Elevator Control for Independent Cars in Common Shaft
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Solution Overview
Problem
Elevator installations with multiple cars face challenges in maintaining high reliability and transport capacity due to priority conflicts and undesired stoppage times, particularly when managing internal destination floor selections, external transport requests, and destination calls in a shared travel shaft.
Innovation Solution
A control apparatus that determines a common travel direction for elevator cars and reverses it only when all internal and external requests in that direction are processed, maintains defined spacings between cars, and prioritizes serving requests in the current travel direction to avoid conflicts, thereby influencing travel parameters such as speed and door operations to manage spacings and optimize travel paths.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If multiple elevator cars operate independently in a common shaft with simultaneous loading/unloading, then transport capacity increases, but priority conflicts and stoppage times increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges the control of multiple elevator cars into a single coordinated system where cars operate in a common shaft with synchronized travel directions. The control apparatus manages multiple cars as an integrated unit, allowing simultaneous loading/unloading at different access regions while coordinating their movements to avoid conflicts, thereby maintaining high transport capacity without excessive stoppages.
Solution Approach 2:
The system dynamically adjusts the travel directions of elevator cars based on real-time destination calls and transport requests. The control apparatus continuously monitors and modifies the travel direction of each car, allowing flexible response to changing conditions while maintaining coordinated operation, thus preventing stoppage times while preserving high productivity.
2Adaptability or versatility
If elevator cars can serve destination calls in any direction, then service flexibility increases, but priority conflicts and stoppage times increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the service function by introducing access regions that are directionally coupled to specific travel directions. Each access region serves destination calls for a specific direction, so cars only stop at access regions matching their current travel direction. This segmentation eliminates priority conflicts while maintaining service flexibility through the coordinated operation of multiple cars.
3Reliability
If elevator cars maintain large spacings for safety, then collision risk decreases, but transport capacity decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The control apparatus continuously monitors the positions and travel directions of all elevator cars, maintaining real-time feedback on their spacing. This feedback mechanism allows the system to safely reduce spacings between cars while coordinating their movements to prevent collisions, thereby increasing transport capacity without compromising reliability.
Data Source
AI summary
An elevator control of an elevator installation with at least two elevator cars that move independently of one another in a common elevator shaft has a control device for fixing a first common direction of travel of the at least two elevator cars and for reversing this first direction of travel on the basis of at least one internal destination floor selection and/or an external conveying request and/or a destination call only when all of the internal destination floor selections and/or all of the external conveying requests and/or all of the destination calls in the first direction of travel have been processed.