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Mr Olds’ remarkable elevator

Tom Scott | November 25, 2025



Olds Engineering, a traditional workshop and foundry, sits in Maryborough, Australia. It’s not the sort of place you’d expect to find a new industrial invention in the 21st century: and yet the Olds Elevator, patented by Peter Olds, is just that.

More about Olds Engineering: https://www.olds.com.au/
and the Olds Elevator: https://www.oldselevator.com/

Edited by Michelle Martin https://www.youtube.com/@OnTheCrux

I’m at http://tomscott.com
on Twitter at http://twitter.com/tomscott
on Facebook at http://facebook.com/tomscott
and on Instagram as tomscottgo

Written by Tom Scott

Comments

This post currently has 39 comments.

  3. @AndyBHome

    November 25, 2025 at 1:38 am

    This video doesn't show the key element of the design until the last second. As soon as you see that it's not hard to understand at all. I grasped it immediately when I saw the fin that draws the material into the cylinder at the bottom but not at all until then. I wish this video had started with a clear picture of the bottom. I believe I would have understood it immediately. It did not. He showed the bottom in a way that obscures the angled scoop, even though he says the word scoop. I paused the video to see what he was talking about and figured it must be on the inside because I couldn't see anything from their videography. Only in the last shot of the bottom at the very end of the video can you see the actual shape, and again, at that point the way it works seems obvious to me.

    I think this video is trying to get the viewer to feel a certain way about this invention that's not really very helpful. It's an approach to teaching that I think tries to undermine people's confidence rather than to help them learn how to understand or simply to distribute information.

    "Why didn't anyone think of this before?" That really seems to be fishing for the answer, "Because in our arrogance and stubbornness we refuse to see what's right in front of us." No thanks. I prefer, "Who cares? Turning screws were quite good for many things, now we have a new way to use them."

    This just seems like a negative way to present the subject that truly turns me off.

  4. @lucasbiaggini

    November 25, 2025 at 1:38 am

    Honestly, it actually felt very intuitive to me. The material being elevated dont care wether it's the screw or the casing moving, as long as there's sufficient friction between the material and the casing.

  7. @cooltheory

    November 25, 2025 at 1:38 am

    Just like turning the nut instead of turning the screw. I remember getting laughed at 25 years ago when I mentioned this as a concept. Probably around the same time this bloke thought of and implemented the idea. I’m glad the people I told laughed at a little girls idea and weren’t bright enough to steal it for themselves because this bloke is a well deserved winner 🏆 ❤

  11. @pahom2

    November 25, 2025 at 1:38 am

    How is this better than rotating a screw? It is more convenient to have a rotating screw inside a closed fixed pipe than having a rotating pipe that have to be mounted on a bearing through the whole its length

  17. @maple7rees-352

    November 25, 2025 at 1:38 am

    Let me get this straight.. You're telling me I made this in engineering class in highschool and I'm just now learning that this is an actual thing that has a name and everything??

  19. @InformationEngineer59

    November 25, 2025 at 1:38 am

    This is a simple issue of relativity and perspective. If you mounted a camera on the cylinder, you wouldn't be able to tell that the cylinder was moving, it would appear that the screw is moving. If you mounted the camera on the screw, it would appear that the cylinder is moving even in an old system where it was the screw moving.

  22. @matthewmccalister5594

    November 25, 2025 at 1:38 am

    Every now and then, Youtube recommends one of your videos and says that I haven't seen it before. I always get so excited that it is new content!!
    But I am very grateful we have these old videos. I always stay till the end and rewatch the videos that I have seen.
    You have done so many great topics that there is always something new to learn!

  23. @mikedunn7795

    November 25, 2025 at 1:38 am

    Mr Olds led an extraordinary life! Sad to see him pass. As far as the tube lifter is concerned,I didn't hear about the rotating scoops at the bottom,which immediately helped me understand how this thing lifts stuff.

  27. @stefanmatthiascornelius526

    November 25, 2025 at 1:38 am

    I feel like this was a trick question, because you didn't show the bottom of the housing. I imagined a simple opening in order to not block the material from entering. But the real bottom has some kind of funneling that pushed material inwards, as you rotate the housing. That's why it's counter intuitive.

  33. @AetherOwl

    November 25, 2025 at 1:38 am

    "new" no. It's not new, idiot. It really isn't.

    How old are cork screws? Tell me that how it lifts the cork works differently?

    Also, you're moving the cylinder, not the screw. (Or both. Won't claim to know the screw isn't also moving, but the container is.)

Comments are closed.

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