Innovative Wheelchair Lift for Lobster Yacht
When a lifelong boater began using a wheelchair to get around, losing access to his beloved “lobster yacht” wasn't an option.
-
John Bowen had been boating his entire life. His pride was a modified lobster yacht named Obsession, a working boat transformed into a pleasure craft. After becoming a wheelchair user, the boat had been made largely accessible, but one problem remained unsolved for over a year: a 30-inch vertical drop from the main deck to the cabin below.
A lift to get from the main deck down the vertical rise to the cabin floor couldn't interfere with the existing stairs, had to sit flush with the cabin floor when not in use, and needed to operate on 12 or 24 volts DC. Most critically, if power failed mid-travel, the owner could not be left trapped below deck. Manual operation from the main deck was non-negotiable. The lift was required to move 550lb—the combined weight of the wheelchair and Bowen—on open ocean swells.
-
Gillespie brought together the owner, the fiberglass installer, and the woodworker for an onsite survey before a single drawing was made. The resulting custom lift uses a gearmotor driving twin wire-rope drums with a novel arrangement of upper and lower ropes on each drum to stabilize the platform against ocean movement, a solution Gillespie had never seen done before. A spring-loaded restraining bar system automatically deploys to prevent the wheelchair from rolling off the platform mid-travel, then retracts automatically on arrival. For emergencies, a hand winch at deck level can disengage the motor and manually raise or lower the platform with as little as 8 to 10 pounds of handle force. The entire lift was fabricated in 304 and 316 stainless steel for marine durability.
Gillespie engineer John Linsley documented this project in a feature article published in Elevator World magazine. To read the full article here.
Challenging project?
Contact us at sales@gillespiecorp.com, call 413-967-4980 or visit www.gillespiecorp.com.