Residential Dumbwaiters

Finding a way to increase productivity is important around the home and especially in commercial settings. Carrying items between floors can not only be hard on the body, but in the case of people who are mobility challenged, it can also increase the risk of a fall. To help around the home, many people choose to install a special type of elevator called a dumbwaiter.

While a dumbwaiter falls into the elevator family, it is usually much smaller and not made to carry people. Instead dumbwaiters are designed to move things like laundry or food around a multistory building. These devices date back several thousand years, but the electric dumbwaiter is relatively new. The electric dumbwaiter was first developed in the late eighteen-hundreds, but it wouldn’t be until the middle of the nineteen-hundreds that these devices would become readily accessible in residential settings.

Today, more and more homes are opting to install an electric dumbwaiter. They are easiest to install if they are added to a home as it is being built, but several popular kits are also available for retro-fit situations.

When doing a retro-fit installation, usually the hardest part is finding a space for the dumbwaiter. This is not a problem in new construction, because the dumbwaiter shaft can be built into the home, but in an existing home, finding a space for the shaft can prove difficult. The shaft refers to the vertical space between floors that the dumbwaiter will move through.

The car, which actually transports the items between floors, moves vertically up and down the shaft. Most are attached to a track that runs the distance of the shaft. The track helps to keep the car steady and balanced. Most dumbwaiters can support around a hundred pounds, but commercial lifts and some residential lifts can support much more weight than this. It is possible for the dumbwaiter car to open up on different sides, so this makes finding a space for the shaft easier.

Once you have a space that the dumbwaiter can be installed into, it will be necessary to install the drive system and shaft. Most use a cable drive system, that raises or lowers the lift on a strong steel cable. Some kits come with the car and drive system already assembled onto a short length of track. This piece of track can then be installed into the top of the shaft and about half of the installation can be completed at once. This reduces the time and makes the task of aligning the drive system very simple.

Installing and using a dumbwaiter in the home is a great way to make it possible to move items quickly throughout the home, without strain on the body or concerns about falls.