Pico Lift issue - 2.25.12

[gmcunni]

Pico Mountain
SUMMIT EXPRESS UPDATE: On Saturday, February 25, 2012 at approximately 12:00pm, during operating hours, a derailment occurred at the load terminal of the Summit Express Quad Chairlift at Pico Mountain. The chairlift was stopped and eight crews of 3-4 staff evacuated all of the approximately 120-130 guests without incident or reported injury. According to state requirements, a Vermont state tramway inspector arrived at Pico. Repairs have been made and based on the tramway inspection the Summit Express Quad Chairlift will re-open tomorrow.

 

[billski]

Must have been interesting with those winds a-whippin. I'm sure we'll find some home video posted tonight.

 

[riverc0il]

Yans freak me out. I know they got the Poma retrofit and this might be more related to wind.

I was there on a powder day once and they held up the summit lift operation for over an hour trying to get spacing right between the chairs. Never seen anything like it on a HSQ. They had to keep pushing the chairs around the load terminal.

 

[abc]

Maybe this is one case when they should not have run the lift in that wind?

 

[billski]

Yans freak me out.

What's a Yans?

 

[riverc0il]

Yan is a defunct lift manufacturer. They had a lot of problems with their high speed quads and had to have them retrofitted. In general, I find their lifts to be freaky and uncomfortable. Killington, Pico, and Mount Snow have a lot of Yans. For fixed trip, you'll normally notice the bubble on the side of the safety bar. I think Magic's Black has Yan chairs but that lift is some frankenlift, OG and sledhauler probably know the exact configuration.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yan_Lifts

 

[threecy]

You'll only find Yans (aka Lift Engineering) in Maine and Vermont - I don't believe there were any Yan installs in any other New England states.

The Black Chair at Magic was originally a Pohlig Double. It was upgraded to a Yan Triple in the mid 80s.

Sunday River also has a few Yans.

 

[xlr8r]

Was at Pico today. Was not on the lift when it derailed, but watched them do the evac. Will post photos in a trip report when I get home tomorrow. Pico staff dealt with the situation very professionally.

 

[drjeff]

You'll only find Yans (aka Lift Engineering) in Maine and Vermont - I don't believe there were any Yan installs in any other New England states.

The Black Chair at Magic was originally a Pohlig Double. It was upgraded to a Yan Triple in the mid 80s.

Sunday River also has a few Yans.

Mount Snow has multiple Yan fixed grip chair (Challenger, Ego Alley, Sundance, Tumbleweed, Heavy Metal and Bear Trap) and now with the new Leitner-Poma chairs on the Grand Summit Express, I think about the only Yan left on that lift might be the towers!

 

[threecy]

and now with the new Leitner-Poma chairs on the Grand Summit Express, I think about the only Yan left on that lift might be the towers!

When they did the rebuild this summer, did they replace the summit terminal? It used to be a Poma retrofit of a Yan terminal.

2005:

 

[catskills]

The now thankfully defunct Lift Engineering, otherwise known as Yan, was a really dodgy operation. The company had the worst record of any ski lift manufacturer operating in the US. Bad design, poor quality installation and a flagrant disregard for safety ......

 

[thetrailboss]

The now thankfully defunct Lift Engineering, otherwise known as Yan, was a really dodgy operation. The company had the worst record of any ski lift manufacturer operating in the US. Bad design, poor quality installation and a flagrant disregard for safety ......

Here's some more info on them: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yan_Lifts

With the exception of a few bullwheel problems, their fixed grip lifts are actually pretty decent. The towers were "overbuilt" so that they could be used for future upgrades and their prices were very inexpensive. A lot of lifts at Killington and Mount Snow are Yans. They were known for their engine terminals (like this one) :

Or this one from Killington:

"Overbuilt" tower:

The fact that their towers were inserted into liquid concrete to solidify, rather than being bolted to a foundation.

And, as Riverc0il hates, their lifts had some style to them...with fluted seats, etc.

Look closely at the second chair and you can see the "fatal grip design:"

Or this pic from Superstar:

One of my pics from Pico showing the Yan chair with a Poma grip on it in 2007:

And I mentioned artsy. Do you see "YAN" anywhere in this pic?

SKI and Pres Smith loved them because they were cheap, generally well built, and installed fast. They also looked cool in the 1970's and early 1980's.

What killed them was their rush into the detachable lift market when they rushed a grip design that relied on weight and gravity to lock the chair onto the cable instead of those high tension springs. Not a good idea. Lots of chairs have fallen off; the gondi at Whistler had cabins come off killing people, and according to the Wiki site, they had problems with another project in California. In all lots of Yan lifts were installed, lots of interesting ideas, and one really bad screw up that sunk it all.

 

[thetrailboss]

Some pics from Pico today:

http://www.wcax.com/story/17018790/skiiers-lowered-from-the-lift

 

[gmcunni]

i showed the pic to Jake and he wanted to know if that was BVibert on the chair

 

[Newpylong]

You'll only find Yans (aka Lift Engineering) in Maine and Vermont - I don't believe there were any Yan installs in any other New England states.

The Black Chair at Magic was originally a Pohlig Double. It was upgraded to a Yan Triple in the mid 80s.

Sunday River also has a few Yans.

Albeit not in the US, there were tons (and still are a few) Yans at Whistler-Blackomb.

 

[drjeff]

When they did the rebuild this summer, did they replace the summit terminal? It used to be a Poma retrofit of a Yan terminal.

2005:

The basic structural steel, less the "bubble top" is still to my knowledge Yan, pretty much everything else from the bubble tops on now both the summit and base terminals to the drive motor to the chairs have been replaced/ retrofitted by poma. Nowadays the grand summit express is probably 80%+ poma with just an occasional piece of Yan thrown in for old time sake!

 

[Newpylong]

Yans freak me out. I know they got the Poma retrofit and this might be more related to wind.

I was there on a powder day once and they held up the summit lift operation for over an hour trying to get spacing right between the chairs. Never seen anything like it on a HSQ. They had to keep pushing the chairs around the load terminal.

Considering Yan fixed grips have an almost (outside of the Keystone accident in the 80's) impeccable safety record and there are no Yan grips left on High Speed quads and most sheave trains and terminals have been replaced or retrofitted by Poma you don't really have much ground for concern.

Manually spacing or pushing chairs around the load terminal is more common place than you think..

 

[Telemechanic]

Manually spacing or pushing chairs around the load terminal is more common place than you think..

Not on modern lifts with conveyor and clutch spacing, Poma, Doppelmayr, Yan or Frankenlift. Its certainly not the right way to run a detachable. A good anti-collison system wouldn't even tollerate that sort of rough spacing.

 

[riverc0il]

Manually spacing or pushing chairs around the load terminal is more common place than you think..

Perhaps. But in all my years of skiing, the only time I've ever seen it done was on that Summit Pico lift when they held up the lift operations for almost an hour trying to get the spacing right.

 

[vcunning]

The basic structural steel, less the "bubble top" is still to my knowledge Yan, pretty much everything else from the bubble tops on now both the summit and base terminals to the drive motor to the chairs have been replaced/ retrofitted by poma. Nowadays the grand summit express is probably 80%+ poma with just an occasional piece of Yan thrown in for old time sake!

So do I (and you) have that YAN stuff in our back yards?