Lifts

[louiselux]

Oh lord. Sanity break.

Yesterday at work, I got talking to man who fixed the lifts, and he showed me his lift shaft. Sorry, I did try and not write that, but it just came out. Anyway, I'd never seen a lift shaft before. He showed me the 2 ton weight that balanced the lift, hanging on five thick steel hawsers, and the door opening mechanism (a chain gear not unlike a bicycle). After seeing those hawsers, I'll never be afraid again of them snapping. And he debunked a Hollywood lift drama convention. If anything were to go wrong with the lift mechanism, it would shoot straight to the top of the lift shaft, not plummet to the bottom, because the counterbalance is always heavier than the lift itself; it would be the counterbalance that fell, not the lift. He had a few terse words to say about Bruce Willis as well.

And, in an unprecedented outbreak of high culture, we are going to see the Eroica symphony tonight. I'm still not sure how they're going to fit the entire BSO into Reading Concert Hall-- it's tiny.

Comments

[derryderrydown.livejournal.com]

I once watched a TV drama about people trapped in a lift that left me terrified to step foot in them again. (I was about seven at the time.)

So my dad arranged for one of his friends to show me round a lift and let me look at all the safety features. Not only is there the counterweight, but there are gearteeth things in the side of the lift that grip it in place if anything happens.

And even if, for some strange reason, the lift does start plummeting, there are big buffer things at the bottom so passengers are unlikely to get anything more serious than some bruises or maybe mild fractures.

It also means that you can sit in the bottom of the liftshaft and you won't get squished by a plummeting lift.

I've never been scared of lifts since.

[louiselux.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, the gear teeth-- they're sort of like a dead man's handle I think: when the power's on they sit back from the rails, but when the power goes off, they stick out, stopping the lift dropping.

I didn't know about the buffer though-- it's good to know if I'm ever at the bottom of a lift shaft.

That was such a lovely thoughtful thing for your Dad to do, as well. *g*

[mandragora1.livejournal.com]

OTOH *she writes brightly* I was once involved in a Fatal Accidents Act claim which involved a lift. The doors went wrong and snapped (and I use the word 'snapped' advisedly) shut on someone trapping them half in and out of the lift. By the time the firemen were able to release him he'd died from bloodloss as a result of his injuries.

Just thought I'd share.

Oh yeah, another Fatal Accidents Act claim involved a counterbalance, but not to a lift. No, this was a counterbalance to a window-cleaning platform on a building on King William Street (in the heart of the City). The counterweight fell off the building and squashed flat a car (and its hapless inhabitants) that was travelling along King William Street at the moment the counterweight plummeted to the ground. Really nasty.

[louiselux.livejournal.com]

*shudders* I don't like the sound of those 'snapping' doors! But thanks for sharing. *g* I get the feeling you may well be treasury of gory anecdotes at Connotations.