Outdoor revolve - pivot needed

The issue with one central pivot point on something like a table top that will flex is on the periphery you will get rubbing of the one top on the other.

Can you not attach the lazy Susan mechanism just to the top and use a central pivot just to keep the top in alignment?

two annuli and a load of balls - i.e. a giant ball race?

A central (sealed) ball race that fits into a socket, add 5 rollers underneath the top and close to the periphery

Propeller bearing (not cheap!), or a propshaft bearing (from a breaker's yard to save money), with a tube or rod to fit.

Thanks for the speedy replies and suggestions. I should have said that the periphery will be supported and the central bearing, whatever it turns out to be, can be set in bosses large enough to provide a degree of sideways support, so the central pivot will be needed purely for alignment.

The problem (at least as evidenced by a brief search so far) is finding a rod/tube combination that will both give a close enough fit and also be reasonably weatherproof. I've been wondering if there's a

Bert

Can’t you get a lazy Susan bearing that would only need screwing to the upper surface? Obviously you’d probably still want some means of centering it on the base.

Tim

I suppose it depends on how much of an engineering job you want to make it? The simplest pivot would be a dowel protruding from the underside of the top fitting into a matching “sloppy” hole in the original top obviously this would wear with constant use so you would have to assess how much use this arrangement will be used, occasional use could see it last years.

As you say a more robust method be to would use metal. I seem to recall B&Q used to sell short lengths of steel and aluminium bars and tubes and some of the tubes could be slid into one another but it is quite a while since I shopped there. If you can find some then epoxy one into the underside of the top and likewise the original top. Do not use dissimilar metals for this though.

Richard

Addendum

Google pattern makers dowels these are usually two part fittings that are used to align parts of a casting pattern. Model railway enthusiasts tend to use them for aligning base boards. Could be pricey buying from model suppliers but will be cheaper elsewhere.

Richard

Something like these would do.

Oh no, not without a pair of washers.

In message <v9vgi6$2sgvi$ snipped-for-privacy@dont-email.me, Tricky Dicky snipped-for-privacy@sky.com writes

I wonder what railway modellers use for turntables, particularly larger scale outdoor garden layouts. Something that could be adapted, perhaps?

Could you not just put a sub base under the bearing, so that you have a turntable you can lift off with its base?

Belated thanks for that idea. Looking at it again, it occurred to me that I could actually fix the Lazy Susan to the lower surface and simply not attach the nuts which would normally secure the top surface to the fixed upward-facing bolts.

It might be necessary to sleeve the bolts depending on how much resistance there was from the threads to lifting off the top, but that shouldn't be difficult. And the bearings in the Lazy Susan would probably give a smoother rotation than a made-up central pivot assembly.

I've just replied to Tricky Dicky, who suggested the same approach: it's occurred to me thant I could invert the idea: fixe the Lazy Susan to the base and instead of tightening the upward-facing bolts which are designed to attach the top, simply leave the rotating surface resting in place.