The pneumatic vacuum elevator

You know how fascinated you were as a kid with vacuum tubes, and we know just how badly you always wanted shrink down and ride in one. Well, say hello to Daytona Elevators' Pneumatic Vacuum elevators, custom-built tubes which move passengers from floor to floor by means of pressurization. Apparently the cost and space benefits of this type of elevator are enormous, but we don't really want to think what happens when you're heading up and the tube pressure suddenly drops—they claim to have locking mechanisms, but is there even enough room to sit down for fourteen hours until you're found? At least it's nice to know Futurama wasn't so far-fetched afterall.

[Via Gadgetopia]

[TIMMAH! @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

This would be cool in the next Bruce Willis Die Hard XXIV movie. Terrorist have taken over the Nakatomi skyscraper and are going up in the elevator. McClain shoots out the tube on the first floor and the terrorists plummet to their deaths as the pressure is released... "Yippie kayeah, mofos!"

[greg @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

"but we don�t really want to think what happens when you�re heading up and the tube pressure suddenly drops"

The same fears prevented the elevator (as we know it today) from being standard issue in taller buildings for a long time. I think it took a demonstration at a worlds fair where an inventor demonstrated his "locking mechanism" by cutting the lines of an elevator while he was on it. The world, all at once let out a fearful gasp.

[Chris @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

Futurama? You mean Jetsons, right?

:-P

We're one step closer to The Jetsons becoming a reality!

[OddManOut @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

What an amusing bit of circularity. Weren't some of the first eleveators actually WATER powered ?

[Sean Foushee @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

"At least it�s nice to know Futurama wasn�t so far-fetched afterall."

I believe the tubes in Futurama were to play homage to the original forward thinkers, the animators of the Jetsons.

I think given the amount of fear most people had when the first "lifts" were created that this concept will take a decade or two to catch on.

[Gordy @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

Not...the...kid!

[theSAWzall @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

Let's take the cab out and make a giant potato gun!

Someone better start breeding a huge potato.

[craig @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

ohh.. that kind of vacuum tube.

[wung @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

how will we breathe in the vacuum tube?

[Alex Stapleton @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

If lifts werent clostrophobic enough already!? Now they are vacuum sealed, probably with barely enough oxygen trapped in the tiny capsule with you to get you a few floors, getting trapped in ones of these things sounds like a really bad idea.

On a somewhat less scary note, I wonder now they control the lift so precisely with nothing but a cushion of air / vacuum. Air tends to compress a lot, meaning that the position of the lift is liable to bounce a lot making accurate tracking of it kinda tricky I imagine

[Mark @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

how will we breathe in the vacuum tube?

with your lungs.

[Brian @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

I love engadget. :-)

[AML @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

so a shot of tekila would have thrice the effect in this thing? or did i fail physics for a reason..

[khamel @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

i remember in 7th grade we had to create a model of our dream house for art class and we were given 2 class periods to do it. I spent the first day playing Oregon Trail and most of the second day doing the same thing till I realized i still hadn't made my dream house. Years of watching television had taught me that all the cool adults just lived in converted factories but my teacher didnt accept my box with a bed, a space for a kitchen and a bathroom so i had to slap something together in 20 minutes. after creating what i thought was an acceptable suburban home i realized with a minute left that it had no doors. i then proceeded to put circular black spots in the open corners of each room.
My teacher came back to me the next day and asked me what the hell the circles were. I told her since it was my dream home, i wanted it to have vacuum tubes to transport me from each room. I continued to explain in detail that since she wouldn't allow me my loft that this is what she was going to have to accept.
Now that my dream has become a reality I need to find her and change that grade from a B- to an A.

[Jeremy @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

This was in the Wall Street Journal last week, I believe it cost mid $20K

[Cliff @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

How can you say that? All elevators have redundant backup systems. If the cable is cut the, the elevator has brakes and comes to a hault.

[Ruegen @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

Hey, how DO you breath if the lift is stuck? Would you run out or would there be an emergency hatch air hole?

