Questions we are asked most.

Capacity follows from a traffic analysis: the population served, the number of floors, and the peak five-minute demand. A residential tower and an office building of identical height can need very different equipment, because their peak patterns differ. Prawita Karya can carry out this analysis during design.

A bed elevator has a deeper car so a hospital bed, its attendants and equipment can be moved without tilting, and its doors and levelling are specified for rolling loads. A passenger elevator of the same rated load is usually too shallow for this.

Service life depends far more on maintenance and duty than on age alone. Well-maintained equipment commonly runs for decades, with control systems typically reaching obsolescence before the mechanical installation does — which is why modernization often replaces controls rather than the whole installation.

Escalators run continuously whenever a building is open, so they are serviced on a defined interval rather than on demand. The correct frequency depends on daily running hours and footfall, and should be set against the manufacturer's schedule and applicable Indonesian regulations.

An escalator forms steps to carry people between floors. A moving walk keeps a flat surface, running horizontally or on a gentle incline, which lets passengers stay with luggage or trolleys.

Usually, but it depends on structure. A survey establishes where a shaft can be formed, whether the slab and foundation can carry the loads, and what pit depth and headroom are achievable. That survey should happen before any equipment is selected.

Yes. A Tenka Tsuki is installed and running at Prawita Karya's joint showroom in Solo Design Hub, Surakarta, so the ride, the car size and the finishes can be judged in person rather than from a specification. Ask and a visit can be arranged.

Because it suits an Indonesian household with room to spare. Average household size is about 3.8 people and average adult weight about 62 kg, so a typical full car is nearer 280 kg — 400 kg leaves headroom for luggage, a wheelchair and its attendant, or moving furniture. Mizu goes to 450 and 630 kg where a household needs more.

For most houses, yes, though it costs more to install. Hydraulic systems are cheaper up front and simple to fit, but they need regular oil maintenance and disposal, they can leak, and ride speed and levelling drift as the oil warms up. Traction has no oil, wears slowly and uses cheaper spare parts, so the difference tends to reverse over the life of the lift. Screw and spindle systems sit between the two: quiet and pit-free, but very slow and high-wear.

The V300 keeps running. It is battery driven, so mains electricity is only used to charge the battery rather than to lift the car — about 250 floors of travel at full load with no supply connected at all. Charging off-peak means a time-of-use tariff can cut running cost by up to 40 per cent, and the battery can be paired with solar panels, supplied separately.

Cost is driven by travel height, number of stops, car size, finishes and whether the shaft already exists — a retrofit into a finished house carries builder's work a new build does not. Prawita Karya quotes against a site survey rather than a list price.

Far less than a commercial elevator. Tsuki works within an 800 × 900 mm shaft, needs no pit at all and 2,800 mm of overhead; Kaze needs a 150 mm pit, Mizu 200 mm, and the battery-driven V300 300 mm. Those figures are usually what makes a lift possible in an existing house — a conventional elevator pit alone would rule most out.

A modern installation layers several independent devices: door protection to prevent contact, an overspeed governor and safety gear to arrest an uncontrolled car, landing door interlocks, buffers at the terminals, overload detection, and emergency communication and lighting. Each is independent by design, so one failure does not defeat the others.

The car stops safely and holds — it does not fall; the brake engages when power is lost. Emergency lighting and communication are designed to remain available so passengers can call for help. Specific behaviour depends on the equipment and whether the building has standby power or an automatic rescue device fitted.

On a defined periodic schedule, set against the manufacturer's requirements and applicable Indonesian regulations, and after any modernization or significant repair.

The saving comes from removing ramps, aisles and manoeuvring clearance, so it depends heavily on the system type and the site geometry. It should be assessed against a specific site rather than assumed from a general figure.

Systems are designed so a fault takes individual bays out of service rather than trapping vehicles, and retrieval procedures exist for affected positions. Exact behaviour depends on the system type, which is one reason maintenance cover and response time matter when specifying one.

