Good idea is not so good.
 

Had someone build a box for an outdoor TV.

It's big, built to hold up to a 70 in.

Because of where it's going we did not want split doors that open left and right and thought one door the swings up would be ideal.

Spent the day staining and mounting it and the swing up door is less than ideal.

The door is 63x40. The bottom of the box is 60" off the ground.

Turns out you kinda need to be NBA player height to open it and I am not even close to that.

Door is currently on basically a piano hinge.

Any thoughts on gas struts or spring loaded solution that might assist the vertically challenged?

I actually contemplated hitting a bone yard and scavenging a lift gate motor system from an SUV but that's probably a stupider idea than the original swing up door.

I can just use lift gate struts to get it to open but then I cant reach the damn thing to close it so something with a motor to handle open / close via a button or switch would be nice/

Thoughts?

https://www.amazon.com/photos/shared...zQWsPiDtVQfJLI
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I saw those but I'm having trouble visualizing how it would work to swing the door 90 degrees in an arc.

It first needs to push the door forward and then at 45 degrees push up.

Your picture doesn't load for me, Amazon wants me to log into your account or something(?) but just spitballing, can you hinge it from the bottom? How much does the door weigh?

I'm having a hard time loading from my PC for some reason. Been doing weird stuff for 2 days now.

Door weighs maybe up to 10 lbs.

The problem is not so much the weight, it's how to get the bottom edge which is 60"ish off the ground 90 degrees to 100" when I'm not nearly that tall. My wife is only like 5ft on a good day and I need to be able to have her open it without my assistance.

Weird, works fine from the phone.

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I love outdoor living spaces.

Why does it have to hinge from the top? Can't it hinge from the bottom?

Why does it have to hinge? Maybe you can lower the lid using some simple tracks built into the edges of the box? A rope and a couple of pulleys kind of like lowering a flag.

The bartop goes underneath it.

A bit or an eye sore but a very simple solution. Hook a rope through a pulley mounted to the rafter of that pergola and pull the door up when you need it open. Tie a metal ring at the end of the rope and hook it somewhere to keep door from falling down.

Same if you want to get complicated but it can be done with a small winch or motor. Leave a cheap Harborfreight winch on top of the pergola near the gutter, cover up the bottom with a couple sticks of the same lumber to match the wood of the pergola. Install pulley near the front edge of the pergola. Use a 3/16" cable. A power source is needed. no need for a hook to keep door up.

Funny. My first thought was put hinge on bottom. Second was the pulley system- which we use at the family farm for similar.

But the best idea? Is a simple prop stick. Like on a cars hood. Have some way to open and then lift up with the stick. Gravity will hold secure. Hopefully it doesn’t weigh 300#.

Rope, pulley, and a tie off point or two?

I really like that setup but I would have put the piano hinge on the right side.

Have you thought about using an articulated mount for the TV so you can pull it out and angle it as needed? I recently installed on for a friend and it worked out great.

Make vertical cut and cut the door in half, hinge on the backside, then hinge door to enclosure on right side, let it fold back onto itself.

Put some type of cleat across the top and remove the whole thing and set aside when watching tube?

I think either a single rope attached to the bottom & pulley, or a "hood prop" system (also attached to the bottom of the door) is how I would approach. The latter might take some effort depending upon the weight & balance....

Rope & pulley then.

I may not understand the setup but, I was thinking of a pulley attached to the brackets on each side and attached to the bottom of the door to pull it up. Another pulley farther out on the bracket to help with the angle and eliminate a wire hanging right in front of your screen. The question is, how heavy is the lid and how sturdy are those brackets?

I was thinkin' a single eyelet "thingy" screwed in the middle of the bottom of the door. Rope attaches and runs to a pulley attached to the outermost "roof" cross member (or 2nd one), and the rope cane either dangle straight down (when door is closed) or be tied off to one side. Whe the door is open, the dangling rope will be much longer, and can either hang by the side of the door and be secured/tied off....

A picture will cost ya :D.

Big stick

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Prop rod(s) like an old fashioned hood support, seem like the easiest solution.
I feel like one on both sides would be good, but maybe you could add a hood strut to the other side. My main concern with the hood support would be if the portion that screws into the wood would be sturdy enough. Maybe some larger inserts that it screwed into would be required.
The support could be hinged to fold up along the bottom of the box when not in use. (it's going to need to be longer than the box is tall to put it comfortably low).

closed frontal view with the support hanging down top lefg. open angled view in the bottom right
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rope and pulley was the first thing that I thought of.

Winner!

Hey! I have Blum Servo Drives on various cabinets at home and they have been bulletproof. Have a look at their offerings. Sounds much simper than adapting a liftgate motor. Good luck!

https://www.blum.com/us/en/products/motion-technologies/servo-drive/servo-drive-aventos/programme/

How well will the Blum servo drives hold up to out door weather?

google Linear Actuator, it's a device that will extend to almost double it's original length, with some pivots at either end, like a gate operator. They are simple to install, a simple toggle switch will drive it up or down. Piece of cake.

They are not weather proof. Are you expecting water coming into the enclosure?

My first thought as well

Good idea, if there's power available nearby. One with built-in limit switches would be ideal.

