Sliding Lift/Automatic Style Doors

[mwp]

Hi there,

 

I'm currently planning the set design of a 'Stars in their eyes' type talent show, and would like the centre of the set to be a pair of sliding doors (not necessarily triangular as in stars in their eyes).

 

Does anyone have any ideas about how to go about building these sort of lift / automatic style doors into a set? They obviously need to open and close together by running accross the stage floor. Either side of the door space would be flats acting as the rest of the set. I need the doors to run pretty silently too.

 

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Brian]

Normal sliding door gear as sold in your local DIY shop and two stage hands (or a length of rope and one stage hand).

 

The doors hang on the top rail and run on wheels. At the bottom you simply have a stop to stop them flapping about.

[LeeStoddart]

Many years ago I built a space ship set (Star Trek parody) which had a pair of doors which opened and closed as you describe.

 

Looked at from the back of the set there was a horizontal wooden bar fixed about 30cm above the opening. Each door panels was hung from this on a pair of short lengths of sash attached with hook eyes in the top of the door panels and the underside of the horizontal (eight hook eyes in total). When hanging freely the doors were in the "closed" position. From the outer hook eye on each door panel was another length of sash leading outwards at about 45 degrees to pulleys again attached to the underside of the horizontal. The left hand pulley was single and the right hand double. The two diagonal sash lines were effectively hauling lines which were brought together on the right hand side. By hauling down on the two lines together the doors effectively swung out and up to the "open" position and when gently released dropped back under gravity to "closed".

 

Of course you should consider the weight of the door panels and the strength of the fixings and suspension sash - other material may be more appropriate!

[andyc]

Try using a couple of lengths of tab track as the slider and then bolt the bobbins directly to the doors.

I designed some bobbing fo a similar effect for the opening of two sides of a house a house each side wighed around 20kg so I used some ABEC5 skateboard bearings as the runners and some 10mm thick steel bar bolted between the bearings coming down through the track this ensured that they wouldnt snap under the weight! And they worked a treat!

 

Andy

[tony]

a few years built sliding doors by mounting them on standard tab track and

then using the electric window mechanism from a bmw as a lever this controled one door and the tabe track was roped to slave the other door

this meant that the soor could be opened on a switch by the cast something the director was keen on for cueing

by altering the length of the lever you can adjust the speed that the doors open at

this worked fine for three weeks the length of the run

 

you can often pick up the mechanism cheep from scrap yards

 

tony

[Darkfold]

Did return to the forbidden planet, a few years ago, and had a set of sliding doors similar to the situation you described. For mechanism, we used 2 crew members holding the doors and one other crew member giving the signal to open or close them. Takes a bit of practice, but works great when you get the timing right. Other advantage is that you have 2 people available to fix the runners, while one props the door up :)