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Are Home Elevators Safe?
While malfunctions are possible, professionally installed residential elevators follow strict safety codes and often include additional safety features that make them reliable for daily use.
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At a glance:
- Additional safety features, like high weight limits, automatic braking, backup power, and safety sensors, all play a role in improving elevator safety.
- Modern home elevators require professional measurements, installation, and routine maintenance to function safely.
- If your home elevator causes an injury, you may have grounds for a product liability claim, as elevator manufacturers are legally required to design, build, and market products to strict safety standards.
Understanding Home Elevator Risks
Before we dive into how you can make your home elevator safer, it’s important to note common safety concerns. After all, elevators are complex machines that may or may not feature electrical components, powered doors, an elevator shaft (hoistway), or a dedicated machine room; all of which can experience malfunctions.
When malfunctions do occur, including sudden stops, door failures, electrical issues, misleveling, or mechanical breakdowns, they can increase the risk of injury for anyone using the elevator. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) also notes that among recalls, young children and seniors are at a higher risk of entrapment.
Examples of reported injuries are:
- Burns and wounds
- Crushing
- Traumatic brain injury
- Organ damage
- Nerve damage
- Broken or fractured bones
Overall, home elevators pose a risk of severe injury when they malfunction, with consequences that can alter a person’s life forever. High medical bills and long recovery are one thing, but paralysis or even death are a huge price to pay for unreliable models or installation.
How to Minimize Elevator Safety Risks
There are several ways to improve the safety of your home lift that we’ll expand on in more detail below, but to start, here are some proactive steps you should take to ensure elevator safety:
- Work with a reliable elevator company: The elevator model, as well as its installation and maintenance, are only as safe and effective as the company that makes it. Most elevator companies cover every step of the process, so you should always research their reliability before you invest.
- Test elevator doors: To prevent entrapment or falls, regularly check that the landing door (also called the hoistway door) and the elevator car door open and close smoothly, lock properly, and leave no gaps.
- Consider additional safety features: Additions like automatic braking, backup power, and safety sensors, which we’ll dive into below, all improve elevator safety.
- Keep the elevator cab and hoistway clear: Carefully remove stored items, debris, and anything else that could interfere with door tracks, wiring, or mechanical components.
- Respond promptly to changes: Don’t ignore vibrations, shaking, slow responses, or odd sounds, as they can all signal malfunctions that the elevator company should address.
The Importance of Choosing The Best Home Elevator Model
There are different types of home elevators, with the four primary models being traction, hydraulic, pneumatic, and shaftless. Each type lifts the elevator cab in different ways, and can feature either a dedicated machine room (MR) or machine room-less (MRL) design.
For seniors with limited mobility, choosing the best home elevator model is essential for safety. After all, every building has its own unique layout and number of floors, and every senior has unique mobility needs and weight requirements. Therefore, installing the right elevator reduces the risk of hazardous malfunctions.
Luckily, we’ve outlined some of the differences, so you can make the best choice for your home:
| Elevator type | Description | Common Safety Features |
|---|---|---|
| Geared traction | Durable and good for homes with multiple stories. | Emergency brake system, overspeed governor, interlocked landing doors, door sensors, and backup lowering system. |
| Gearless traction | Quiet, low-maintenance operation for homes with several stories. | Automatic braking, soft start/stop, emergency battery lowering, interlocks on elevator car and landing doors, and overload protection. |
| Roped hydraulic | Higher travel distance compared to other hydraulic models, with a higher weight capacity than traction models. | Pressure monitoring system, emergency manual lowering, non-slip cab flooring, door interlocks, and overspeed protection. |
| Holed hydraulic | Cost-effective functionality with a travel distance up to 60 ft. | Rupture valve, pressure relief, emergency lowering, car-to-landing door interlocks, door sensors. |
| Holeless hydraulic | Compact system for homes that cannot accommodate a deep pit or drilled shaft. | Emergency alarms, landing door sensors, manual lowering system, overspeed safety, and car door interlocks. |
| Pneumatic (vacuum) | Minimal construction requirements with limited travel distance (up to 50 ft). | Automatic braking, air pressure safety system, emergency descent, door locks, and obstruction detection. |
| Shaftless | Minimal renovation and space requirements, but can only travel between two floors. | Interlocked landing doors, pressure sensors, emergency stop, non-slip platform, and smooth start/stop. |
Improving Home Elevator Safety With Additional Safety Features
As mentioned in our chart, different elevator models offer unique optional safety features. These features can increase upfront costs, but play a key role in preventing serious injury. Some additional features you should consider for peace of mind include:
- Safety sensors: modern elevators can have safety sensors installed on the elevator car, frame, or landing doors to detect obstructions, misalignment, or hoistway interference. When triggered, the sensor initiates an immediate stop that helps prevent crushing, entrapment, or impact injuries.
