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Taipei (pte019/17.12.2004/11:00) - A pair of high-speed lifts in Taiwan have been officially recognised as the world's fastest. As the BBC http://www.bbc.co.uk reports, the lifts in the TFC 101 Tower in Taipei, Taiwan, take only 30 seconds to take passengers to the top. The "Guinness Book of Records" has declared the 17m per second speed of the two lifts the fastest on earth. At 508m, The TFC Tower is also now officially the world's tallest skyscraper - more than 50 metres taller than the Petronas Tower in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, which was formerly the world's tallest. The lifts also feature the world's first pressure control system to prevent passengers' ears popping as they ascend and descend at high speed.
The TFC Tower consists of 61 lifts, 34 of which are double-deckers, and 50 escalators to transport people around its 106 floors. The high-speed lifts can take up to 24 passengers up 382 metres to the tip of the tower in around 30 seconds. Their 17m per second top speed roughly translates to 37 mph, or 60km/h. Strangely enough, the lifts take much longer to descend - almost a minute to return to the ground level from the top of the tower.
The world's fastest lifts contain various key new technologies, including a pressure control system, which adjusts the atmospheric pressure inside a car by using suction and discharge blowers, preventing ears from popping. An active control system has also been installed, which tries to balance the lift more finely and remove the sources of vibrations. Furthermore, there are streamlined cars to reduce the whistling noise produces by running the lifts at a high speed inside a narrow shaft.
"The certification of our elevators as world record-holders by the authoritative Guinness World Records is a great honour for us," said Masayuki Shimono, president of manufacturer Toshiba Elevator and Building Systems http://www2.toshiba-elevator.co.jp/elv/infoeng/index.jsp , who installed the lifts. The first record for the world's fastest passenger lifts was published in the first edition of the Guinness Book of Records in 1995. "As such, it is an interesting indicator of how technology has advanced in the fifty years since that first edition, when the record was 426m per minute, or 25.6 km/h, less than half the speed of the new record," said Hein Le Roux, specialist researcher at the Guinness World Records.
Although the TFC 101 Tower is now officially the world's tallest skyscraper, the world's tallest building is still the CN Tower in Toronto, Canada, which is 553.33 m tall. The TFC 101 Tower is due to be officially opened on 31 December.
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