[ThePete @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

Yeah, I'm with Chris and Sean--Futurama? The Jetsons had tubes like that in the 1960s... how old are you, 12?

As for breathing, I don't think the tube is literally a vaccuum inside--I had a toy as a kid--Micronauts toy, I think--that was like a race car track, only instead of the track it was a massive length of interconnecting tubes that used a motor to blow air through them. You dropped your little Micronaut man inside a capsule that fit perfectly snug inside the tube and off he'd go. Looked like a set piece from Logan's Run. The point is, it ran on air pressure, not a complete lack of air--just like home vacuums. Your Dirt Devil doesn't create a vacuum--it sucks air. Didn't anyone take physics in high school?? Or am I just a gullible twonk that can't get sarcasm over the 'net? :

[Jackson West @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

Vacuum tubes, or thermionic valves, have nothing to do with pneumatic tubes. Pneumatic tubes rely on a pressure differential, so you don't need a true vacuum at all -- though they certainly need to be air-tight. For instance, on the way up, the air pressure below the lift would increase and the pressure above decrease -- slowly, for a smooth ride. On the way down, you'd want very high pressure below the lift that decreased -- again, slowly, as gravity will do all the hard work, and would do it really fast without a cushion of air. I doubt a particularly 'hard' vacuum would be achieved at any point in the lift's operation.

[E. Marrs @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

I could see a group of stoners blowing all their smoke into the second floor on one of these things, and then allowing the lucky one to ride it up from the bottom. Can anyone say gravity bong?

[Dawn O'Connor, Daytona Elevator @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

Read more about how this swanky elevator works at our site: www.daytonaelevator.com. You can also view a photo gallery of some of the pics that I took.

[Nicky @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

What Dawn didn't mention is that even if you lose power, the "tube" just gradually drifts down to the bottom floor. You can't get stuck in this unit.

[Rick @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

Actually Ive rode in one of these, I can honestly say its the coolest elvator ride going, very swwweeeeeet....I only have a one level home but Im tempted to sell the home and get a three story home just so I can enjoy the sweeeet ride everyday.

[Pat Reynolds @ Dec 19th 2005 12:53AM]

It always amazes me how negative people can be about the application of scientific/physical principles into their everyday lives. As a mode of transportation (i.e. movement of goods or people as an alternative to transport by road or rail), the use of a vacumn system may well become more economical and environmentally friendly. On the newly built aircraft, such vacumn systems are employed (using titanium tubes) for the removal of passenger sewage. Speeds of 150mph are easily achieved inside the tube. With modern computer control it is not impossible to imagine people or goods travelling in a similar fashion (of course I dont mean with sewage).

It could easily be like this - a travel pod unit sitting snugly inside a tube. The tube could have guides on its innerside so that the pod will be held in place and orientation during its journey down the tube (magnets may be employed to help achieve this). Once sitting comfortably inside the pod, the door is sealed (as on plane) and a vacumn is pulled between two sealed points, lets say 1-5 km in distance apart, in the outside tube atmosphere - i.e. the length of the journey. The pod, which is held both mechanically in place and magnetically in position, would be released as soon as the appropriate vacumn is reached within the tube. The propulsion of the pod would be caused by the introduction of air - the same quantity of air that is pulled from the tube to create the vacumn. It is a matter of timing and control that is all. It works on small scale and there is little reason why it would not work on large scale. The energy required to travel is equal to the energy required to pull the vacumn. The pod will reach its destination very fast, with buffering at the end of the journey as the air equalises the pressure inside the tube. One could imagine a network of such tubes, interconnected and computer controlled. Perhaps the best way to get capital investment would be to design a fun-fare ride - that would get the attention of the public - such a ride could have a thread-like guide for the pod so that its passengers could enjoy the experience of high speed twisting, with extreme vertical drops and loops (mind you in this case maybe passengers would be travelling with sewage as it would scare the **** out of them!).

I see no problem in breathing within a sealed pod - since the pod could build a slight positive pressure (like a plane) whilst the vacumn is being pulled.

Think it over.....contact me on [e-mail] if you would like to discuss more.