DIY Cardboard Crane

Intro!!

Cranes are one of the vehicles that fascinate every kid. Operating a crane looks cool and is the dream of every kid. Unfortunately, no government allows kids to drive them. So in this instructable, I will show you how to build a cool cardboard crane. It is not just a silly cardboard model of a crane, it has a pulley system capable of lifting objects

So what are you waiting for, roll up your sleeves and let's start building

Materials

1. cardboard
2. toothpick
3. fishing line and hook
4. dead battery
5. old pen body
6. cereal box

Tools

1. hot glue gun
2. pencil
3. ruler
4. super glue
5. scissors
6. box cutter

IMPORTANT:the template is just for reference,it is not for printing or scaling.

Cutting

you can copy the template into the cardboard and cut them out. the numbers in the bracket indicate how many of that piece is needed. don't forget to mark the corresponding letters on the pieces after cutting otherwise gluing will be very confusing

The G part will be a little difficult to draw since it is not a square,rectangle or circle

To draw that,draw a 10 cm x 10 cm square then draw line joining adjacent side as show in the image 2

After cutting all the pieces make sure that you have

2 x A piece

1 x B piece

1 x C piece

6 x D piece

12 x E piece

4 x F piece

2 x G piece

2 x H piece

8 x I piece

2 x J piece

now we have to make the necessary holes

take 1 x A piece,1 x B piece, 1 x C piece,5 x D piece(image 2)

put a hole(radius=) at the center of these pieces(use a xacto knife or box cutter) the center can be easily determined by drawing two diagonals ,the place were they meet is the center

Next, we have to put holes in all the 4 circles. make a hole at the centre of each of the circle two of these circles need one more hole which is one centimeter away from the center(image 3)

after that make holes on both J pieces as shown image 4

The Arm

draw a line joining the mid points of the opposite side. On that line make a hole at every 2 cm.you should get 17 holes(image4)

before we step into building the arm we have to make 2 small pulleys wheels for that you will need 4 cardboard(i used cereal board) circles(radius=1.5cm) and two pieces of plastic tube(use body of the old pen)each of length 1cm.glue the pieces together as shown in image 1

now that you have finished making the pulleys you can move into the arm

• join the 2 pieces together using toothpicks(image 2)
• insert a pulleys
• reinforce the tooth pick joints using super glue(image 3)
• cut off the extra length of toothpicks(image 4)

now let's glue the base

1. take 3xE piece and glue them together repeat this three more time so that you have 4 pillars(image 1)
2. now take an A piece(one without hole at center)and glue one pillar at each corner(image2)
3. take the other A piece (one with hole) and glue a D piece ,C piece and the battery on it as shown in the video(see the video)after that glue the finished piece on top of the piece in which the pillars were glued(image 3)
4. next,glue the 5 D pieces (image3)together,make sure the holes are aligned perfectly,then glue the 2 G pieces on its opposite sides as shown in image 5
5. glue 4x I pieces together repeat this one more time so that you have 2 such pieces(image 6)then glue each of these on the 2x J piece(image 7)
6. now take the B piece and glue pieces on it as shown in image 8

now that our base and arm is ready we can connect them together

place the pieces on top of the other as shown in image1

join the arm to the base as shown in image .don't forget to install the second pulley here(image 2)

connect the thread and axle image3

the axle and locking mechanism

make hole on the piece as shown in image 4

the second hole on the circle is for locking the axle (image 5)

If you want to make it more realistic you can add a drivers cabin(image 1)

i just glue a small cardboard cube at one corner and added some color with a black marker

i also did a paint job on the arm(image 2)(actually i uses duct tapes of different colors instead of paint)

I had four plastic wheels (salvaged from an old toy car) lying around. So I glued them to the crane(image 3)

all the aforementioned steps are optional

now that you have finished building your crane you can start lifting the heavy loads in your room or help your neighbors to lift their stuff and above all don't forget to have fun

I hope you enjoyed this Instructable. I'd love to see your work so please share it with me.

plus it would be great if you vote for me in the 'simple machines challenge'

Thank you