Portable Elevator Brake Trigger for Dust-Prone Construction Safety

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Solution Overview

Problem

Existing elevator systems lack a reliable mechanism for service personnel to manually trigger safety brakes during construction phases, where sensors may fail due to dust or incomplete components, increasing the risk of accidents.

Innovation Solution

A portable emergency stop switch that transmits a signal to a signal receiver, which in turn triggers the elevator safety brake, allowing service personnel to deploy the brake independently of sensor readings.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Reliability

If sensor-based automatic safety brake deployment is used, then the system can automatically detect dangerous situations, but sensors may fail due to dust or incomplete components during construction phases

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvesafety brake deployment reliabilityVSAvoidsensor failure due to dust

Core Design Contradiction:

ReliabilityVSObject-affected harmful factors

Solution Approach 1:

A portable emergency stop switch acts as an intermediary device between service personnel and the safety brake system. This manual override mechanism bypasses the sensor-based automatic detection system that may fail due to dust or incomplete components, providing a reliable fallback control method during construction phases.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #24Intermediary (Mediator)

Solution Approach 2:

Service personnel are empowered to directly control the safety brake system through the portable emergency stop switch when they perceive dangerous situations. This self-service capability allows workers to take immediate action without relying on automatic sensor detection, ensuring safety during construction when environmental conditions may compromise sensor reliability.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #25Self-service

2Ease of operation

If manual emergency stop switch is added, then service personnel can control safety brake independently, but device complexity increases

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvemanual safety brake controlVSAvoidsystem complexity

Core Design Contradiction:

Ease of operationVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The emergency stop functionality is extracted as a separate, portable device rather than being integrated into the fixed elevator control system. This allows service personnel to carry the control mechanism with them during construction activities, providing manual override capability without permanently modifying or complicating the main elevator control architecture.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #2Taking out (Extraction)

Solution Approach 2:

The portable emergency stop switch serves multiple functions: it acts as a manual override for the safety brake system, provides a backup control mechanism during construction phases, and can be carried by any service personnel. This multi-functional design adds safety capability without requiring separate specialized devices for different scenarios.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #6Universality (Multi-functionality)

Data Source

PatentUS12486140B2Safety brake trigger

Publication Date: 2025.12.02 OTIS ELEVATOR CO

AI summary

An elevator system (1, 1′) includes a portable emergency stop switch (2, 2′), arranged to transmit a signal (4) when activated, a signal receiver (6, 6′), arranged to receive the signal (4, 4′) transmitted by the portable emergency stop switch (2, 2′); and an elevator safety actuator (8, 8′) and an elevator safety brake (10, 10′). In response to receipt of the signal (4, 4′), the signal receiver (6, 6′) is arranged to trigger the elevator safety actuator (8, 8′) to deploy the elevator safety brake (10, 10′).