Home Forums General Discussion Technical Questions MCE Smartraq on Dover HD 86 operator

So we recently installed a couple of Smarttraq motors and drives on couple of Dover HD 86 operators, All was fine, except the inspector asked for the nudging face to be lowered to the 2.5ft/lbs required by the current code. The lowest I can get them to work at is 5ft/lbs and MCE tech support is useless on the matter. We have new roller gibs, new door rollers and the door glides as free as can be. I'm down to a torque setting of 3 on nudging and 6 on nudging speed. Any lower on either setting will cause a stall. If I take a wrap off the spirator to lessen closing force and they will stall. Any recommendations?

Are you stopping the door completely then testing the force? Kinetic energy is computed by the weight of it's mass and the square of it's velocity. Perhaps the door weighs more than they engineered the door package for. When I test doors for closing force, I stop it 1/3 or so in it,s travel and put my gauge on the leading edge. The force to hold the door stopped with the gauge is the force. Make sure you are using a good gauge.

How are you measuring the kinetic? The spring stick is incredibly inaccurate. If you are timing the doors, double check your door weights you are using to calculate the time are correct.

TKE has dual sided motor pulley. Larger radius side is less torque more speed. Maybe use this side and then greatly reduce all door speeds, but you might be able to get a torque low enough to make inspector happy. 2.5 lbs ??? Really? Seems like a gentle breeze would keep doors from closing.

I’ve been through this same thing with at least 3 inspectors. The 2.5 ft/lbs. is kinetic energy. You can’t measure kinetic energy with a gauge. It is a formula that takes into consideration the weight of the door and the speed that the door is moving. The gauge measures the torque of the motor which is to be measured after the door has been temporarily stalled (hence, you can’t measure the speed on a stalled door). You are allowed by code up to 30 ft/lbs. of motor torque which is what the gauge measures. Kinetic energy is calculated with a formula that is also found in the code book. If your inspector gets really stubborn about it, call the engineer at Columbia Elevator Products. He is the one that wrote the code.

If you don’t have the exact door weights, tell me the door height, type, opening width, and finish and I will find the time for reduced speed (2.5lb kinetic) from the Dover charts I think I have somewhere. Static force can still be 30 lbs.

All, thanks for all the replies, sorry buy I just saw them today. Didn't get any email notifications any replied.

John Jay, yes that is how I have been measuring.

Indirtwtrust, we had a discussion on site about this, we had three mechanics and an inspector (multiple mods going on at once) , between our four gauges we had 4 different readings. Thanks for being willing to look up the door info. They are 48" two speed side slide with a 84" clear height with a stainless finish. If I remove them and weigh them, do I use the total weight or just one?

TC7, that's a good call, didn't think abut flipping it. I am using the small groove.

ridevertical, thanks for that clarification as well. I couldn't find the calculation in the book. Not in 2.13.4.2 or any of the appendix.

What I have, if they are original Dover doors, says full speed > 3.38 seconds and reduced speed > 5.64 seconds. And of course that’s measured from 2” from daylight to 2” from daylight.

Thanks again Indirtwetrust

Why anyone would buy that smarttrak nonsense is beyond me.