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Murphy Alexander's All-Zinc "Nifty Lift" Carrying Device

By Rain Noe - October 24, 2014

in Materials | design.edu | Competition

Design theory is all fine and good, but one of the better things that will happen during an industrial design education is when schools connect with real companies that make real things. The company gets an opportunity to see what fresh minds would do with their product line-up, and design students get real-world feedback on creating something that's actually doable.

Case in point: The annual Zinc Challenge sponsored by InterZinc, a Michigan-based company that unsurprisingly specializes in zinc—the fourth most commonly used metal worldwide, they're quick to point out—and asks ID students to come up with product-based uses for the stuff. "Our challenge [is] a two part zinc casting design competition," the company writes. "The first part based on knowledge, the second on practical design."A 2014 winner was ID student Murphy Alexander, from the University of Wisconson-Stout, whose Nifty Lift design took top prize. The Nifty Lift is something like a potato chip bag on steroids, with the goal of allowing users to carry unwieldy items like, say, heavy bags of Quikrete on a jobsite. Alexander put some 80 hours into the project getting the engineering right—the weight of the object being carried activates the clamping action via gravity and a scissors hinge—and troubleshot the design using an on-campus 3D printer, trying to minimize the amount of parts required.

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"Limiting it to five parts [pins, halves, brackets, a handle and a handle cross-member] was one of the more successful aspects of the design," Alexander told a local paper. "Fewer parts bring down manufacturing cost." Music to a manufacturer's ears.

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Rob Wilkey

10 years ago

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@ Tom Mc - Concentrating that weight on that area is no different that what happens when you lift a bag with your hands. In fact, the force-to-surface-area ratio is probably better with this device.

@ Eric - A lot of people lift bags like these on a daily basis for their jobs. Using this device gives your hand a vastly better geometry to grip and a better load scenario being transferred to your wrist and arm. While it might not be a great product for your average everyday user, those who could benefit from this thing could _really_ benefit from it.

I'm sure the molding and FEA and intense engineering details of the components aren't 100% polished, but this is a student project. I say bravo. Keep up the good work.
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Ben Pratt

10 years ago

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As with 90% of products that students design, it would have to go through end user testing, engineering, etc to prove its desirability usefulness, and efficacy. Looking at at appearance models, cad models, and drawings, all we can do is make an educated guess.
I'm his professor BTW. It's nice to see a project I graded highly win a prize. Usually, the judging is not really in line with my grading.
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David

10 years ago

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There will always be those who will disagree with what you do. Just use them for motivation towards more ideas coming to life. It's a great idea, with plenty of time for improvement. A promising start for this young man. Congratulations on your first place prize!
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Eric

10 years ago

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Is it a good idea to pick up a bag of that weight with one hand? Just because you can mechanically solve the problem does not make it a good idea. Did your professors ask you this or Tom Mc's question when you were working on the project?
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Tom Mc

10 years ago

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The device intends to concentrate 50-80lbs of force on a surface area of a multi-ply paper or polyethylene that's only a few square inches that's not meant to bear that kind of locally intense load? How is this a good idea?
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