Duration depends on the number of units, travel height, equipment type and how ready the builder's work is. Shaft readiness is the most common cause of delay: installation cannot begin until the shaft is complete, true and dry, and power is available.

A survey, equipment specification, mechanical and electrical installation, testing and commissioning, then handover and the start of a maintenance programme. On a new build the survey ideally happens during design, when shaft provision can still be adjusted.

The shaft must be complete and within tolerance, the pit waterproofed, headroom and machine space available, scaffolding or hoisting access arranged, and a suitable power supply present. A pre-installation survey confirms all of this.

On a regular planned interval rather than on demand. The correct frequency depends on usage intensity, equipment type, age and environment — a hospital bed lift running continuously needs more attention than a low-rise office lift. The interval should be set against the manufacturer's schedule and applicable Indonesian regulations.

Yes. Prawita Karya provides maintenance programmes covering planned preventive visits, safety inspection, corrective repair and emergency response.

Yes. Maintenance and spare parts are provided for all brands, which matters for buildings that have inherited equipment from several earlier contractors.

Call the 24/7 emergency hotline. Passengers are safe inside the car and should wait for trained personnel; the doors must only be opened by someone competent to do so, because a car stopped between floors presents a fall risk if released incorrectly.

Common triggers are control system obsolescence and spare parts becoming unavailable, rising breakdown frequency, poor levelling or ride quality, long waiting times as building use changes, and safety devices that no longer meet current expectations. Condition matters more than age.

Modernization replaces selected components — typically controls, drive, doors and fixtures — while retaining sound structure such as guide rails and steelwork. Replacement removes the entire installation. Modernization is normally faster, less disruptive and less expensive where the structure is serviceable.

Less than for full replacement, and it depends on scope. Where a building has more than one lift, work can be staged so one remains available. This is a principal reason to consider modular modernization.

Yes. Parts are supplied for elevators, escalators and home lifts of any brand, not only equipment originally installed by Prawita Karya.

Obsolescence is common in control systems, where boards go out of production well before the mechanical installation wears out. Where no equivalent exists, the practical route is usually a component upgrade or modular modernization of the affected system rather than replacing the whole installation.

Door equipment, because door operators cycle on every trip. Rollers, guide shoes and door gear are the most frequently replaced components, followed by control contactors and sensors.

A calculation of how many lifts a building needs, at what capacity and speed, based on its population, number of floors and peak demand pattern. It is the difference between a building that moves people comfortably at peak and one where queues form in the lobby every morning.

During design, while the number and size of shafts can still change. Once the core is built, the analysis can only tell you what you already have.

Yes. Condition surveys and safety inspections are carried out on equipment of any brand and any original installer.

Report it to the hotline. If anyone is inside, say so immediately — entrapments are prioritised. Do not attempt to open landing doors: a car stopped between floors presents a fall risk if released by someone not trained to do it.

A repeating fault usually has an underlying cause that resetting or replacing the affected component does not address — a door track out of alignment, a marginal safety-circuit contact, or a control parameter that no longer matches how the building is used. Recurring faults warrant root cause investigation.

Yes. The emergency hotline operates 24/7 for entrapments and equipment out of service.

A bed elevator has a much deeper car so a bed, its attendants and equipment can travel together without tilting, with door widths and levelling specified for rolling loads. A passenger elevator of the same rated load is usually too shallow, because rated load describes weight, not floor plan.

Enough that clinical routes survive one unit being out of service, which usually means separating bed, visitor and service traffic rather than sizing a single group. The number follows from a traffic analysis based on bed count, departmental layout and floor population.

Planned around clinical activity, so that units are taken out of service when the routes they serve are least critical, with the work sequenced to keep alternatives available.

Because shafts frequently run alongside bedrooms. Machine noise, door operation and airborne vibration that would pass unnoticed in an office building become guest complaints in a hotel, which is why drive selection, isolation and door equipment deserve attention at specification.

Generally yes. Housekeeping trolleys, linen, room service and waste sharing guest cars affects both the guest experience and service efficiency. A dedicated back-of-house lift with its own access is the normal arrangement.

