Elevator Roller Guide Shoe With Emergency Guidance Redundancy
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing elevator guide systems, particularly those using T-shaped or U-shaped guide rails, face challenges in providing safe, reliable, and comfortable guidance for elevator cars while maintaining operational integrity.
Innovation Solution
A roller guide shoe design featuring freely rotating rollers for end-face guidance and a guide body for lateral guidance, with an optional emergency guide and cover, housed in a high-strength plastic or sheet metal structure, ensuring continuous operation even in roller failure.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If sliding guide shoes are used in T-shaped or U-shaped guide rails, then the elevator car can be guided vertically, but the guidance precision and ride comfort are insufficient
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces the traditional sliding contact mechanism with a rolling contact mechanism. Roller guide shoes with freely rotating rollers are used instead of sliding guide shoes, transforming the friction-based sliding motion into a low-friction rolling motion. This substitution significantly improves guidance precision and ride comfort while maintaining the vertical guidance function in U-shaped guide rails.
Solution Approach 2:
The guide shoe design incorporates dynamic elements including freely rotating rollers that adapt to guide rail variations, oscillating guide bodies that respond to lateral forces, and emergency guides that activate only when needed. This dynamic design allows the system to maintain optimal guidance precision and comfort under varying operational conditions.
2Reliability
If guide rails with safety device contact surfaces are used, then safety braking can be achieved, but the guidance function and safety function conflict in the same component
Solution Approach 1:
The guide shoe is divided into functionally independent segments: rollers for vertical guidance, guide bodies for lateral guidance, and emergency guides for safety intervention. This segmentation allows each component to perform its specific function optimally without interference, enabling both guidance and safety functions to coexist without compromising either.
Solution Approach 2:
The guide body acts as an intermediary element between the rollers and the lateral guide surfaces. It mediates lateral guidance forces while allowing the rollers to focus on vertical guidance, and provides a separate interface for emergency safety devices without interfering with normal guidance operations.
3Reliability
If traditional guide shoes are used, then the structure is simple, but the reliability is insufficient due to lack of redundant guidance mechanisms
Solution Approach 1:
The guide shoe incorporates redundant emergency guide elements that are prepared in advance but remain inactive during normal operation. These emergency guides provide a backup guidance mechanism that automatically engages if the primary roller guidance fails, ensuring continuous safe operation without adding complexity to the normal guidance system.
Solution Approach 2:
Different parts of the guide shoe have specialized properties: hard wear-resistant surfaces for rollers, oscillating flexible elements for lateral guidance, and rigid emergency guide structures. This local differentiation optimizes each component for its specific function while maintaining overall system reliability without unnecessary complexity.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The roller guide shoe provides safe, reliable, and comfortable guidance with enhanced ride quality and derailment prevention, while maintaining operational integrity through redundant guidance mechanisms.
Implementation Method 1
The roller guide shoe comprises two rollers (4, 5) for guiding along the frontal guide surface (12) mounted so as to rotate freely about an axis of rotation
Implementation Method 2
During the travel of the car, the rollers can run on the frontal guide surface (12)
Implementation Method 3
the guide body is guided in an oscillating manner between the lateral guide surfaces when the car travels
Data Source
AI summary
An elevator has an elevator car that is guided on two mutually opposite guide rails in an elevator shaft. The guide rails each contain a U-shaped guide channel with a frontal guide surface and two lateral guide surfaces. Roller guide shoes are provided for guiding the elevator car. Each of the roller guide shoes has two rollers mounted on a common axle so as to rotate freely about an axis of rotation for guiding along the frontal guide surface of the U-shaped guide channel and a guide roller received between the two lateral guide surfaces of the U-shaped guide channel for lateral guidance. Covers are arranged upstream of the two rollers for covering the respective rollers, wherein the covers form an emergency guide.