Example embodiments relate to an elevator provided with a coated hoisting rope.
One of the goals in elevator development work has been to achieve an economical and efficient utilization of building space. In recent years, this development work has produced, among other things, various solutions for implementing an elevator without machine room. Good examples of elevators without machine room are disclosed e.g. in specifications EP 0 631 967 and EP 0 631 968. The elevators described in these specifications are fairly efficient in respect of space utilization, because they have made it possible to eliminate the space required in the building by the elevator machine room, without a necessity of enlarging the elevator shaft. In the elevators disclosed in these specifications, the machine is compact at least in one direction, but in other directions it may be much larger than a conventional elevator machine.
In these otherwise good elevator solutions, however, the space required by the hoisting machine constitutes a limitation on elevator lay-out options. The arrangements for the passage of the hoisting ropes take up space. The space required by the elevator car itself on its path of movement and likewise the space required by the counterweight can hardly be reduced, at least at a reasonable cost and without compromising the performance and quality of service of the elevator. In a traction sheave elevator without machine room, especially in the case of a solution with machine above, installing the hoisting machine in the elevator shaft is difficult because the machine is relatively heavy and large. The size and weight of especially a machine designed for larger loads, higher speeds and/or greater hoisting heights are such a problem in respect of installation that in practice it has even limited the range of application of the concept of elevator without machine room or at least retarded the introduction of this concept in the case of larger elevators.
Specification WO 99/43589 discloses an elevator suspended on flat belts, which achieves relatively small belt bending diameters on the traction and deflecting sheaves. However, this solution involves the problems of a restricted lay-out solution, disposition of components in the elevator shaft and orientation of deflecting pulleys. Furthermore, orientation of the polyurethane-coated belts having a load-bearing steel part inside is a problem e.g. in a situation where the car is tilted. An elevator implemented in this manner has to be fairly massive, at least as regards the machine and/or the structures supporting it, in order to avoid undesirable vibrations. Also, the massiveness of the rest of the elevator structures required to maintain the mutual orientation of the deflecting and traction sheaves increases the weight and costs of the elevator. In addition, the task of installing and adjusting such a system is difficult and requires great precision.
Specification WO 01/68973 discloses an elevator provided with coated hoisting ropes, in which the rope has been twisted from a number of coated strands and finally coated even externally with plastic or a similar material. The external diameter of the rope is specified as 12 mm, which is a large diameter in comparison with the present invention. A problem with this type of a fairly thick rope, which combines a steel wire rope and a relatively thick and soft outer layer, is that, as the rope is running around the driving or deflecting pulleys, the steel core sinks towards the bottom of the rope groove, forcing the relatively thick and soft sheath to yield out of its way. The only yielding direction is upward along the edges of the rope groove, and consequently the sheath of the rope tends to be squeezed out of the rope groove. This results in fast rope wear.
Another expedient used to achieve a small bending diameter of the rope is to employ rope structures in which the load-bearing part is made of artificial fiber. An elevator rope of this type, based on an artificial fiber structure, is disclosed in European patent application no. EP1022376. Although a solution like this does make it possible to achieve ropes lighter than steel ropes, artificial fiber ropes do not provide any essential advantage, at least not in elevators for the commonest hoisting heights, especially because artificial fiber ropes are considerably more expensive than steel ropes. In addition, the heat resistance of artificial fiber ropes e.g. in the case of fire is certainly not as good as the corresponding resistance of steel ropes.
The object of the present invention is to overcome the above-mentioned drawbacks and/or to reduce the size and/or weight of the elevator or at least its machinery by providing the possibility of using traction and deflecting sheaves of a smaller diameter. A concurrent objective is to achieve more efficient space utilization in the building.
Example embodiments of the elevator are disclosed below. Some embodiments of the invention are characterized by what is disclosed in the claims.
The invention makes it possible to achieve one or more of the following advantages, among others:
The primary area of application of the invention is elevators designed for the transportation of people or freight. Another primary area of application of the invention in passenger elevators whose speed range is conventionally about 1.0 m/s or higher but may also be e.g. only about 0.5 m/s. In the case of freight elevators, too, the speed is preferably at least about 0.5 m/s, although with large loads even lower speeds may be used. In the elevator of the invention, elevator hoisting ropes twisted from substantially round and strong wires coated with e.g. polyurethane are used. With round wires, the rope can be twisted in many ways using wires of different or equal thicknesses. In ropes applicable to the invention, the average wire thickness is below 0.4 mm. Well applicable ropes made from strong wires are ropes having an average wire thickness below 0.3 mm or even below 0.2 mm. For example, thin-wired strong 4-mm ropes can be twisted relatively economically from wires such that the average wire thickness in the finished rope is between 0.15 . . . 0.25 mm, in which case the thinnest wires may even have a thickness of only about 0.1 mm. Thin rope wires can easily be made very strong. The invention uses rope wires having a strength over about 2000 N/mm2. A suitable range of rope wire strengths is 2300-2700 N/mm2. In principle, it is possible to use rope wires having a strength as high as about 3000 N/mm2 or even higher.
In the following, the invention will be described in detail by the aid of an embodiment example with reference to the attached drawings, wherein
The hoisting ropes 9 may have, for example, a load-bearing part twisted from steel wires of circular cross-section (e.g.,
The mutual structure of the sheath 17 and the core is so constructed that the friction between the sheath 17 and the core is greater than the friction between the sheath 17 and the rope groove 18 of the traction sheave 5. Thus, any undesirable sliding that eventually may occur will occur at the desired place, i.e. between the traction sheave and the rope surface and not inside the hoisting rope between the core and the sheath, which could damage the hoisting rope 9.
