Simple Dolly With 3dprinted Parts

In this Instructable I will show you how I built a simple dolly that is quite stable but most important pretty cheap to build. For all the parts I payed less than 20€ and if you have some rollerblades wheels lying around at home the price to pay for this project becomes ridiculous. Of course you will need the access to a 3d printer.

As it's pretty simple to build I encourage you to customise this project and evolving it. :) Have fun!

To build the dolly you will need this parts:

• A 1mt long M8 threaded rod that later you will need to cut in pieces 1€
• 18 M8 nuts and 8 auto-locking M8 nuts 0.50€
• 3d printed parts(I used red PLA, infill 80%) less than 0.50€
• 4 rollerblade wheels 76mm 12€
• 8 608zz ball bearings 3€
• A "photographic screw" free from the tripod
• A ballhead free from the tripod

You will also need these tools:

• An hacksaw to cut the threaded rod
• A file to round off the 3d printed parts and rods ends (optional)
• 2 13mm wrenches or in alternative only a wrench and pliers

If you use my .STL files for the 3dprinted parts you will need to tap the holes with a 8mm or 9mm drill bit.

Design your own parts or download mine, I used a program from Autodesk called 123D which is simple to use but at the same time it gives you a lot of "design/engineering power" :)

The parts were printed in 2 hours on prusa i3. PLA, 50mm/s, 80% infill.

Here is the link to the download page: http://www.123dapp.com/123D_Design/3dprinted-dolly/4223092

Just cut the 1mt rod in 2x 20cm rods and 2x 25cm rods.
A good habit is to file the ends of the rods to make it simpler to screw on the rods the nuts.

Start assembling the parts as shown in the photos.
At the end you will have 2 identical axles(in this part you have to use the 20cm rods).

To complete the dolly mount the 2 25cm rods as shown in the last picture.

Anyway you can see from the pictures that the mounting is pretty easy.

Enjoy your new dolly and have fun film making!

In a future I'll try to make a motorized version of this dolly using Arduino & stepper motors!