1958 Gearless Traction Otis Elevator Machine Room tour

(12-5-2014) HAPPY CHRISTMAS eve! NEVER TRESPASS in a machine room! You can be injured/killed. Anyway Enjoy a look at some nice vintage Otis elevator equipment that is about to get modded.

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[NoSpam]

I watched a Ward Leonard set running an elevator and thought it was one of the most marvelous things I'd seen. To see that motor running at full speed then slow down to a slow crawl was amazing.

[memorex]

love watching all of the physical machanics of these machines. Computers are cool but to watch all this stuff work like a giant clock. so smooth

[donalddavis]

I had 4 of these, but the newer generation that used 1625 vacuum tubes for the directional circuit control LG, LJ XLG and XLJ and HS....and the diode matrix for the hall call circuits. PI plate selectors with the advancer motors.... The generators and the drive motors were absolute beasts... the controllers...maybe not so much, over 40 year career..hundreds of hours keeping it all running... I miss it. I enjoyed what I did and I think I was pretty dam good at it!

[kevinharris]

I used to work on a geared version on this unit in San Antonio. Ironclad units. I rarely had issues with it. They knew how to make things last back in the day, that’s for sure! Thanks for sharing.

[ssaraccoii]

Type B MG sets and pie plate selectors! I still work on this type of equipment in LA! Still using the 2040 touch tubes in the car and still using the glass vacuum tubes at the top of the controller! Still has the original flyball governors! 👏👏👏👏👏👏

[Sirenenwolfi]

Very nice and impressive old Gearless DC machinery. 175 volts, 141 amps when I read the type plate correctly - so, about 22 KW or 30 HP of power. Great! I love these old DC drives. Sad that this technology now is obsolete and more and more replaced by three-phase AC engines.

[vincentheartland]

My father was an elevator operator very briefly. Otis is the best brand by orders of magnitude. Keep running strong!

[alenanikitina]

god I love the sound of relays working. You should make an hour video of that on a very busy day.

[edwardvickers]

Worked on all of those machines over the years.Replaced field coils and white metal bearings on the gearless machines, comm skims and undercutting on site.Those Generators have exciters on the end which otis later modernised and removed.

[krnlg]

These things really are beautiful to watch.

[smitlag]

True to a degree about the machines. Though incredibly built, those big gearless eventually need to get rewound.The good news is they do it onsite.Way too heavy to send out. We finally lost one about 80years old. The wire insulation deteriorates. You start getting hot spots on the commutator. They also start losing motor fields.
DC drives too are becoming a thing of the past. Magnetek or the 12pulse MCE still work well.
These days the AC gearless PM motors are the standard.

[poopoopweass]

what beautiful machines. This is honestly my true passion. I'm 21 but I want to get into the elevator business. I'm starting my electric class this semester. Please God help me study to become worthy of working for OTIS or another elevator company one day

[donalddavis]

spent a lot of years with those! Back when Otis was built like a tank!

[kansasthunderman]

If you want a complete controller, you might ask the modernization contractor if you could buy one of those being removed.

Otherwise, they're just sold to a scrap metal dealer. There's a lot of copper in those old controllers and contractors may get as much as $50 a piece at the scrap metal yard.

[mrmattandmrchay]

At last I've found an excellent video to watch tonight - must have missed this one when you published it.  Wow, amazing!  Some things puzzle me though, mainly due to cost I suppose - Why Gearless in a relatively low rise building, and why do they have the more expensive "advancer" system (2:46) on the selector?  Answer, for you to film :)  but do you see what I mean?  Most other buildings would have cut that out, unless the building was high rise and demanded these extra features.  Glad you filmed the journey up to the motor room, always interesting so see just where they are and how to get to them - every building is different.  EXCELLENT video!

[corrinaandlenycorrinaandle]

This video about the elevator and visit to its machinery room is fun to view.Reposted the link thru You Tube so more whom are interested about this can also view.Reposted YT link to facebook too.Enjoy viewing, this is fun!!!Thank You for telling its story!!!

[Wetboyslim]

It is built only using relays, but it functionality is very similar to modern elevators, powered by microcontrollers, inverters and other electronic stuff. Great machine!

[grindupBaker]

Little walk down memory lane. I was an elevator consultant, later a safety inspector, for a couple of decades (I'm 73, retired) and I've been into many hundreds of buildings and inspected thousands of elevators, many like those Otis installations with Ward-Leonard & the relay-based controllers. I don't miss the 85 decibels of those m.g. sets or the kneeling on the carbon/dust floor to write my notes because a clip-board was a nuisance & there's hardly ever a table. Interesting electro-mechanical equipment though. Consultant's general recommendation: Refurbish Otis gearless machines, scrap everything else in the room. Use SCR. New door operators, fixtures, cab finishes. Refurbish hall/car door equipment & whatever's >60% worn (ropes etc.). But, as always, if somebody keen to get the work gives a great price for everything in the room being scrapped and A.C. gearless installed then likely go with that, a tidy package. If memory still serves.

[mattmoreira]

It's funny to hear someone trying to explain what they have little clue about in an utterly confident tone. I've been there and done that many times before, too. 😂
Nice video, BTW.

[HobbyOrganist]

Ive wanted one of the small ones with the old slate controller board, but yeah even the small are are insanely heavy! So all I have is a ball governor from one