- Automatic braking systems: Typically connected to the sensor system, built-in automatic braking engages when overspeed, mechanical failure, or unexpected movement is detected. This added layer of protection helps prevent free-fall or sudden drops.
- Battery backups: If power outages are common where you live, battery backups can safely return the elevator car to the nearest landing, preventing entrapment during outages.
- Emergency stop buttons: These buttons allow users to immediately halt the elevator and signal for help from inside the car when needed.
- Interlocked landing doors: Prevent falls into the hoistway by installing mechanically or electrically interlocked landing doors that cannot open unless the elevator car door is properly aligned and present.
- Overload protection: Built-in weight sensors prevent the elevator from operating when the load exceeds its safe capacity, reducing strain on the system and preventing breakdowns.
- Soft-start and stop technology: A small feature that helps prevent jerky movements; something that can cause seniors with limited mobility to fall.
- Diagnostic error displays: Some traction and hydraulic elevator systems include onboard diagnostic indicators that alert you or your elevator company to mechanical issues, low fluid levels, sensor failures, or other problems requiring maintenance.
Modern Home Elevators Require Expert Installation and Maintenance
Often, the most important aspect of improving elevator safety for senior homeowners is to invest in professional installation and maintenance. While DIY attempts or choosing a cheap manufacturer might seem to save money in the short term, it’s never worth the risk.
Fortunately, reliable elevator companies like Lifeway Mobility, Arrow Lift, Stannah, Harmar, and Mobility123 all offer these services.
Installation
Professional technicians carefully analyze your home’s layout and take precise measurements before installation even begins. This then allows them to carefully modify your home to install a system that operates smoothly, safely, and within its design limits. Many companies also include warranties, giving homeowners peace of mind that their investment meets all safety and operational standards.
Important tasks installers tackle include:
- Securing hoistway doors and elevator car doors properly
- Calibrating weight limits and confirming that automatic braking is functional
- Testing all safety sensors and other features for proper operation
- Connecting and verifying a reliable power supply
Maintenance
Regular maintenance, at least once a year, is a key part of keeping a home elevator safe and operational long-term. Simple, routine tasks help prevent minor issues from escalating into serious safety hazards. Plus, many elevator companies offer professional maintenance services, such as:
- Cleaning the machine room and mechanical components.
- Testing safety sensors, automatic braking, battery backups, and other features.
- Ensuring landing doors and elevator car doors are aligned and functioning properly.
- Monitoring the hydraulic pump, pistons, and fluid levels of hydraulic elevators.
- Checking the cables, motor, and counterweights of traction systems.
What To Do If Your Residential Elevator Causes Injury
If your home elevator causes an injury, whether minor or life-threatening, you can often seek reimbursement for the damage. Personal injury lawsuits against the elevator manufacturer or the company you purchased the model from are the most common method.
Filing a Product Liability Lawsuit
Because elevator manufacturers are held to certain safety standards, most state laws allow you to file a lawsuit when manufacturing defects, design errors, or misleading instructions/advertising impact users. After all, defective elevators that get past inspection and out to the public pose a major public safety risk.
These specific lawsuits are called product liability claims, and allow you to sue the manufacturer for:
- Failure to warn about risks or defects that can impact someone’s safety while using the elevator.
- Design defects, such as flaws in the elevator’s design that make it inherently dangerous or unsafe.
- Manufacturing defects that occur during production compromise safety.
However, please note that you typically have two years to file a product liability lawsuit. Because these processes can take time, you should address the issue sooner, rather than later.
Our Takeaway: Home Elevators Are Safe When Properly Installed
Home elevators are generally safe to use when purchased from a reliable company, installed correctly, and maintained regularly. Additional safety features can also contribute to improved safety overall.
Though they’re more complex and more likely to result in injury, at least compared to stair lifts, most home elevators should be considered only by seniors with severe mobility issues or homes with several floors.
Frequently Asked Questions About Home Elevator Safety
Most home elevators have 0–2 breakdowns per year, but with additional safety features like safety sensors, automatic stops, and battery backups, they’re generally reliable.
The most effective ways to make your home elevator safer are to:
– Choose the right model based on your mobility issues, weight capacity, home layout, and required travel distance.
– Add additional safety features based on your unique concerns and needs.
– Invest in proper installation, proactive maintenance, and repairs.
Yes and no. Some additional safety features can add to the overall cost, but the type of elevator you need, whether it needs a machine room, and other design elements play a bigger role in determining the final price.
No type of elevator is definitively the “safest.” Instead, the best home elevators are professionally installed and include several safety features. Ultimately, most models from reputable elevator companies are a strong choice.
The main risks of using a home elevator are falls, injuries, and entrapments caused by malfunctions or obstructions. Having the right model properly installed and maintained greatly reduces these risks.
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