By virtue of the small traction sheave, in an elevator according to the invention for a nominal load e.g. below 1000 kg, a machine weight as low as about one half of the present machine weights can easily be achieved, which means elevator machines having a weight as low as below 100-150 kg. In the invention, the machine is regarded as comprising at least the traction sheave, the motor, the machine housing structures and the brakes.
It will be easy to achieve an elevator in which the machine without supporting elements has a dead weight below 1/7 of the nominal load or even about 1/10 of the nominal load or even still less. Basically, the ratio of machine weight to nominal load is given for a conventional elevator in which the counterweight has a weight substantially equal to the weight of an empty car plus half the nominal load. As an example of machine weight in the case of an elevator of a given nominal weight when the fairly common 2:1 suspension ratio is used with a nominal load of 630 kg, the combined weight of the machine and its supporting elements may be only 75 kg when the traction sheave diameter is 160 mm and hoisting ropes having a diameter of 4 mm are used, in other words, the total weight of the machine and its supporting elements is about ⅛ of the nominal load of the elevator. More generally, when a suspension ratio of 2:1 is used, the thin and strong steel ropes of the invention have a diameter of 2.5-5 mm in elevators for a nominal load below 1000 kg and preferably about 5-8 mm in elevators for a nominal load over 1000 kg. In principle, it is possible to use ropes thinner than this, but in this case a large number of ropes will be needed unless e.g. the suspension ratio is increased.
By using a polyurethane or similar coating, the smoothness of the rope is also improved. The use of thin wires allows the rope itself to be made thinner, because thin steel wires can be made stronger in material than thicker wires. For instance, using wires of about 0.2 mm, a 4 mm thick elevator hoisting rope of a fairly good construction can be produced. Depending on the thickness of the hoisting rope used and/or for other reasons, the wire thicknesses in the steel wire rope may preferably range between 0.15 mm and 0.5 mm, in which range there are readily available steel wires with good strength properties in which even an individual wire has a sufficient wear resistance and a sufficiently low susceptibility to damage.
In the above, ropes made from round steel wires have been discussed. Applying the same principles, the ropes can be wholly or partly twisted from non-round profiled wires. In this case, the cross-sectional areas of the wires are preferably substantially the same as for round wires, i.e. in the range of 0.015 mm2-0.2 mm2. Using wires in this thickness range, it will be easy to produce steel wire ropes having a wire strength above about 2000 N/mm2 and a wire cross-section of 0.015 mm2-0.2 mm2 and comprising a large cross-sectional area of steel material in relation to the cross-sectional area of the rope, as is achieved e.g. by using the Warrington construction. For the implementation of the invention, particularly well suited are ropes having a wire strength in the range of 2300 N/m2-2700 N/mm2, because such ropes have a very large bearing capacity in relation to rope thickness while the high hardness of the strong wires involves no substantial difficulties in the use of the rope in elevators.
The coating material selected for use in the steel ropes is a material that has good frictional properties and a good wear resistance and is substantially hard as mentioned before. The coating of the steel ropes can also be so implemented that the coating material penetrates into the rope partially or through the entire rope thickness. For example, at least part of spaces between the steel wires in the hoisting ropes may be filled with at least one of rubber, urethane, and other medium of substantially non-fluid nature.
It is obvious to the person skilled in the art that the invention is not limited to the example described above, but that it may be varied within the scope of the claims presented below. In accordance with the examples described above, the skilled person can vary the embodiment of the invention e.g. by using a suitable coating in the rope grooves.
It is also obvious to the person skilled in the art that the ropes may be twisted in many different ways. Likewise, the average of the wire thicknesses may be understood as referring to a statistical, geometrical or arithmetical mean value. To determine a statistical average, it is possible to use e.g. the standard deviation or the Gauss distribution. It is further obvious that the wire thicknesses in the rope may vary, e.g. even by a factor of 3 or more.
It is further obvious to the person skilled in the art that the ropes may be constructed in many different ways. The sheath may have e.g. a double-layer structure comprising a somewhat softer outer layer of polyurethane or equivalent that has good frictional properties and a harder inner layer of polyurethane or equivalent.
It is also obvious to the skilled person that the lay-out of the elevator solution used may differ in may ways from that described above. Thus, the elevator drive machine 3 may be placed lower in the elevator shaft than in the above description, for instance so that the hoisting ropes 9 pass around the traction sheave 5 by its lower side. In this case, the deflecting pulleys may correspondingly be fixedly placed in the upper part of the elevator shaft.
Number | Date | Country | Kind |
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20021100 | Jun 2002 | FI | national |
This application is a continuation of, and claims priority under 35 U.S.C. §120 and 35 U.S.C. §365(c) from, PCT International Application No. PCT/FI03/00418 which has an International filing date of May 28, 2003, which designated the United States of America and which claims priority on FINLAND Application Priority Number 20021100 filed Jun. 7, 2002, the entire contents of which are hereby incorporated herein by reference.
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Number | Date | Country | |
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20050060979 A1 | Mar 2005 | US |
Number | Date | Country | |
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Parent | PCT/FI03/00418 | May 2003 | US |
Child | 10969095 | US |