Got called out for a stuck car in a 12-story office building downtown

It was a Friday afternoon and the main elevator just stopped between floors 7 and 8. I got the call at 3 PM. When I got there, the building manager was freaking out because three people were stuck inside. I opened the hoistway door and saw the problem right away: a worn-out roller guide had jumped the track. I had to manually lower the car to the nearest landing, which took about an hour. Everyone was fine, just a little shaken up. Has anyone else had a guide jump track on a newer Otis Gen2? What's your go-to fix to get it back on fast?

3 comments

3 Comments

murray.betty10d ago

Manually lowering a car from between floors sounds insane to me. You just had them all stand at the back while you worked the brake? That's a lot of trust in your manual skills. I've seen a guide jump once on a Gen2, but it was a bad install from the start. Did you have to replace the whole roller assembly after or just reset it?

robin_schmidt579d ago

We had a Gen2 roller jump at the old courthouse last year. I found the best fix was to use a pry bar and a come-along to gently walk it back onto the track. It saved us from a full assembly replacement that time.

the_abby2d ago

Glad you got it back on track without a full replacement. Murray.betty is right, that's a lot of trust in your hands when things go wrong. Those Gen2s can be tricky.