GB888693A - Improvements in or relating to storage lifts for vehicles - Google Patents

Abstract

888,693. Mechanical garages. O'SULLIVAN, E. Feb. 14, 1958 [Nov. 14, 1956], No. 34861/56. Class 78 (4). A frame sufficiently strong to support a whole column of vehicle-carrying cages surrounds each cage of a vertically-circulating system in a mechanical garage, the frames being substantially in the lateral centre-planes of the cages. As shown, the load-carrying frame comprises members 45, 48, 51 (Fig. 3), and when a number of cages are arranged in vertical columns 11, 12 (Fig. 1), the members 48, 51 of adjacent cages are in contact. The columns of cages are raised and lowered by hydraulic rams 14 which engage the lowest members 51, and the top and bottom cages are transferred from one column to the other by trolleys 15, 16, which may be electrically operated. The cages may be circulated from the position shown by first raising column 11 until the top cage engages a device on the trolley 15 to cause depending claws 60 to engage under its tubular members 47, Fig. 3. The column is then slightly lowered so that the top cage is clear of the rest, which are supported on pivoted ratchet frames 70a, 70b (Fig. 5), which ride over the cages during their upward travel, but are urged to engage beneath the cages by springs 89. The frames can be disengaged to allow a column to be lowered by first raising the column clear of the frame and then energizing a solenoid 88. The initial raising movement also disengages the claws 60 of trolley 15 and allows a complete column to be lowered until the next to bottom cage engages the ratchet frame 70a, or 70b (the solenoid having been de-energized), the lowest cage then descending slightly on to the trolley 16. In this way the cages can be circulated in either direction, and the movements are preferably automatically controlled so that the pressing of a button causes a selected cage to be brought to the bottom of column 11 by the shortest route. The cars may be driven into and out of the cages, but are preferably loaded by a trolley 35 which pushes a wheeled platform 31, carrying the car, into the cage. A platform 31 is provided for each cage. Such loading apparatus is described in Specification 863,025. According to the Provisional Specification the ratchet frames 70a, 70b may engage the cages through rollers, and each cage may be independently supported. Specification 693,170 also is referred to.