How do elevators really work? If you want to understand how they work, you will get frustrated as their working parts are typically covered up. From someone who is travelling from the ground floor to the 24th floor, the elevator is simply a box made up of metal with doors that close when prompted to. If you are really curious what the key parts of the elevator are, here they are:
- At least one car of metal boxes that goes up and down.
- Counterweights which balances the cars.
- An electric motor that lifts the cars up and then down including a braking system.
- A system of pulleys as well as strong metal cables which runs between the motors and the cars.
- There are also various safety systems that protect the passengers if ever the cable breaks.
- In big buildings, there is an electronic control system which directs the metal boxes or cars to the right floors with the use of an “elevator algorithm” (this is a modernized kind of mathematical logic) in order to ensure that several numbers of people are being moved up and down the quickest and most efficient way. These intelligent systems are being programmed to transmit many people upwards compared to downwards during the beginning of the day and then it reverses its system at the end of the day.
From a scientific standpoint, elevators are about the use of energy. In order to get yourself from the ground floor to the 24th floor by walking upstairs, you will have to move your body’s weight against the force of gravity that pulls you downward. The energy that you use in this process is converted into potential energy. That is the reason why climbing stairs will increase your potential energy and decrease the same energy when you move downward. This illustration is an example of the law of conservation of energy. You will really have more potential energy when you are already at the top of the building compared when you are at the bottom although you will not feel the surge of energy when you are up there.
For scientists, the elevator is a device which contributes to the increase or decrease of someone’s potential energy without the person having to supply the energy. The elevator will be the one to give you potential energy when you go up and take it away from you when you go down. In theory, this is very simple but when put into actual action, it can be complicated. If the elevator had a simple lift with a cage that passes over a pulley, it will use great amounts of energy when lifting people but it will have a problem of getting the energy expended back.