CAR SLING OF ELEVATOR AND ARRANGEMENT FOR FITTING ELEVATOR CAR TO CAR SLING

The object of the invention is a car sling of an elevator as defined in the preamble of claim 1 and an arrangement for fitting an elevator car to the car sling as defined in the preamble of claim 9.

Usually in elevators the elevator car is generally fitted inside the car sling, which car sling is suspended by the hoisting roping and fitted to travel along guide rails. There are elevator cars of different sizes for different buildings and different applications and thus there must also be car slings suited for these cars of different sizes. Thus for each car size, car slings suited to them must be separately manufactured. In this case one drawback is the relatively high price of car slings .

The purpose of this invention is to eliminate the aforementioned drawbacks and to achieve a car sling of an elevator, in which the width of the car sling can be adjusted, and in which car slings of different sizes, for elevator cars of different widths, can be implemented with the same car sling parts. The purpose of the invention is also to achieve an advantageous arrangement for fitting elevator cars of different sizes to a car sling that varies in width. The car sling according to the invention is characterized by what is disclosed in the characterization part of claim 1.

Correspondingly, the arrangement of the invention is characterized by what is disclosed in the characterization part of claim 9. Other embodiments of the invention are characterized by what is disclosed in the other claims.

Some inventive embodiments are also discussed in the descriptive section of the present application. The inventive content of the application can also be defined differently than in the claims presented below. The inventive content may also consist of several separate inventions, especially if the invention is considered in the light of expressions or

implicit sub-tasks or from the point of view of advantages or categories of advantages achieved. In this case, some of the attributes contained in the claims below may be superfluous from the point of view of separate inventive concepts. Likewise the different details presented in connection with each embodiment of the invention can also be applied in other embodiments. In addition it can be stated that at least some of the subordinate claims can in at least some situations be deemed to be inventive in their own right .

In the following the car sling and the arrangement according to the invention are referred to jointly as the solution according to the invention. An advantage of the solution according to the invention is that the car sling can be a standard model and assembled from standard parts, but at the same time the width of the car sling can be adjusted, as a result of which it is easy to fit elevator cars of different sizes inside a car sling made with the same standard parts. As a result of this the car sling according to the invention is less expensive than conventional car slings that are made separately for each size of the cabin of the elevator car and as a result of the arrangement according to the invention also the whole elevator becomes less expensive than conventional elevators. Another advantage is that the car sling takes little space in the lateral direction and thus enables the use of a spacious elevator car. Another advantage is that an elevator car provided with a car sling according to the invention can be driven to an extremely low point in the shaft, in which case no wasted space is left at the bottom of the shaft. A further advantage is that the solution is simple and inexpensive to implement . The solution according to the invention also enables a through-type car. Preferably the car sling and the cabin of the elevator car can be manufactured separately from each other. Thus when installing the elevator car into position, the car sling is installed . into the elevator shaft and then the elevator car is installed in, or constructed in, the car sling, for being supported by the car sling. In this kind of construction, the car sling and the

cabin are separate components. This can be modified by making the car sling and the cabin such that they have common constructional element, or common constructional elements, e.g. the car sling can comprise a support platform that also functions as the floor of the cabin. Irrespective of whether the car sling structure and the cabin have common parts, it is at least in some cases advantageous to fix the cabin and the car sling to each other so that the rigidity of either or both increases. In this case rigidity is obtained either by one acting as a stiffener for the other, or as a result of separate fixing means providing stiffening, or from the combined effect of these.

In the following, the invention will be described in more detail by the aid of one of its embodiments with reference to the attached drawings, wherein

Fig. 1 presents an oblique side view of a car sling of an elevator, in which a car sling according to the invention is used,

Fig. 2 presents a side view of the upper support of the car sling incorporated in the car sling according to the invention, adjusted to its shortest extreme position, and Fig. 3 presents a side view of the upper support of the car sling incorporated in the car sling according to the invention, adjusted to its longest extreme position.

