VerticalTechNY well bet lost! I think a union card in your pocket doesnt make anyone a better mechanic than someone without. I aslo think that the ability to pass a test doesn't make a person qualified to work on public transportation either. I wouldnt want a surgeon with only book experience cutting on me. It takes years of school and traing by competent mechanics, union or non-union, to be qualified to be on your own.

That being said, I would like to clear up the intent of the Timeout Jumper. It is to end one very specific type of problem. A jumper left behind, forgotten for whatever reason. The Timeout Jumper is just as dangerous as any other jumper while the circuit is jumped out. AND all current jumper safety practices HAVE to remain. Now if a stanard jumper is left behind the safety circuit will remain defeated until a person finds it and removes it, which could be days, weeks or months. But with the Time Out Jumper the safety circuit will return as designed when the programmed time expires, even though the actual jumper is still attached. Currently, if a jumper is found there is no way to know the intent of the person who left it behind. If the Time Out Jumper is mandated in our business any time a regular jumper is found defeating safety circuits it should be immediate dismissal. If injury or death occured the full force of the law should be brought upon that person. I hope this clears up the intent of my earlier posts. Work safe.

I can feel your intent Dan. And it's hard to argue safety in our industry. The majors may soon be calling since this accident and the one in Southern California are brought to national attention. It's funny to read the posts about the accident in NY and see how unfamiliar people are with our business and what the units will and won't do. We talk so much in this thread about safety, yet the major companies want less service and more SRM,REM or what ever remote monitoring device can be used. Good Luck with your product, the phone maybe ringing soon.

i personally like the idea of a timeout jumper. many factors can make a mechanic forget they have applied 1, with pressure from a stuck with passenger call to supervisor and building manager pressure. having said that this is where we mechanics have to be assertive and say no we have not finished and when im done i will let you know.also under no circumstance should you short both locks when alone on site no matter what pressure your under. this should only be done via maintenace speed and with your mate on the level of the lift as you would when you have to kick the lift below or above floor levels. this is something that when we had licenses(here in melbourne aus wwe have been deregulated ie no licenses to new mechanic after about '95') that was drummed into us. just on licenses im surprised you guys havent got these as with the level of code oversight i would've thought this would be standard.otis also used to do tool box talks just to remind procedures including these(prob still do).

i thought the best idea out was the safety string test plugs on the otis gem's. keep the jumpers in the bag. for those that haven't seen this its a plug that is in the normal position, then if you needed to jump out the pit circuit you would put the controller on inspection and remove the plug and plug it into the pit or car or limits position and run the car. the car would only go back into service with the plug in the normal position.

i had left otis by then but from what ive heard they are good. but you have a mix of units so you still need shorts. maybe another way also is to have a sign fixed to the inside of the motorroom door that you can switch saying 'attn short attached to lift' or something similar to remind the tech.

I worked for Delta which was an Otis subsidiary company. We had Otis's safety policy. I did think SOME of the ideas worked well in most cases.I also found some of their policies could leave new mechanics with a false sense of security especially when servicing older equipment.
Personally I never use jumpers for troubleshooting. I am a field adjuster with 30 yrs in the trade. I may use a couple jumpers during a full load test, mostly for things like ETS and terminal slowdown tests but that is it. I find the use of a meter has always negated the need for jumpers. If I need to run a car out of the pit or overhead, I may use a wire for the 2 or three seconds needed AFTER I personally check the car. Obviously things like Otis safety jumper tags are needed on mod and new construction start-up procedures but once that car is in Automatic, jumpers should not be used. If you need to bypass a non-safety related circuit to allow the unit to run pending a part, then it should be hard wired with long bright wiring and properly tagged. An example of this might be where I needed to keep a motor generator running due to a faulty shutdown timer. If a mechanic gets a call of doors being knocked off the track, it is a SERVICE call and requires 2 men FOR A SAFETY FACTOR. Anytime the unit needs to be moved with the doors open, a second man with adequate communication should be at the affected landing. People being in a hurry or also being hurried by company management is what gets other people or themselves hurt.

yes smitty this is what i meant. shorts are only used ie fault in safeties or door lock cct's. again with a second man manning the effected area when required.in aus we have 2 landing door locks generally plus a car door lock so when 1 landing lock is open but the doors are shut you can safely short the 1 lock after you have inspected where the lift is and checked that the doors are shut. just on your wire shorts of non essential ccts,i agree with the type which is the idea of the long wires and fluoro orange tags with your name on it.

