Elevator and Escalator Installers and Repairers

About the job

Assemble, install, repair, or maintain electric or hydraulic freight or passenger elevators, escalators, or dumbwaiters.

What you'll do

• Assemble electrically powered stairs, steel frameworks, and tracks, and install associated motors and electrical wiring.
• Assemble elevator cars, installing each car’s platform, walls, and doors.
• Attach guide shoes and rollers to minimize the lateral motion of cars as they travel through shafts.
• Bolt or weld steel rails to the walls of shafts to guide elevators, working from scaffolding or platforms.
• Connect car frames to counterweights, using steel cables.
• Cut prefabricated sections of framework, rails, and other components to specified dimensions.
• Install electrical wires and controls by attaching conduit along shaft walls from floor to floor and pulling plastic-covered wires through the conduit.
• Install outer doors and door frames at elevator entrances on each floor of a structure.
• Operate elevators to determine power demands, and test power consumption to detect overload factors.
• Participate in additional training to keep skills up to date.

Things you need to know

• Mechanical – Knowledge of machines and tools, including their designs, uses, repair, and maintenance.
• Customer and Personal Service – Knowledge of principles and processes for providing customer and personal services. This includes customer needs assessment, meeting quality standards for services, and evaluation of customer satisfaction.
• Building and Construction – Knowledge of materials, methods, and the tools involved in the construction or repair of houses, buildings, or other structures such as highways and roads.
• Public Safety and Security – Knowledge of relevant equipment, policies, procedures, and strategies to promote effective local, state, or national security operations for the protection of people, data, property, and institutions.
• Design – Knowledge of design techniques, tools, and principles involved in production of precision technical plans, blueprints, drawings, and models.

Abilities you'll need to have

• Repairing – Repairing machines or systems using the needed tools.
• Troubleshooting – Determining causes of operating errors and deciding what to do about it.
• Operation Monitoring – Watching gauges, dials, or other indicators to make sure a machine is working properly.
• Equipment Maintenance – Performing routine maintenance on equipment and determining when and what kind of maintenance is needed.
• Equipment Selection – Determining the kind of tools and equipment needed to do a job.
• Critical Thinking – Using logic and reasoning to identify the strengths and weaknesses of alternative solutions, conclusions or approaches to problems.
• Active Listening – Giving full attention to what other people are saying, taking time to understand the points being made, asking questions as appropriate, and not interrupting at inappropriate times.