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In a tall building, the lifts decide how the building feels to live or work in. Too few cars, the wrong speed or poor dispatch means long queues at 9am, frustrated tenants and complaints to the building manager.
Hub Elevator designs and installs high-rise lift systems across Pakistan for residential towers, office blocks, hotels and hospitals, from the traffic calculation through to commissioning and annual maintenance.
A gearless machine drives the sheave directly, with no gearbox. It delivers higher speeds, a smoother and quieter ride, lower energy use and less wear. For most towers above about fifteen storeys it is the right choice, and it has the lowest running cost over the life of the building.
A geared machine drives the sheave through a gearbox. It suits mid-rise buildings at moderate speeds and can be economical where speed requirements are modest. For taller towers, gearless is normally the better long-term investment.
An MRL lift places a compact permanent-magnet machine inside the shaft, so no machine room is needed on the roof. It saves space and construction cost, and suits mid-rise buildings where rooftop space or height limits matter.
Hydraulic lifts are pushed up by a piston. They work well for low-rise buildings of up to about five or six floors, but their speed and travel height are limited, and they use more energy per trip. For a high-rise, a traction lift is the correct engineering choice. See our guide to elevator types for the full comparison.
The number of lifts, their capacity and speed should come from a traffic calculation, not guesswork. We model peak demand for your building, then specify how many cars you need and how they work together. Group control shares calls across a bank of lifts so passengers wait less. For very tall office buildings, destination dispatch can raise throughput further.
An old lift in a tall building does not always need replacing. New controllers and drives can bring reliability and ride quality up to current standards while keeping the car, shaft and structure. See how we did this at SMK Apartments, a 32-storey residential tower, alongside six new high-speed lifts.
| Building height | Recommended drive | Typical speed |
|---|---|---|
| Up to about 6 floors | Hydraulic or MRL | 0.4 to 1.0 m/s |
| 6 to 15 floors | MRL or geared traction | 1.0 to 1.75 m/s |
| 15 to 30 floors | Gearless traction | 2.5 to 4.0 m/s |
| 30 floors and above | Gearless traction, high-speed | 4.0 m/s and above |
Guidance only. Final drive, speed and number of cars are set by a traffic calculation for your building.
For towers above about fifteen storeys, gearless traction lifts are the standard choice. They are faster, smoother, quieter and cheaper to run than geared machines. Machine room-less traction suits mid-rise buildings, and hydraulic lifts are limited to low-rise buildings of around five or six floors.
It depends on the number of occupants, the building use and peak traffic, not height alone. The correct number, capacity and speed of lifts comes from a traffic calculation, which Hub Elevator carries out as part of every high-rise proposal.
Speed rises with building height. Mid-rise buildings typically use 1.0 to 1.75 metres per second, while towers of fifteen floors and above usually need 2.5 metres per second or more. We specify speed from the travel height and traffic requirement.
Every high-rise lift should have an automatic rescue device that brings the car to the nearest floor and opens the doors on power failure. For critical buildings, lifts can also be connected to standby generator supply so service continues.
Often, yes. Replacing controllers and drives while keeping the car, shaft and structure can restore reliability and ride quality at a fraction of the cost of full replacement, as at SMK Apartments.
Yes. We offer annual maintenance contracts for high-rise lift systems, with scheduled servicing and breakdown response, from offices in Karachi and Lahore with service coverage across Islamabad and Rawalpindi.
Send us the number of floors, building use and expected occupancy. Our engineers will run the traffic calculation and propose the right number, size and speed of lifts.
Site surveys across Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad and Rawalpindi. Part of Haji Hameed Engineers and Suppliers, in the industry since 1970.
Our primary firm name is Haji Hameed engineers and suppliers, and we have been providing services in the industry since 1970 as well as being manufacturers, importers, and merchants.
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