Traction drive

In a traction lift the cabin is suspended from hauling ropes. The drum drive lift is a very rare special form of traction lift in which the hauling ropes are wound around a drum.

Today most lifts are traction lifts in which one end of the hauling ropes is attached to the cabin and the other end to a counterweight. The hauling ropes is led over the moving traction wheel. 

For traction lifts, the types of drives used are either combinations of an electric motor and gears (from 0.1 m/s to 2.5 m/s) or lift drives (from 0.63 m/s to more than 10 m/s) without gears.

For reasons of energy economy and comfort the electric motors (synchronous or asynchronous) are today driven by a frequency inverter.  

In the case of lifts that only perform a few journeys per day and where comfort is unimportant, traction drives with pole changer motors are also used. Due to the requirements in the current EN81-1 regarding stop precision, this type of drive is no longer used in new buildings or when modernising.

In the past, large carrying capacity could only be achieved by using regulated DC motors. When a motor of this type has to be modernised and it is not possible to replace a DC drive, the drive can be fitted with a regulated DC chopper controller.