AskCodeMan

We are doing an elevator modernization in a condo complex (r3) and are being told that the new door in the pit area to the elevator needs to be fire rated. Does anybody know what this rating needs to be? Thanks.

I presume you are referring to the door to the elevator equipment room, not to what is referred to as the "elevator pit"?

Typically, this door would be at the first floor or the top floor, depending on the elevator installation. The elevator equipment room is also typically separated from the elevator shaft (such as for hydraulically operated elevators) if it is not on top of the elevator shaft (such as for cable lift elevators). For those separated elevator equipment rooms, the hydraulic and electrical cables are firestopped at the penetrations through the rated wall separating those elevator equipment from the elevator shaft.

Are you referring to those doors, the ones to a separate elevator equipment room?

If so, the elevator equipment room door would need at least a 2 hour rating if the building is fully sprinklered. I am presuming there are four or more stories, if there are less than four stories then not less than 1 hour rating would be acceptable.

No this is a unique situation where there is a door that leads directly into the elevator pit.

And the elevator equipment/machinery is in the pit?

The same fire-resistance rated doors would be needed, and maybe the reduction to 1 hour would not be applicable - I'd have to check and may need more information, but a 2 hour rated door would be the safer way to go.

no the elevator equipment is not in the pit.

What is in the pit? Anything?

How large (width-length-depth) is the pit?

I'm trying to visualize what you are referring to, but am having difficulties doing so. I have seen elevator pits with equipment in them, typically the motor and hydraulic pump, and elevator pits with nothing in them (other than accumulated grease, leaked hydraulic oil, etc.). The pits without anything in them have been there to allow the mechanism, car structure, tracks, etc., to extend down below the first floor, with the hydraulic lift cylinder about the only thing being in the pit in addition to the hydraulic lines which operate the lift.

The problem I'm having is that everything I've seen would not have the door you describe across it - I am visualizing a 'floor' covering the pit with a 'hinged hatch' for the door, but I am not yet understanding what you are describing.

See attached pictures. The opening is the last picture (001) is the door in question. It separates the pit from the mechanical room. The pit room is 6'X8'.

With a picture being worth a thousand words, you filled in all the my blanks with those 4 thousand words with those 4 pictures - that is not at all what I kept envisioning ... thank you for the photos.

Yes, that wall needs to be like the other walls of that shaft, at least 2 hour rated, and any opening protective device (such as a door) would need to be rated at least 1-1/2 hours.

It looks like it was intended to have a door there, but the mechanism likely would not fit through the door, so they knocked part of the wall out ... and left it out - not good, not good at all.

THanks there where I was leaning but wanted to be sure.