20 replies to this topic

[Peter Pitcher]

I am interested in knowing who invented the concept of bottom tension and drive and where was the first onw built and which manufacturer. I know that riblet was selling BTD terminals in 1975 but in 1973 they were not. Vic Hall told me in 1976 that Riblet's bottom tension and drive was the lastest state of the art technology

[willis]

I bet he was talking about overhead drives

There are a number of 60's riblet bottom tension drives that have a drive carriage that runs on rails on the ground

[Lift Dinosaur]

Original "E Lift" at Copper Mountain, CO - 1972 Double Chair HERON Bottom Drive Tension with vault.
Original "B-1 Lift" at Copper - 1973 Double Chair YAN Bottom Drive Tension Overhead Motor Room.

Dino

[Kelly]

Thinking you (or he) might mean overhead drive?
I recall seeing a Heron overhead DT (Northwest) in the 1970s (from the 1960s) at Mt Rose Nevada with the loading portal being Yan adjustable towers. I got the impression Yan copied many of the features…sorry no picture.
SLI also had an DT in this time period.
Sales brochure from Hall showing drive tension - from Chairlifts.org
 Hall-DT-sales-info.jpg (24.93K)
Number of downloads: 155
This thing looks old
 DT.jpg (23.41K)
Number of downloads: 157

[Lift Kid]

Buck Hill in Minnesota had a Hall double chair that was supposedly built in 1965 that was bottom drive and tension. Similar arrangement to Kelly's two pictures.

[Peter Pitcher]

I did mean overhead but the vault drives are certainly interesting. It seems like that might be a Hall invention. There is a bottom tension overhead drive at Maverick Mountain in Montana. It was built in 1970. It has Riblet centerpost chairs and Riblet bent pipe line machinery. It has vertical possibly Hall towers with an angle strut on the depressions. I has a hydraulic drive with a BIG triple roller chain. The motor has a small triple sprocket driving the chain and the bullwheel has a large sprocket welded to it. Probably about 1:10 ratio. There is no high speed service brake or backstop(there is no high speed shaft) There is a calipher brake on the bullwheel flange and a Riblet TRB. It runs at about 435fpm and is about 5000 feet long with about 1400 feet of vert. Chair interval is about 15 seconds. This lift is 41 years old with the original rope and it seems to run like a top. I just wonder where it came from?

[iceberg210]

I would think SLI would have been early in those bottom tension/drive overhead stations. For example Three Kings at PCMR is one and that was installed in 1970.

Three Kings

[liftmech]

Lift Dinosaur, on 06 February 2011 - 10:59 AM, said:

Original "E Lift" at Copper Mountain, CO - 1972 Double Chair HERON Bottom Drive Tension with vault.
Original "B-1 Lift" at Copper - 1973 Double Chair YAN Bottom Drive Tension Overhead Motor Room.

Dino

Didn't know EE had a bottom tension setup. How'd that work with a vault drive?

Old I had the same combined setup as B-1, also.

[Lift Dinosaur]

liftmech, on 06 February 2011 - 06:40 PM, said:

Didn't know EE had a bottom tension setup. How'd that work with a vault drive?

The F-Frame with bullwheel was above ground and rode on rails much like the Hall pictured above. The drive equipment was hung below the Frame in the vault and the gearbox was shaft coupled to the bullwheel (Like B & G). The Vault became the Electrical Bunker when E was replaced with the YAN triple in '84 and then removed when the Excelerator was built in '98.
Unfortunately, I didn't own a camera in those days!
Dino

[cordury joe]

Peter Pitcher, on 06 February 2011 - 02:46 PM, said:

I did mean overhead but the vault drives are certainly interesting. It seems like that might be a Hall invention. There is a bottom tension overhead drive at Maverick Mountain in Montana. It was built in 1970. It has Riblet centerpost chairs and Riblet bent pipe line machinery. It has vertical possibly Hall towers with an angle strut on the depressions. I has a hydraulic drive with a BIG triple roller chain. The motor has a small triple sprocket driving the chain and the bullwheel has a large sprocket welded to it. Probably about 1:10 ratio. There is no high speed service brake or backstop(there is no high speed shaft) There is a calipher brake on the bullwheel flange and a Riblet TRB. It runs at about 435fpm and is about 5000 feet long with about 1400 feet of vert. Chair interval is about 15 seconds. This lift is 41 years old with the original rope and it seems to run like a top. I just wonder where it came from?

The lift at Maverick is an interesting lift. Overhead drive but not bullwheel loading. It is hydrostatic drive with control for decell and check valves on the hyd motor to work as a backstop. Could very well be one of a kind.

