It's made up of an arm that
goes up using fishing line. The motor on the end of the arm reels the line in, so it goes up. When a ball comes into the arm's bucket, it pushes a switch on the arm's motor, and that is how it goes up. Easy, right? Wrong. The part of the lift that took the longest to build was the section that makes the arm go back down. When the ball leaves the arm, it goes through the tower and runs into a rod. The red rod is part of a hammer-looking thing. The hammer holds up a lever that when released, one side of the lever pushes a switch on the arm that locks into place, so the arm then descends back to the bottom of the tower, where the switch is unlocked. Then the arm is ready for another ball to come in. Not too hard, but that's not all. the lever that pushed the switch on the arm needs to be pushed up like it was before. For this, another CyberKnex motor is used. After the ball pushed the red rod, it ends up on a platform. This platform is pushed down by the ball's weight, and it pushes a switch on th
e motor. A small rod turns around and pushes one side of the lever up, making the other side go back down. But if the ball stays on the platform, it won't be going anywhere. So, I built a ball pusher that turns around at the same speed as the rod that resets the lever. When it pushes the ball out, the motor stops, and it will start all over again. The ball pusher and the rod always stop at the same place they were before because they move at the exact same speed.
Whew! That took awhile to type, mostly because I'm a slow typist. If you still don't understand how the lift works, I made another preview video right here.
Well, that's about it. I plan to build a few new lift systems, and improve some existing lifts.
