Change for the Better

In this Readers’ Platform, your author talks about how safer pit ladders are coming due to 2022 A17.1-B44 code.

by Margaret Lourenço

The ASME A17.1-2022/CSA B44:22 Safety Code for Elevators and Escalators will take effect in various auto-adopt jurisdictions and for federal government jobs starting this month (March 2024) and then rolling out across the U.S. and Canada over the next few years. Some of the biggest improvements to safety are the new requirements for elevator pit ladders. A broad coalition of elevator industry personnel worked together over many years to get these changes adopted because there had been too many injuries — and even fatalities — occurring when personnel were on pit ladders. Everyone who needs to enter the elevator pit will be safer because of their work.

What are these new requirements? Firstly, every nonretractable elevator pit ladder installed will need to have a ladder electrical device: a safety switch that stops the elevator from running when someone is detected on the ladder. It will act similarly to the pit stop switch. Retractable ladders already have a switch that activates when the ladder is extended. For the new requirement for nonretractable ladders, the switch can be actuated by weight, movement or removal of a guard, or by “other detection means.” The last option was purposefully left broad to allow for innovation. It could include such things as light beams, pressure sensors on each rung, etc. 

How will this work? Essentially, personnel entering the pit should still perform the safety procedures outlined in the Elevator Field Employees’ Safety Handbook, including activating the stop switch. Then, with a nonretractable pit ladder equipped with a safety switch, they will automatically have added protection from being hit by the moving car when they are on the ladder and, depending on the switch chosen by the ladder manufacturer/elevator company, perhaps even when they are in the pit.  

The second code change impacting pit ladders is the required rung width. All pit ladders will need to have 16-in. wide rungs. Before the 2022 edition, the A17.1/B44 code prescribed 16-in. wide rungs, but allowed the rungs to be reduced to as little as 9-in. wide if there were obstacles in the way. That’s a small rung, and we’re not an industry known for small feet, especially when wearing our steel-toed footwear!   

But elevator pits are crowded places. How would there suddenly be room for 16-in. wide rungs if there wasn’t room before? The tradeoff is in the required 4 ½-in. clearance on either side of the ladder risers — essentially the space on either side of the ladder that allows you to hold the ladder’s sides instead of the rungs as you climb up and down the ladder. Previously, the code allowed you to reduce the rung size to maintain the 4 ½-in. side clearance. The 2022 code keeps the rungs at 16 in., but allows the side clearance to be reduced. In that case, the ladder needs to have rungs that extend the full height of the ladder including the 48 in. above the sill where currently no horizontal handholds are required — only the vertical risers. The result should be ladders that are safer and easier to climb. 

These changes are not highly technical, are not “Internet of Things”-level innovation, but they will disrupt elevator contractors installing new construction who will suddenly realize they need a switched ladder, probably only days before inspection is scheduled. For one thing, at present, most nonretractable pit ladders are not even supplied by the elevator company. They are often procured by the general contractor or made by miscellaneous metals contractors. It is often a “by others” item in elevator bids. That will likely change, since any switched elevator ladder becomes an integral part of the safety circuit and something that is of critical importance to the elevator contractor and its personnel. Old timers will remember that the phones in elevators used to be supplied by others, but as they became more integrated into the car operating panel and the electronics, they are now always provided by the elevator companies. The same thing will likely happen with pit ladders.

Smart Elevator Tech, LLC, the provider of the Retracta Ladder® and an innovator in pit ladders since its inception in 2010, will be offering two new pit ladder solutions for the 2022 code requirements: The SmartLadder™ and the SmartGate Ladder™. The market-leading Retracta Ladder and its variants — the Extended Retracta Ladder® and the Powered Retracta Ladder® — already meet the 2022 code requirements. Some elevator companies so highly prioritize the safety of their personnel that they are planning to install these ladders even though their jurisdiction does not yet require them. Smart Elevator Tech is proud to partner with companies and an industry that value safety to that degree.