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Beam Me Up

 non-linear lift
  (+3, -1)
(+3, -1) 		  [vote for,
against]

Instead of transporting one car in its shaft, this radically new elevator’s shaft with numerous cars moves them up and down by turning itself end over end. The shaft is really a beam, as tall as the building, and turns on an axel at its middle.

The cars, one for each floor except for the middle floor, hang from the beam by their roofs to stay level. The beam rotates 90º at a time, stopping to load and unload passengers. On the middle floor is a corridor with elevator doors where riders can change cars when the beam lift is horizontal.

Say if Joe Shmough enters a seven story building and wants to ride to the sixth floor, he gets on at the ground floor, rides one stop to the fourth floor, changes to the car next door and rides one more stop before getting off. Going instead to the second or third floor means walking to a car past the axel on the fourth floor corridor and riding to the next stop or walking a shorter distance and getting off at the third stop (270º).

Thus passenger ambulation means less moving parts and increased safety. This lift would also work well on the side of a building and with a cross form, maybe with windmill vanes as a power supplement. Joe Shmough requests flags and streamers.

—FarmerJohn, Mar 13 2004

schematic sketch http://www.geocitie....html?1079174992687
[FarmerJohn, Oct 04 2004, last modified Oct 21 2004]

Ferris Lift http://www.halfbake.../idea/Ferris_20Lift
I think my idea is sufficiently different in transport and (un)loading design [FarmerJohn, Oct 04 2004]

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       I was completely confused before I saw the picture. One side-effect of this is that you wouldn't be able to have buildings taller han they are wide unless you had multiple 'beam lifts'. So, the first one would use a beam as long as the height of 15 storeys. If you wanted to go to the 24th floor, you'd get off at the 15th floor and get on the next 'beam lift' which would serve floors 15-30. Floor 15 in this example would be served by both beams and you'd have to make sure they didn't crash into each other.
—hippo, Mar 13 2004
   

       Funny, I was just thinking of the multiple beams thing as well.   

       I love this. Very inventive. I'm a little concerned about the amount of foot traffic on the central floor, with all the folks swapping cars. To go to any floor other than the 7th (in your example), Joe has to get off at the 4th. So it would be quite busy there. (But I suppose, no busier than the lobby, where it all originates anyway.)   

       I'm picturing the wall of elevator door openings with signs above them.   

       Next Stop Floor 7 | Next Stop Floor 6 | (etc.)   

       And the left side of the corridor marked UP and the right marked DOWN.   

       And one would have to consider the G forces on the out-most cars when setting the speed of rotation.   

       You don't mention in the idea, but I presume that the cars themselves rotate so to remain properly oriented. (Else they'd be doing the Fred Astaire gimballed room dance.)
—waugsqueke, Mar 13 2004
   

       That was the "The cars ... hang from the beam by their roofs to stay level." part.
—FarmerJohn, Mar 13 2004
   

       Ah, sorry. That was right in the middle of the bit where I'm reading and totally not understanding the idea until I looked at the picture.
—waugsqueke, Mar 13 2004
   

       [FJ], if the cars hang from the beam by their roofs, how do you suppose they can reach the top floor?
—Ling, Mar 13 2004
   

       Is that a trick question, or do you mean the penthouse?
—FarmerJohn, Mar 13 2004
   

       I think I see the point Ling is making. If the car is suspended by the roof and is level and accessible on the first floor, then when the beam rotates, that car's top portion would be level with the bottom of the doorway on the 7th floor. It would also be halfway off from lining up with the 4th floor doorway.   

       In order to line up with all the doorways, the cars would need to rotate on a central pivot point, and not be suspended from one end.
—waugsqueke, Mar 13 2004
   

       Oops, quite right; missed that one.
—FarmerJohn, Mar 13 2004
   

       I forgive you
—Ling, Mar 13 2004
   

       Clever addition to this idea: The big beam should rotate continuously clockwise. Then, there should be small beams pivoting around the ends of the big beam, each of these smaller beams about 4 lift cars long and rotating anti-clockwise. These smaller beams will have the lift cars attached to them. If the speeds of rotation of the big and small beams are correctly matched, as the beams continuously rotate, each lift car will hover near a floor before being whisked up to the next floor.

From outside this will look like a cross between a fairground ride and giant flailing robot arms.
—hippo, Mar 13 2004
   

       That's actually very similar to an addition phoenix suggested to the Ferris lift idea.
—waugsqueke, Mar 13 2004
   

       <looks> So it is - (however [phoenix] didn't explore the way in which cars attached to counter-rotating ferris wheels (or beams) would give you cars which almost stopped at each floor).
—hippo, Mar 13 2004
   

       What if the beam was actually an intersection of three beams, like an asterisk , to provide more capacity? I wonder also if you would need to be concerned with balancing the load, either as described above, or in asterisk configuration, like you need to on some ferris wheels, or if it could be overbuilt enough to deal with total loading on one side of the axle.
—oxen crossing, Mar 13 2004
   

       + for giving me the hiccoughs.
—dpsyplc, Mar 13 2004
   

       I don't see how this is significantly different from the Ferris Lift idea. You're just replacing a line for the circle. Why not a square, triangle or octogon? It all seems arbitrary to me.
—phoenix, Mar 15 2004
   

       Well sir, as I recall the Ferris Lift only transported passengers on cars at its perimeter, and it never stopped so that they had to hop off and on as it turned. My riders only use rotation to get to and from the middle floor where most of them *safely* change floors horizontally, when the beam pauses.
—FarmerJohn, Mar 16 2004
   

       I agree that's a significant difference.
—waugsqueke, Mar 16 2004
   

       How is it any safer if the "beam" only stops on the middle floor? I guess it's safer if you don't intend to leave the middle floor, but you're on your own for the other ones.
—phoenix, Mar 17 2004
   

       I’m thinking safer, because (un)loading a stopped beam lift car as with a conventional elevator is safer than hopping on/off a moving ferris lift car.
—FarmerJohn, Mar 17 2004
   


 

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