Rule for Jumpers are the same as Firearms..

Jumpers don't kill people who use them carelessly do. Control of the elevator is the key along with jumper awareness. You have got to KNOW what you are jumping, have total control of the elevator, and when leaving remove every jumper you have put on.

You can put tags, Jumper lists, timed jumpers, and all kinds of little things, but if you're going to use them you have to know what you're doing and keep up with them and go through your mental check list, before you leave that job, and remove everything.

Between the falls, crushing injuries, electrouction, this business is dangerous enough without having this crap occur..

I vividly remember, supervisors, who knew what they were doing, would immediately dismiss anyone caught breaking a jumper infraction. It's about pride in your trade..

The trouble is those well indocterined,well intentioned supervisors are few and far . Companies are to caught up in whose number one and their managers are the scrummers how those supervisors kept their eye on. They made into these positions by sacrificing our safety and we let them .k1 led the way

You Guys better check this one out.....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tYE4Qm0g30

Note here so called elevator expert only put one jumper on and the car ran w/DO.

NEII ought to put together one of those, and have a miniature elevator, with a REAL SACRIFICIAL lab rat, getting caught between the doors. Students seeing that should get the message..

After reading all of the above, time out jumpers, licensing and legislation will not and cannot replace �COMPETENCE� It�s all about training and supervised experience. There are elevator companies out there using employees that have less experience and knowledge about the equipment there�re working on, then the guy that comes to fix the copy machine in your office. Say what you want but how many fatal accidents have been attributed to IUEC trained personnel as opposed the non IUEC personnel?
My Case Rests�����������
As Always Work Safe,
Jim

When Suzanne Hart was killed the mechanics had years of experience and are IUEC to my knowledge. Anyone can forget. Surgeons forget sponges in people and they are trained for years before they can operate. It really comes down to a simple question is a jumer that can remove itself from service safer than one that cannot? If jumper left behind accident are responcable for only 1% of all accident that equals 1 death every 3 years and 1,700 injurys in the US alone!!! And belive me the numbers are not easy to come by. But my research shows about 18 death cases in the last 50 years with doors jumped. So if the US is only 10% of the worlds elevators and the rest of the world has the same safety record as us. (witch I dont belive)That would come to 3 deaths a year and 17,000 injurys from jumper that have been forgotten!!! The majors are all world wide companies and that is why jumper training is a yearly mandated safety topic.

Good assessment, I completely agree with you regarding passenger miles traveled in elevators as compared to all forms of transportation. In all probability there were more fatalities during the morning commute into NYC on the day of Susan Harts� death.
Why are elevators the safest form of transportation? It�s engineering along with the personnel that install, adjust, repair and do the maintenance.
Call it a mistake and blame it on an occupied call, time management or boss on your tail? Sorry, don�t buy it. I could almost understand if the route guy got his elevators mixed up, but, and a very large but. First off, didn�t check if the car he was working on was still on automatic. Second, check the lock circuit with a meter or test light and then worst of all, go ahead and jumper BOTH the locks and gate switch. Just how long could the first two parts take? A minute tops. The last and fatal act is not and never has been an option for trouble shooting. It�s just not done at least during the 40 years I was in the business. I would have been fired on the spot or would fire anyone working for me that took out both the gate switch and the locks on a car that was not under complete control. (I will post a story that happened in Seattle with a much better ending)
It�s a sad story, sad for Susan Harts family, sad for our industry and not to mention poor route guy that has to carry this rest of his life.

completely agree christy. there has been an influx of single lock instalations here which confuse mechanics as we always had twin lock lifts. facts are you do not short both locks and car doors at all without a helper standing at the front of the lift under our control. even then normally you would just kick the lift with the helper in position to gain car top access.