24-11-2012, 06:17 PM
ESCALATORS
Escalators.doc (Size: 1.97 MB / Downloads: 559)
INTRODUCTION TO ESCALATORS
An Escalator is a moving staircase – a conveyor transport device for carrying people between floors of a building. The device consists of a motor-driven chain of individual, linked steps that move up or down on tracks, allowing the step treads to remain horizontal.
Escalators are used around the world to move pedestrian traffic in places where elevators would be impractical. Principal areas of usage include department stores, shopping malls, airports, transit systems, convention centers, hotels, arenas, stadiums and public buildings.
HISTORY OF ESCALATORS
Nathan Ames, of Saugus, Massachusetts, in the US, invented the first escalator in 1859. He called his invention “revolving stairs’, but in the patent there is no mention of the type of materials he preferred to use or how he thought this design might be out to use. The mechanism he developed could be either manual or be controlled by hydraulic power, but he never did develop a prototype of the design. It was in 1889, that the first successful patent for the escalator was granted. This was to Leamon Souder, but again no model of the design was ever built.
MODEL DEVELOPMENT AND DESIGN TYPE
"Cleat-type" escalators
Jesse Reno's escalators did not resemble modern escalators too closely. Passengers' feet tilted upward at an angle, and the treads consisted of cleated metal (initially) or wood (later models). Reno worked on his own for several years, gaining success with installations from Toronto to Cape Town, South Africa. Similar units of the day by other manufacturers resembled conveyor belts more than moving staircases. For a time, Otis Elevator sold Reno's escalators as their own "cleat-type" escalators.
"Step-type" escalators
Seeberger's model, bought by Otis, clearly became the first "step-type" escalator, so called after its visual likeness to steps on a regular staircase. The company later combined the best aspects of both inventions (guiding slats and flat steps) and in 1921 produced an escalator similar to the type used today: they called it the "L-type" escalator. It was succeeded by the "M-type", the "O-type", and current models by Otis such as the "NCE-type" escalator.
Primary uses and application
Department stores/shopping
As noted above, a few escalator types were installed in major department stores (including Harrods) before the Expo. Escalators proved instrumental in the layout and design of shopping venues in the twentieth century.
By 1898, the first of Reno’s "inclined elevators" were incorporated into the Bloomingdale Bros. store at Third Avenue and 59th Street. This was the first retail application of the devices in the US, and no small coincidence, considering that Reno's primary financier was Lyman Bloomingdale, co-owner of the department store with brother Joseph Bloomingdale.
Public transportation
The first "standard" escalator installed on the London Underground was a Seeberger model at Earls Court. Noted above, London's Underground installed a rare spiral escalator designed by Reno, William Henry Aston and Scott Kietzman for the Holloway Road Underground station in 1906; it was run for a short time but was taken out of service the same day it debuted. The older lines of the London Underground had many escalators with wooden treads (ca. 1930s) until they were rapidly replaced following the King's Cross fire, noted above.