Lift enthusiasts

[Ferret]

That is too obvious though. An elevator charge is on the border of believable.

A keep fit tax! LOL! Oxygen masks at the ready at floor 4...oh hang on, the Mirror says we're gonna be charged for that!

 

[flymo]

Living in Hong Kong, lifts are endemic out here, it's a vertical city as well as horizontal. I've used more lifts in one week than I would do in probably 2 years in Britain. I do try to walk up when there is only a flight or 2 but more than that and it is the lift.

Escalators are another thing you could enthuse about, out here I guess. We have some of the bendy ones that curve as they rise or fall. See the attachment below to see what I mean

Now I will admit to bashing these on occasion, 5 minutes will clear the 4 escalators, 2 up and 2 down in Times Square. Ideal for wasting time whilst waiting for someone...

If you want to push the envelope a bit further then the mid-levels escalator system would take about 10-15 minutes to bash if you walk as well as ride.

Anyway back to lifts... One of the first ones I used as a kid was in the "Wengers" store near the bottom of Grainger Street in Newcastle. Like many old buildings of the day the lifts were installed in the stairwell meaning the stairs wound around the lift shaft. These were old metal cages and the doors were operated manually by a lift attendant. The lift cage had an internal set of doors and there was an external set on every floor. One of my first ambitions in life was to be a lift attendant as I thought it was the coolest job in the world.
Well when I was 5 or 6 I guess my expectations were different back then.

 

[red circle]

When I was little,Dad took me to work where I was allowed to wander about quite happily amoungst live front switchboards with knife switches and revving diesel gensets,he took me to check on the 'directors'lift and told me it was an Otis gearless machine,we first went into a small room containing an MG set,all open frame and singing away to itself,Dad explained it was a Ward-Leonard control system which meant nothing to me then.He then took me to the bottom of the lift shaft where to one side sat the most monstrous motor I had ever seen it must have been five feet in diameter and a comm of about two feet,this beast then started to move in almost complete silence to full speed of about twenty rpm then slowed to a smooth stop the only noise came from the brushgear and the ropes in the pulley sheaves.I was'nt allowed right into the well due to the danger of the 'silent killer'(counterweight).Now that was a proper lift.

 

[Blindtraveler]

ok for you lift bashe$, the nethybridge hotel near avymore in the highlands stil has manual gates

 

[SouthEastern-465]

I've heard of shipping container enthusiasts, now lift enthusiasts, what next car wash fanatics, sheesh I never knew levels of saddery could sink that low.

Alarm clock enthousiast ?

I am actually happy in a way if this 'lift' enthusiast thing kicks off, people will give the image of the spotter and anarak and 1980s NHS glasses look to them, and there bloody welcome to it! I am just expecting to be in a shopping centre and a bunch of people in anaraks and 80s NHS glasses writing down the number of each stair...

Any hobby that anyone mentions to me now is really not going to suprise me, I am now expecting people who spot electric doors and fence posts.

 

[Yew]

I always liked tha Half height Escalator in harrods, where you went further forwards that up.

 

[theblackwatch]

Does anyone else who has been to Portugal remember the ancient lift in the Hotel Peninsular in Porto (a regular staying place for cranks). It was allegedly the oldest working lift in Porto, although I gather it has now been replaced. There used to be a video of it on Youtube but unfortunately I cannot find it now.

 

[43021HST]

It really isn't.

It really is.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

Does anyone else who has been to Portugal remember the ancient lift in the Hotel Peninsular in Porto (a regular staying place for cranks). It was allegedly the oldest working lift in Porto, although I gather it has now been replaced. There used to be a video of it on Youtube but unfortunately I cannot find it now.

Thats just sad

 

[class156]

The Crystal Palace Wetherspoons near Glasgow Central has gated lifts inside it, never been in it but i'm sure it would be interesting to "Lift Enthusiasts"

 

[43021HST]

I am actually happy in a way if this 'lift' enthusiast thing kicks off, people will give the image of the spotter and anarak and 1980s NHS glasses look to them, and there bloody welcome to it! I am just expecting to be in a shopping centre and a bunch of people in anaraks and 80s NHS glasses writing down the number of each stair...

Any hobby that anyone mentions to me now is really not going to suprise me, I am now expecting people who spot electric doors and fence posts.

