboxes, cabling, etc) or other misc for smaller shoots which will have to double to hold some gaff stuff or even heads. I will probably drop a wood base or some metal for each shelf. I'm trying to keep the overall height under 50".

What do you like about it? What would you change? Dimensionally, could it find a home in a truck? (Again, thinking of common ratios for film carts).

If there are any experienced welders, do you feel the 1" angle is strong enough? I'm trying to see if I need to put 1" square tubing under the angle, for the bottom base.

IMG_1029_4.jpg

IMG_1030_4.jpg

Grip_V2.pdf

Edited by Joseph Tese
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28.5 might cause problems turning corners inside and narrow doorways.

Go with 1" square tubing 16g for most of the cart frame  and use 1x2 for the bottom frame.

This is a good design. Shelves are adjustable.

 

http://backstageweb.com/product/head-mini-cart


Not a fan of your design for holding the c-stands. Should be  taller in the middle with a flat piece of metal on edge  so the C-Stands can hang.

 

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What's the advantage of having the C-Stands hang on the set screw vs the clip design? Not saying I disagree, but curious.

It seems like you're confirming my precautions for strength.

Might go back to the drawing board and keep the slimmer profile.

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I want to build myself a cart for more general purpose use, possibly with room to hang a few stands on the end.

I rather like the Inovativ carts but for the money you'd expect them to be made out of something a bit more advanced than welded steel, but they are, and they're really much heavier than I think they really need to be.

Carbon fibre, honeycomb cored aluminium, perhaps? Not for a grip cart, of course, but I want something I can pack up small and throw in a car.

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18 hours ago, Joseph Tese said:

What's the advantage of having the C-Stands hang on the set screw vs the clip design? Not saying I disagree, but curious.

It seems like you're confirming my precautions for strength.

Might go back to the drawing board and keep the slimmer profile.

The clips tend to lose their grip.

Added fabrication time- of lining them up and drilling all the holes for the bolts.

You dont need the separation rack/ pieces for the legs on the bottom either. The C-Stands will hang just fine and stay lined up.


As far as the angle vs sq. tubing.  Square tubing is a whole easier to cope the corners than angle iron so fabricating goes a lot easier.
For angle iron 45 corners-- you cant just flip it around to cope the other end like square tubing or rectangle.

It can be done but takes more time to set up the saw.

You could notch the corners on angle iron but again just more time.

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Thanks, Ed for the insight and pics.

Makes sense.

I'm okay making it slimmer for maneuverability - but now also considering the adjustable shelves point.

Drill holes in the columns/vertical supports, as well as each shelf, and have removable metal pegs with cotter pins? Maybe instead of the weight relying on the metal peg, have welded bits of angles on each corner at different heights, so the shelf can slide in like a tray at the desired height. The only disadvantage there, is having to increase the overall length, as I don't want the welded lips to get in the way of working space. Thoughts?

Joe

Edited by Joseph Tese
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You dont need adjustable shelves.

Honestly, we haven't moved the shelves on the one we have from Backstage.  

 

We made a custom one to fit in our Sprinter van and just made the shelves fixed because we knew the height each shelf needed to be.

 

For the shelf brackets we just used angle iron.


 

 

 



 

 



 

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  • 5 months later...

Where do I put all the spare arms and heads?

Why big skinny fixed wheels and tiny swivel casters? Those hard tires won't absorb bumps.

I can see the clips breaking on a job, then what?  Carry spares?  Wouldn't fly for a rental design.

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