Fundamentals

How an elevator system is put together: components, drive types and the vocabulary used across the trade.

Entries

• Acceleration, jerk and levelling: engineering a ride that feels right
  The three motion parameters that decide ride quality, how they interact with the machine and the building, and how to tell a tuning problem from a…
• Counterweight, compensation and balance: why load matters to diagnosis
  What the counterweight and compensation system do, how balance changes the symptom you see, and how to test load-dependent faults deliberately.
• Elevator glossary: working definitions of the terms used in the trade
  From A17.1 to worm gear: a plain-language glossary of elevator and escalator terms, including the words different manufacturers use for the same thing.
• Elevator system anatomy: what every part does and which ones fail
  The traction machine, ropes, counterweight, car frame, safeties, governor, buffers, doors and controller explained as one system - with the failure modes each part actually produces…
• Escalators and moving walks: the components that generate the calls
  Step chain, handrail, comb, brake and skirt - how an escalator differs from an elevator in service terms, and where its failures concentrate.
• Suspension ropes and belts: inspection criteria, wear patterns and retirement
  How to examine suspension means properly, what the wear patterns tell you about the machine and alignment, and why retirement criteria must come from the maker…

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