Fig. 1 presents an oblique side view of a car sling of a rucksack-type elevator, which is implemented according to the invention. The car sling 1 comprises two vertical supports 2, which are connected to each other slightly below their centre points with horizontal supports 3, and by their bottom parts also with a connector plate 4. In this embodiment the vertical supports 2 are made of e.g. steel plate by bending right- angled folds in the edges of the plate such that the profile of the vertical support is essentially U-shaped. This kind of

steel plate bent into a U-profile withstands vertical stress well and does not buckle easily. The horizontal supports 3 connecting the vertical supports 2 are e.g. steel profile rods or steel plate bent into a suitable cross-sectional shape and the connector plate 4 is e.g. normal steel plate. Enclosed diverting pulley packs 5 and 6, via which the hoisting roping of the elevator is arranged to pass, are fixed to the horizontal support 3. In addition, the guide wheels 7 of the guide rails are fixed ito the outer edges of the top ends of the vertical supports 2 and safety gears 8 to the outer edges of the bottom ends of the vertical supports 2. The vertical supports 2 are disposed near that wall of the shaft in the proximity of which, or fixed to which, are the guide rails of the elevator.

The horizontal upper supports 9, which are essentially at right angles to both the vertical supports 2 and the horizontal supports 3, are fixed to the top ends of the vertical supports 2. The upper supports 9 are oriented essentially horizontally outwards from the wall in the proximity of which, or fixed to which, are the guide rails of the elevator. The upper supports 9 comprise two different parts: a fixing part 10 and an adjustment part 11. The fixing parts 10 are made e.g. from steel plate and they are fixed to the top ends of the vertical supports 2 e.g. with a bolt fixing and they are connected to each other with transverse upper horizontal supports 12.

The adjustment parts 11 are made e.g. from steel plate or from steel profile and they are fixed to the inside edges of the fixing parts 10 such that the adjustment parts 11 are essentially horizontal extensions of the fixing parts 10. The adjustment part 11 contains a plurality of fixing holes 13, which are at regular intervals in two rows, one above the other, that are in the longitudinal direction with respect to the adjustment part 11. The first row of fixing holes 13 is in the top edge and the second in the bottom edge of the adjustment part 11. Both rows have the same amount of fixing

holes 13 as each other and the holes in the top row are in vertical alignment with the holes 13 in the bottom row. The first holes of the rows are near the first end of the adjustment part 11, from where the holes are at regular intervals up until approx. the middle of the adjustment part 11.

Likewise at least four fixing holes 14 elongated in the longitudinal direction of the fixing part 10 are made in both the top and bottom edges of the fixing part 10, which when fixing the adjustment part 11 to the fixing part 10 are fitted in alignment with some of the fixing holes 13 in the adjustment part 11 and the parts are fixed to each other at the fixing holes 13 and 14 by means the bolts 15 and nuts 16 functioning as fixing elements. Where the adjustment part 11 is fixed to the fixing part 10 at the fixing holes 13 of the adjustment part 11 is selected according to how long the upper support is desired to be. This in turn depends on the width of the elevator car to be fitted inside the car sling 1. The fixing holes 13 form a rough adjustment of the length of the upper support 9. Correspondingly the elongated fixing holes 14 of the fixing part 10 enable fine adjustment of the length of the upper support 9, because the adjustment part 11 can be moved in relation to the fixing part 10 before final tightening of the nuts 16 by permitting an adjustment clearance of the elongated fixing holes 14.

