Extending the useful life of elevators through appropriate maintenance strategies

The useful life of elevators is typically considered to be 20-25 years. However, there is no empirical evidence to support this recommendation. In practice, elevators may take a useful life that is a few years longer. This research statistically analyzed the 25,548 breakdowns attributed to 5400 elevators in Hong Kong. The results indicated that the useful life of elevators is 30 years under the notion of the bathtub curve. Furthermore, Pareto analysis revealed that faults in the controller, car door mechanism, landing door mechanism, and other equipment in the car cage are the four leading causes of breakdowns. The research also uncovered "faults in the controller" as the trigger which onsets the wear-out phase. Subsequently, enhanced risk-based maintenance of the controller would probably increase the useful life of elevators to 35 years.