How Do Fuji Elevators Work

Although elevators are common in offices and gaining popularity in homes, it wasn’t that long ago that the elevator was one of the most magical and mysterious machines people had ever encountered.

The first concept you'll want to know about elevators is that there is a counterweight. This means that if you have an elevator with no people in it - the counterweight is keeping roughly equal tension on both sides of the pulley which holds up the elevator. Now let fujihd steps to looking at elevators and how they work.

Counterweight

You must have observed this one. You can see this thing on ground floor whenever an elevator is at the top floor. When the lift starts coming down, the counterweight starts moving upside & vice versa. But why do we need it ?

Imagine the lift has to go up on 10th floor now being on ground floor & it will require 1000 KJ of energy. What these smartass’s have done – they have joined a counterweight on the other end of the cables. Now what happens, the electric motor above require less energy to lift you because our friend – Mr Counterweight is already helping us by pulling us up. Which means instead of 1000 KJ, this time you would need less amount of energy like 500 KJ thereby consuming less power. There you go.

The counterweight makes it easier for the motor to raise and lower the car just as sitting on a see-saw makes it much easier to lift someone’s weight compared to lifting them in your arms. Also a heavy loaded elevator car would be hard to pull up but will race down to the ground while coming down. All thanks to counterweight, which makes it easier to control the car. A counterweight weighs almost half of a fully loaded car.

Safety

Making the cables from steel strands doesn’t assure a 100% guarantee of safety. So Otis elevator(Otis -the one who designed it) had a ratchet system as a backup. Each car ran between two vertical guides with sturdy teeth all the way to the top. If the cables broke, a spring loaded mechanism with hooks sprung outside engaging into the metal teeth. So now you are somewhere stuck in between the floors but you are SAFE. These mechanisms were used on Otis elevators & only few of them have it today.

Speed Governors

Another important safety feature that is also critical to the operation of an Elevator is the speed governor. A heavy flywheel with massive mechanical arms built inside it, the governor ensures that the elevator car doesn’t rise or fall too quickly. In the event that the car accelerates past a safe speed on its way up or down, the governor activates and trips one or more braking system to slow down or stop the car altogether.