Many of our customers will know about the legislation changes that came into effect 1st September 2017 regarding the manufacture and installation of new lifts. In preparation for this, Temple Lifts took great care to ensure that products relating to the manufacture of new lifts on our behalf were fully compliant with the new lift standard EN 81-20. Well in advance of the 1st September 2017 compliance date we also applied the requirements as laid out in EN 81-50, to our work as this standard allies to all lifts that we install, design and supply.
These new standards have replaced EN 81-1 and EN 81-2 and were released for the design and manufacture of lifts. The EN 81-20 particularly focuses on the technical specifications needed for the manufacture of lifts, while the EN 81-50 standard defines the design rules, calculations and tests of the lift components.
For lifts, the major changes with EN 81-20 and EN 81-50 contain a number of increased safety requirements for passengers and service personnel, which are:
- Improved strength and durability of car walls, car roof, car door and landing doors.
- Safety glass for mirrors.
- Brighter shaft illumination.
- Wider emergency exit in the car roof.
- Larger permanent safety spaces in hoistway headroom and pit.
- Required security against the risk of an ascending lift car overspeeding.
- Improved authorisation of light curtain to avoid smaller object being trapped.
- Improved floor levelling at each landing.