In addition also the top clamps 19 of the elevator car are fixed to the fixing part 10 with the same bolts 15 and nuts 16 as the adjustment part 11. The top clamp 19 is a steel plate bent into an L-shape in terms of its profile or a similar profile, which is fixed by one of its sides to the outer edge of the fixing part 10 and by another of its sides to the roof of the elevator car. The first bottom clamps 20 of the elevator car, which are arranged to support the elevator car at the bottom of the car, are fixed to the bottom ends of the vertical supports 2. Essentially vertical suspension arms 17, which are led beside the other side wall of the elevator car

to the bottom edge of the elevator car, are fixed to the other ends of the upper supports 9, i.e. to the second ends of the adjustment parts 11. The bottom ends of the suspension arms 17 contain the second bottom clamps 18 of the elevator car, which are arranged to support the elevator car at the opposite edge of the bottom of the car to the first bottom clamps 19. The suspension arms 17 are essentially thin in the width direction of the elevator car, i.e. in the longitudinal direction of the upper supports 9, in which case they take up as little lateral space in the shaft as possible.

Fig. 2 presents a side view of an upper support 9 of a car sling according to the invention. In the situation of the figure, the upper support 9 is adjusted almost to its shortest possible position, i.e. the adjustment part 11 is fixed to the fixing part 10 such that the elongated fixing holes 14 closest to the second end of the fixing part 10, i.e. the end on the right-hand side in the figure, are fitted in alignment with the fixing holes 13 of their adjustment part 11 that are farthest from the first end of the adjustment part 11. As mentioned in the descriptive part of Fig. 1, the adjustment parts 11 are fixed to the fixing parts 10 at the fixing holes 13 and 14 by means of the bolts 15 and the nuts 16 functioning as fixing elements.

Fig. 3 presents a side view of an upper support 9 of a car sling according to the invention in the manner of Fig. 2. In the situation of this figure, the upper support 9 is adjusted into its second extreme position, i.e. into its longest possible position. The adjustment part 11 is fixed to the fixing part 10 such that the elongated fixing holes 14 farthest from the second end of the fixing part 10 are fitted to be aligned with their fixing holes 13 of the adjustment part 11 that are closest to the first end of the adjustment part 11. The adjustment parts 11 are again fixed to the fixing parts by means of the bolts 15 and the nuts 16.

There are essentially many more consecutive round fixing holes 13 in the adjustment part 11 and in a longer area than the elongated fixing holes 14 in the fixing part 10. Thus some of the fixing holes 13 remain at the second end of the fixing part 10, i.e. outside the free end, when the upper support 9 is adjusted to other positions than its shortest position of all. This can be easily seen e.g. in Fig. 3.

In the arrangement according to the invention the elevator car, the width of width can be freely chosen, or the width of the elevator car can be selected from a number of different options, is fitted to the car sling 1. In this case the width of the car sling is adjusted in the aforementioned manner by changing the position of the adjustment parts (11) in relation to the fixing parts (10) according to the selected elevator car width. This enables flexible deliveries and an entirely new delivery system, which is efficient, fast and advantageous to the customer.

It is obvious to the person skilled in the art that the invention is not limited solely to the example described above, but that it may be varied within the scope of the claims presented below. Thus, for example, the car sling according to the invention can be used just as well in other kinds of elevators than in the rucksack-type elevator described above.

It is further obvious to the person skilled in the art that the length adjustment of the upper support according to the invention could have been implemented differently to what is described above. The length adjustment can be e.g. stepless and implemented by means of a groove/guide pair sliding in relation to each other. In this case the fixed groove is e.g. in the fixing part and correspondingly the moving guide is in the adjustment part, or the fixed guide is in the fixing part and correspondingly the moving groove is in the adjustment part. Locking in position can be implemented with tightening screws or similar.

It is further obvious to the person skilled in the art that the aforementioned groove/guide adjustment can also be stepped, in which case the correct length of the upper support at any particular time can easily be defined.

It is also obvious to the person skilled in the art that the length adjustment of the upper support could also have been implemented such that either the fixing part or preferably the adjustment part contains an elongated slot of the length of the whole adjustment interval and correspondingly the adjustment part or preferably the fixing part contains a plurality of fixing holes for the fixing bolts. In this case the adjustment of the length of the upper support can be stepless or stepped. The notches or marks corresponding to the steps can be made either in the slot or e.g. in the upper support or in the fixing part .