[SML] Florida Venues - Orchestra Pit Lift?

Stephen Litterst litterst.stagecraft at gmail.com
Thu Sep 8 14:16:22 UTC 2016


On 9/8/16 10:02 AM, Joe Wilson via Stagecraft wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> I'm looking for feedback specifically from Florida venues, but other
> suggestions or experiences are also welcome.
>
> Short version:  I'm looking for information from other Florida theatres
> with orchestra pit lifts.  What lift mechanism do you use, and how has
> your experience with that been?

We have two pit lifts on campus.  Not Florida, but hear me out...

The oldest, dating to the early 70s is a traditional piston lift.  It's 
had all of the problems you describe, except the sediment.

The newest, dating back 10 years is a Gala Spiralift.  The floor of the 
pit mechanism is about 3' below the structure of the lift itself at its 
lowest point.  One motor drives two of the Spiralift units. Travel is as 
smooth as with the traditional pistons.  The only drawback I found was 
the noise of the motor.  Not loud, per se, but if you wanted to use it 
during a production the audience would be aware of it.

Our water table is not as high as Floridas, but we have started seeing 
some seepage into the pit area, which tells me if we'd had piston shafts 
20' deeper there would be issues.

Steve L.

-- 
Stephen Litterst            Technical Operations Supervisor
litterst at udel.edu           Mitchell Hall
302/831-0601                University of Delaware





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