Skilifts.org / SORT Forum

I was browsing a map of ski lifts created by the Remontées-Mécaniques forum today, and my heart almost skipped a beat when I found a centre-pole Riblet double right in the middle of Pakistan. From what little information I could glean, it may have been recently relocated to there. Does anybody know more about this lift, and did any other Riblets ever make their way outside of the Americas? I might have heard an unsubstantiated rumor on here about Riblets in Japan.
Thank you,
Passengerpigeon.
This post has been edited by passengerpigeon: 22 October 2018 - 03:18 PM

Riblet chairlifts is (or was) an offshoot of the Riblet Tramway Company.
Ore tramways were built all over the world, many were easily over 5 miles long.
In a transition of transportation... As ore tramways became less economically feasible (mostly due to the refinement of the dump truck and larger earth moving equipment to make roads for that truck) and as skiers flocked to resorts with chairlifts (rather than ropetows) the company moved from tramways to chairlifts.
Riblet was well situated to understand the foreign market.
By looking at the modifications of this install it is not original equipment, it has been transplanted from another location.
I’ll post some more Riblet history in the upcoming weeks.

Too funny, I had just discovered and added that chairlift to the map yesterday only a few hours before you posted this! I was surprised to see it there as well: I've done a lot of research on chairlifts worldwide making that map, and that was the first Riblet I've seen outside the Americas! I have not researched the types of chairlifts found at Japanese ski areas, so couldn't comment on that country.

Conrad, on 23 October 2018 - 02:48 PM, said:

If it's any help - or anything you didn't know already - I know that Mitsubishi installed at least one YAN detachable (at Whitepia Resort), one "pure" YAN fixed grip and a few more frankenlifts with YAN parts in them, but I'm pretty sure the first two are now extinct. GIRAK of Austria installed quite a few lifts, and Montaz-Mautino of France installed or licensed at least one. Unfortunately, the enthusiasm of Japanese rail otakus in chronicling all of the different rail systems doesn't quite translate into ropeways.
This post has been edited by passengerpigeon: 24 October 2018 - 08:57 AM

Wow, very interesting information about Yan in Japan! I was not aware of this western lift manufacturer presence in Japan, excluding Poma and Doppelmayr.

That is pretty sweet!

Nice find! That has to be the old Funnel lift from Snowmass. http://www.skilifts....nnel/funnel.htm I remember reading that when the funnel lift was removed, it was headed to Pakistan. All the equipment matches that Abbotabad lift so thats gotta be it. I find it particularly interesting that whoever constructed it also added some Carlevaro Savio gondola sheave assemblies into the mix. Quite the franken lift indeed.

I'll second that. I had a class at Gogebic with a gent from Pakistan that imported the lift from Snowmass. I think that was spring of 2012, although not sure what year it was put in.

The old Sheer Bliss or Funnel lift, perhaps?

Sheer Bliss was over 8000ft!! The new one is 9000ft

http://www.skilifts..../sheerbliss.htm

This has to be the Funnel chair from Snowmass. Funnel had carriers with a footrest that came out from beneath the chair when you lowered the safety bar. On Sheer Bliss the footrest was attached to the safety bar raised up and over your head.

Campground, Elk Camp and Funnel all had this same chair design. Alpine Springs and Sheer Bliss had the other design like I mentioned. I can't recall what Big Burn had, if any footrest at all.