Oooh yeah 24 hour lift veg at Festival Place Shopping Centre, where they will be a running an antique lifts gala, You cant beat the hum and rattle of those quality british lifts from the 70s, my lordzz flail.
Cant beat a bit of Otis lift thrash.

 

[Zoe]

Does anyone know of any elevators where the doors close immediately when you press the floor you want rather than having a separate door close button or even no way of closing the doors? As I said earlier, I remmeber almost every elevator doing that but most have been changed in the last ten years and I can't think of many at all the still do this.

 

[Mojo]

Does anyone know of any elevators where the doors close immediately when you press the floor you want rather than having a separate door close button or even no way of closing the doors? As I said earlier, I remmeber almost every elevator doing that but most have been changed in the last ten years and I can't think of many at all the still do this.

In my experience most lifts don't have a door close button and the doors do close as soon as you press the button. Odd incident at work this morning, the doors were closing and someone jumped in at the last moment :roll: and we were there with the doors open for about 30 seconds until someone pressed a button and they then closed.

 

[Blindtraveler]

Meanwhile the exact opposite happened to me - my place of work is a 45 year old hospital building in Edinburgh and although the lifts have been refurbished and have had almost every possible bit replaced over the years the cars are stil the origionals and have a nasty habbit of not opening at your desired floor, resulting in much use of the hold door open button to get them moving at all and this afternoon a new record of 5 minutes trying to get out of the lift was set by me and a coleeg!

 

[Crossover]

We're very sorry to inform you that due to rising costs, First Capital Connect must add 60p to the price of your ticket due to the electricity required to power the lighting. If you would like to open the windows, this leads to drag, so we must charge you a further fifty pence for adding the fuel bill to our train.
It doesn't bother us that people urinate on our services, throw rubbish, put gum on the seats, peel the stickers off the windows, abuse the ticket collectors, hold the doors, put their feet on the seats, leave papers on the table, spew all over your feet whilst in a drunken state and then stab you in the heart for complaining, but here at First Capital Disconnect, we've got to make ends meet.

Apologies for the rant!

Have to say this is brilliant!

I was going to write Crapital, but I didn't want to get punished by the moderators. I've had enough posts deleted as it is!

Anyway, time for the legendary Crapital Disconnect ticket office video...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WaKB_y_UfdU

If you haven't seen this, you have to!

Also pretty good - is it just me or does it actually sound exactly like something you would hear as an automated station annoucement too!

In my experience most lifts don't have a door close button and the doors do close as soon as you press the button. Odd incident at work this morning, the doors were closing and someone jumped in at the last moment :roll: and we were there with the doors open for about 30 seconds until someone pressed a button and they then closed.

Not an "enthusiast" but as with everything, interested in how stuff works (hence my interest in the railways too, though perhaps moreso)

Most lifts don't tend to be too bad, although I was doing some work at the hotel of the company I did my placement with, upgrading some of the computer/network equipment...reception and offices on the ground floor and server room on the very top floor...cue many trips in the lift that day! Those didn't shut when you pressed the button and I quickly developed the knack of hitting "3" (or "0" for ground) quickly followed by ">|<" to prevent wasting a load of time for the ruddy things to shut!
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
As for enthusiasts, I have heard of lorry spotters, getting every type of lorry (one was on a gameshow or something once (like a Jim'll fix it type thing, although I'm too young to remember Jim'll fix it!) and the result was that an apparently rare lorry turned up outside her house.

Carrying on from which (and many of you will remember this from the TV series recently) is Eddie spotters who go to spot each and every Stobart lorry. One of my friends has worked previously at a Tesco distribution place and said that Eddie spotters used to be out and about around their place!

Personally, I don't find it particularly odd as such, everyone to their own at the end of day. At the end of the day, its just another thing that goes against the "norm", if there can ever be a norm, that is.

 

[deltic1989]

My work mates call me weird for liking trains. but lifts? really? ah well each to thier own.

 

[Crossover]

My work mates call me weird for liking trains. but lifts? really? ah well each to thier own.

I'm not a lift enthusiast personally. Its strange, of people who know I have an interest in rail, some people think I'm a bit weird, others don't seem too bothered.

