Uplifting maintenance

The need for appropriate maintenance and repairs for lift is a pressing matter.

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Broken air-con in the office or at home causes extreme discomfort, especially in the hot and humid climate in the Middle East.

But broken or malfunctioning lifts are an entirely different matter altogether. The implications of neglecting a building’s plant and equipment can entail deadly consequences, particularly when it comes to lifts. Due to the vital role these play in transporting people and goods in the modern urban environment, the need for appropriate maintenance and repairs is a pressing matter. This is because of the safety-critical nature of lifts.

“In our business, safety is absolute. If air-con breaks down, it is uncomfortable but not life-threatening. Therefore we have to ensure our lifts are maintained properly, using genuine parts, and serviced by properly trained professionals,” says Al-Futtaim Engineering Elevators Division GM Syed Shamsul Haq. While the ideal situation is for lifts not to break down at all, this is unlikely due to the complexity of the equipment concerned and the heavy demands placed on it.

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Two recent media reports highlight the fatal consequences of what can go wrong. In central Cape Town, South Africa on Friday 17 July, electrical engineer Leigh Kenton Roomes (26) fell four storeys down a lift shaft, succumbing to his injuries at hospital, which included a fractured skull. The lift apparently became stuck between the third and fourth floors, whereupon Roomes and his four friends pried open the doors.

Roomes attempted to reach the third-floor level, but apparently slipped and fell. On Thursday 16 July, it was reported that an elderly couple in Georgia in the US succumbed to heat exhaustion when their home lift got stuck between floors. Their bodies were only discovered four days later.

In Dubai on 11 January, a tour to the At The Top observation deck of Burj Khalifa turned into a nightmare for 15 visitors when they became stuck between floors in a high-speed lift, and had to be rescued via a service lift. Apparently the problem was only a ‘stall’, and hence not a major problem, but neither Burj Khalifa nor lift supplier Otis has issued any statement to date about the incident.

Complex technology

“A lift should not be seen as a box moving up and down. Behind them is complex technology that needs to be monitored and maintained. Regular preventative and proactive maintenance can avert breakdowns to a large extent, even though they cannot be eliminated totally,” says Joseph Anil Paul, product line manager for Schindler’s lift department. “It is the responsibility of the owners to ensure that their equipment is in the safe hands of a professional and capable maintenance provider.”

Rajkumar Viswanathan, service manager for Al-Futtaim Engineering’s Elevators Division, says the cause of breakdowns should be separated into those incidents that are controllable and those that are not. “From a lift maintenance perspective, controllable breakdowns have a technical cause, which might come down to the quality of production, installation or maintenance, while those that are uncontrollable are caused by misuse, vandalism or power supply problems, for example.

” Viswanathan explains that the breakdown rate is the accumulation of these factors and the incidents that arise.

In general, lifts need to be maintained on a monthly basis, but frequency of services and repairs can depend on the lifecycle of components. Lift maintenance includes a thorough inspection, which is based on the manufacturer’s recommendations, while other necessary adjustments are carried out as need be, according to Viswanathan.

“Services include cleaning the car tops, door mechanisms and machine rooms to keep dust and grime from getting into the equipment. The technicians should also inspect the machine room and ensure that the drives are working properly,” he explains. Check-ups can also include different tests of the lift’s operation, such as levelling, door operation, ride quality, operation of buttons, signal fixtures, door sensors, interphone, alarm and emergency landing devices, among others.

In order to get a first hand account of the maintenance routine, we spoke to ETA-Melco technician Jaffar Sadiq during a routine lift inspection in Dubai. “Lifts need to be inspected once a month. We are checking the ropes, carrying out an oil and grease service and checking the buttons, et cetera. We are giving the lifts a full service,” he reports.