[aug]

willis, on 06 February 2011 - 08:15 AM, said:

I bet he was talking about overhead drives

There are a number of 60's riblet bottom tension drives that have a drive carriage that runs on rails on the ground

Yes, indeed, the pedestal drive terminal. Skibowl's Lower Bowl Chair had one and that was installed in the early to mid sixties. All of the drive machinery was mounted on the moving pedestal attached to the CWT rope . I remember it being quite dynamic as in moving a lot with different loads. It was removed in the late 90's and replaced with an Ellis bottom tension (hyd) overhead drive terminal.

[liftmech]

Old chair 2 at Hyak (1967 or '68) had one of those as well.

[Bill]

Easy Street at Summit Central (Ski Acres) has a bottom drive and tension:

 lowerstation.jpg (76.45K)
Number of downloads: 112

[aug]

Bill, on 09 February 2011 - 10:08 AM, said:

Easy Street at Summit Central (Ski Acres) has a bottom drive and tension:

lowerstation.jpg

Riblet pedestal .... that one looks very unique with the shack built around it and the elevated rails.

[william b]

The original Stadeli chairlifts at Waterville Valley were installed in 1965, and they were overhead drive/tension. Tenney Mt. had a bottom drive/tension Stadeli at about the same time, although it was not originally an overhead drive. Mueller had drive/tension above ground drive stations on rails (side loading) starting about 1960 around here (Gunstock).

WBL

[ceo]

The Sawduster double at Sugarloaf (ME) is a Riblet with a pedestal drive/tension bottom terminal. It was originally installed in the late 60s, and in the mid-80s was realigned and extended to extend above the base lodge.

Cannon's Gremlin double, installed in 1974 (I think), had an overhead drive/tension terminal without bullwheel loading. Think it was a Hall. Originally the New Peabody Chair, it was so unreliable its first few years it was unofficially, and then officially, named the Hong Kong Chair before being renamed Gremlin, supposedly after the trail of the same name that it paralleled.

[Kicking Horse]

Great info guys. Always can count on the members here :-) to learn something new each day.

[sbwhidbey]

Kicking Horse, on 26 May 2011 - 04:09 PM, said:

Great info guys. Always can count on the members here :-) to learn something new each day.

The old "high speed" chair at A-Basin was an overhead drive on rails with tensioning. It was the first double at A-Basin (had lattice towers, had to date back to the 50s). It was torn down when Keystone bought the area and installed the exhibition chair. Anything with a fixed bullwheel at the top and a bottom drive had to have tensioning and drive at the bottom. The old Red chair at Whistler and the Comet and Meteor T-Bars at Winter park are other early examples I know of.

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[william b]

ceo, on 26 May 2011 - 12:41 PM, said:

The Sawduster double at Sugarloaf (ME) is a Riblet with a pedestal drive/tension bottom terminal. It was originally installed in the late 60s, and in the mid-80s was realigned and extended to extend above the base lodge.

Cannon's Gremlin double, installed in 1974 (I think), had an overhead drive/tension terminal without bullwheel loading. Think it was a Hall. Originally the New Peabody Chair, it was so unreliable its first few years it was unofficially, and then officially, named the Hong Kong Chair before being renamed Gremlin, supposedly after the trail of the same name that it paralleled.

The 'Hong Kong' chair at Cannon was a Pullman-Berry; The 'Pullman' coming from the railroad industry. One of only two manufactured, I believe. I wasn't around then, but evidently they could have done a little more r&d on those lifts, as well as additional quality control.

wbl

[boardski]

sbwhidbey, on 26 May 2011 - 09:15 PM, said:

The old "high speed" chair at A-Basin was an overhead drive on rails with tensioning. It was the first double at A-Basin (had lattice towers, had to date back to the 50s). It was torn down when Keystone bought the area and installed the exhibition chair. Anything with a fixed bullwheel at the top and a bottom drive had to have tensioning and drive at the bottom. The old Red chair at Whistler and the Comet and Meteor T-Bars at Winter park are other early examples I know of.

Do you have any more pictures of the old lifts which ran the Exhibition line at A Basin before Exhibition was there? Later pictures show two paralell double chairs, they look like early Poma or Miner-Denver lifts. Was the ski patrol shack at the bottom formerly the drive housing for one of those lifts? Was the lift on the right with the lattice towers the single lift that formerly ran that line? I'm not sure when the single was removed and the two double chairs and the Poma were installed. Sorry about all the questions, I'm not very familiar with A Basin prior to 1978 but have skied there just about every year since.
My appologies for digressing off topic a bit but those are very cool pictures!