Before heading in that direction though...how heavy is that cover, and will it tend to warp if supported only on one side while up?

Gas springs are also a good idea. They can support quite a bit of weight and using two would balance out the load on the cover. If there's room, they could even be mounted on the inside and be hidden when the cover's closed.

Been busy today so will sum up a few things.

Just lifting a box over the TV to cover it then uncover when used is not really going to work. The TV will be mounted about 7 ft up the wall. It's built to fit a 70" TV. Not something my wife or even I could do alone, that's a 2 person job and a pain in the ass frankly.

Lift and support with pole similar to car hood. That's already part of the unit, was built that way. In practical application it doesn't work. I thought it would but it just doesn't.

Its a 5x4ft slab of cedar planks that start 5 ft off the ground. It's entirely different body mechanics from lifting a hood. You are lifting something that hinges 5 ft above your head versus something that hinges from waste height. Fully open it'll be 10 ft in the air.

A car hood is rigid, this flexes and you are lifting from one side not the middle. I guess you could raise it from the middle then pop rods in sides but that's even less ideal.

I thought about a winch, I do like that idea.

Something like the Blum servo drives above are exactly what I'd like to source.

I guess part of my problem is the right terminology for the type of spring loaded hinges or motorized units I should be searching for.

Thanks for all the great advice so far. Really appreciate it.

Looks, my sankara stone skull encrusted chain run has held up for all time... TO LAVA!!!!!!!

(take that liftmaster, genie, et al...)

I'd like to see drones employed in opening and closing it.

Ok, thanks for the additional info.

Based on the new information, string and pulleys is now my favorite plan. It could be setup so the pull is off to the side, and pulls equally on both corners and based on the physics of pulleys, could be made to cut the weight in half or more.

hood supports wouldn't be a good solution because you'd have to pull it down from 10' up against the force of the hood supports, so ideally, you'd need to be able to pull down evenly from both sides so to me that's a no go.

I think your option is going to be some sort of servo setup.

I'm sure it would be too expensive and complicated, but the setup from a power convertible top would probably work really well. It would be designed to be OK with being in the elements, and should be more than sturdy enough.

Considering his name, I think this is the obvious solution.

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Or, IIRC, I think many moons ago, there was a "couchmonkey" or was it a "basementmonkey?" Maybe you could re-enlist that one.

The thing I would do if it was me would be to make it fold like a horizontal hangar door. It would require rebuilding the door.
I would start with the hardware kit to hang lightweight bifold closet doors, and some pulleys and parachute cord. I believe it could be engineered in a way that you could pull a single rope down, tie it around a cleat and when the festivities have ended for the evening, unwrap the cord from the cleat and gravity would close it. A simple latching mechanism would keep it windproof.http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1656379528.jpg

Just walked the wife through the winch concept and she approves of the idea so that's the path.

Came in and started googling AC winches.

One of my earlier reluctance's with a winch is they are a bit overkill. I only need to lift maybe 15 lbs not 1,500.

Then I thought, well, it's just a motor with pulley and I only need 10 or so ft of cable, why not just make one using an old corded drill? It's got all the components, AC power, motor, chuck to rig a pully into, forward and reverse trigger.

I have a whole drawer of old semi busted power tools like, drills, sanders, grinders, etc....

I'm sure I can find something.

I used a heavy duty awning motor when building a TV that folds into the roof of the motorhome. In your case the TV is stationary but it would work the same.

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Have you got a cake batter mixer? SmileWavy

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If women don't find you handsome, they should at least find you handy.
And always keep your stick on the ice.

Simple is good.

Mop handle would be perfect, sand and stain it to match the door, make a little niche on the inside of the door for the end of it. Pulley setup would also work, but I already have a mop handle.

How humid is the environment, does it freeze there?

Big D is not as bad as Houston, still imagine it damp enough it would not have a salubrious effect on electronics. I had a friend who bought a condo in Houston, TV outside by the hot tub in a big box, not sure how his held up. There was a TV in the master bath, mirror in the corner so you could see it from the tub or the throne.

You could keep the current build using pulleys. cable and a cam, then equalize with weight. It is possible to build it so it moves with a pound of force and won't slam down when you release it.

You need a cam because the force needed to lift the door increases as the door goes higher. And it needs to compensate for the changing angle from the cable to where it attaches at bottom of the door.

But you gotta find someone to draw the cam for you...

It is neat that math can work around such a stupid design - how did you think it would work?

The stick works but not really. Because of it's size It has to be lifted from the middle first. If it's lifted only from the side it's going to slowly pull itself apart over time. To keep it light enough to lift it's going to flex. Make it rigid it becomes too heavy to lift.

Dallas is not nearly as humid as Houston and it does get to freezing often enough.

But I've had regular TV's outside the whole 15 years I've been here and never had an issue.

And with the prices of TV's today, ~$0.50 per inch of screen it's not really a big deal if you have to replace it every 5 years.

I picked up a 60" for that spot last Black Friday, $250.00 at Wally. At that price if it only lasts 2 years who cares.

But that's part of the reason for the fully enclosed robust box. Try and protect it as much as possible from the elements is only sensible.