I understand all of the vocabulary and I get the overall gist of what is being said, but I have no clue how to translate this sentence into english. I’m guessing this is a grammar problem.
“そのエレベーターは私のアパートについている進化した井戸つるべのような安手で直接的なエレベーターとは何から何まで違っていた。”
That’s a tough sentence.
The main point is that:
This elevator has nothing in common with the elevator that is in my building (litt. Connected to my apparament).
In parentheses are additional info describing the elevator from the speaker’s building.
“Cheaply made [as if it was an improved well bucket] and straightforward (=simple?)”
Edit: now that I think about it, you could also read it as “Cheaply made and straightforward [as if it was an improved well bucket]” (the and goes before the description)
Translation is tough, especially when you have no context. Here’s one:
That elevator couldn’t have been more different than the cheap, glorified, water well bucket connected directly to my apartment.
Note that translation is a completely different skill from simply learning Japanese - and totally unnecessary.
Thanks for your reply. The end bit of the sentence makes sense now (having nothing common), but I’m still struggling with
especially
As I have no clue what つるべ is and I can’t find it in any dictionaries!
I was almost going for glorified, but it strayed a bit too much from the literal translation.
(Literal translation is more useful when trying to explain sentence structure in my opinion)
aha! Thank you so much for your help 
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