 

[HST Power]

Also pretty good - is it just me or does it actually sound exactly like something you would hear as an automated station annoucement too!

I wouldn't be suprised somehow!

 

[starrymarkb]

bog

Bog enthusiasts exist too!
http://www.youtube.com/user/ramdomness453

Then there are Pylon Enthusiasts, Road Enthusiasts etc

 

[HST Power]

Bog enthusiasts exist too!
http://www.youtube.com/user/ramdomness453

I can understand road enthusiasts and just about pylon enthusiasts, as for the latter...

hock:

 

[ChrisCooper]

Bog enthusiasts exist too!
http://www.youtube.com/user/ramdomness453

Then there are Pylon Enthusiasts, Road Enthusiasts etc

I hope you're talking about 101s!


I think nearly everyone has at least one strange hobby. Even those with mainstream hobbies (like sports) tend to have some "weird" hobbies too or are obsessive about their mainstream hobby to the point it becomes weird. I actually can't think of a single person who isn't a bit of a geek in one way or another. I mean I find it hard to be embarassed as a transport enthusiast when dealing with someone who is so obsessed with their favourite team that they can spout all sorts of random crap about them, buys almost anything possible related to them, goes to every game they can get to etc.

 

[starrymarkb]

I hope you're talking about 101s!

Well at least that one has no Logs to go with his Bogs. The reason I know of the bog enthusiasts was when a video appeared in my recommendations on youtube (apparently an HST passing didcot was the basis for the recommendation - if you liked that you'll like this!) of someone demonstrating a desiro bog, but rather then just flushing, they'd curled off an enormous turd to demonstrate the flush action...

 

[Hydro]

rather then just flushing, they'd curled off an enormous turd to demonstrate the flush action...

If you're going to test something, make it a real test.

 

[Blindtraveler]

I did, and my test failed! Appologies to to fellow passengers!

Seriusly though, if you search the internet long enough theres an enthusiasts forum for pritty much anything although admittedly failed to find one relating to bogs. Wonder what a bog uk forum would talk about? 'check out the new auto flush m and s have installed', maybe a gen list on public convenience refurbishment and maybe even a topic on favourite air freshners.

To drift slightly back to topic, bogs and lifts sadly are to often one and the same

 

[Hydro]

To drift slightly back to topic, bogs and lifts sadly are to often one and the same

I know, I went for a pony the other day and ended up being hoisted through the roof. Boy, was my face red.

 

[43021HST]

To drift slightly back to topic, bogs and lifts sadly are to often one and the same

Much like railways, the same old boring procession of MUs, MUs and more of the buggers. Preservation has a much more interesting flavour then again a lot of the railways just seem to run the same old BR standard kettles.

 

[HugePilchard]

My most interesting lift experience (there's some words that I never, ever thought I'd use) was a lift in a Bulgarian hotel. The outside doors were ... well, just doors really. Normal style doors that you had to pull to open. The car doors were non-existent, so you just saw the wall of the lift shaft rushing past as you went!

 

[jon0844]

Maybe in your opinion but it's more believable than an Oxygen charge. If someone has said 30 years ago that it was a possiblity that cars could be tracked by sattelite and charged by the mile then I doubt many would believe them.

There will never be a lift charge, so it may be more believable than an oxygen tax (0% chance) but that means nothing. Remember when you said cars will drive by themselves within ten years? Well, guess what, they'll need to use GPS (or similar) to work.

Of course, you can put driverless cars running in 2021 in the same box of not-going-to-happen-anytime-soon predictions as an oxygen tax and lift charges!

 

[43021HST]

My most interesting lift experience (there's some words that I never, ever thought I'd use) was a lift in a Bulgarian hotel. The outside doors were ... well, just doors really. Normal style doors that you had to pull to open. The car doors were non-existent, so you just saw the wall of the lift shaft rushing past as you went!

I would LOOOve to bash that lift, I bet you thankful when you reached your floor

 

[justinsteam]

This thread is such a leg pull!

 

[jon0844]

When we were in our old office, the lift was given a refresh with new carpet, wall panels and ceiling lights. It also got a display and a voice announcement. I wonder if people tour the country to see lifts that are refurbished?

Also, I am thankful that Bombardier don't make lifts. Given their track record with doors being able to open and close, I think they'd really struggle!