Yes. Car interiors, fixtures and doors can be refurbished as a component upgrade while retaining the drive and structure, which is a common scope during a property refresh.

The peak runs the other way. Offices are sized for a morning up-peak into the building; residential towers face a downward peak as residents leave. The populations behave differently too — residential traffic is spread across more of the day, with sharper concentration at the morning departure.

Usually when the control system reaches obsolescence and spare parts become difficult, or when breakdown frequency starts affecting residents. Because residential buildings hold equipment for decades, modernization of controls and drive while retaining sound structure is often the proportionate route.

Yes. Maintenance and spare parts are provided for all brands, which matters for residential buildings that have changed maintenance contractors over the years.

It follows from a traffic analysis rather than a rule of thumb: the building population, number of floors, and the proportion arriving in the peak five minutes. Two towers of identical height can need materially different groups depending on floor population and use.

The morning condition where most journeys start at the entrance level and travel upward. It is normally the design case for an office building, because it concentrates the heaviest demand into the shortest window.

Adding shafts is rarely practical, but performance can often be improved without them — modernizing controls, re-tuning dispatch as occupancy changes, or upgrading door equipment to reduce the time spent at each floor.

Because an escalator moves a continuous stream with no wait, which suits retail footfall. Achieving the same throughput with lifts would require a large group, take more floor area, and still make shoppers wait — which shoppers browsing between levels tolerate poorly.

Outside trading hours wherever possible, so a route is not closed during opening. Because escalators run continuously, the interval is set against running hours and footfall rather than left until a fault appears.

A moving walk on a gentle incline with a flat surface rather than steps, which lets shoppers move between levels while keeping a trolley with them. It is common in malls with supermarket anchor tenants.

A goods elevator is built for load rather than for people: a stronger platform, wider doors, hard-wearing finishes and, where forklifts load it, a structure that tolerates concentrated wheel loading. Rated capacity alone does not describe it, because how the load arrives matters as much as its weight.

Sometimes, and it is a decisive question. If a forklift drives into the car, its weight and wheel loading must be included in the specification. If it only places a pallet at the threshold, the requirement is considerably lighter.

Dust, humidity, washdown and temperature all shorten the life of equipment not chosen for them. Specifying for the environment at the outset avoids failures that appear to be quality problems but are really specification ones.

Usually, subject to structure. A survey establishes where a shaft can be formed, whether the slab and foundations can carry the loads, and what pit depth and headroom are achievable. That survey should precede any equipment selection.

It is the most common reason. Where the alternative is leaving upper floors unused or moving house entirely, a lift keeps an existing home usable as circumstances change.

Yes. Domestic use is light and intermittent, which makes servicing easy to overlook, but the safety devices and door equipment still require periodic inspection and adjustment.

ISO 9001:2015 for quality management systems and ISO 37001:2016 for anti-bribery management systems. The latter is directly relevant to public sector procurement, where anti-bribery controls form part of tender scrutiny.

It is an obligation to every visitor rather than a design preference, so car dimensions, control heights, audible and visual indication and door timing follow from the accessibility requirement rather than from average passenger convenience.

Often yes, and it is frequently the proportionate route. Public buildings hold equipment for decades, so structure and guide rails commonly remain serviceable long after the control system has become obsolete and unsupportable.

It depends on the equipment, its duty and how many units are covered in one attendance. The checklist above is worked through in full on a routine visit; a first visit to unfamiliar equipment normally takes longer, because the baseline measurements have not been taken yet.

For parts of the visit, yes. Work in the shaft, pit and on the car requires the unit to be taken out of passenger service. In buildings with more than one lift the work is sequenced so an alternative stays available.

A record of the check points completed and, more usefully, the measured values taken — brake gap, rope condition, levelling deviation. Those figures are what make the next visit meaningful.

Periodic inspection of lifts and escalators is regulated, and the applicable requirements should be confirmed for your building and equipment type. Manufacturer schedules and regulatory intervals are separate obligations; meeting one does not automatically satisfy the other.

The interval can be longer, but it should not be abandoned. Safety devices need periodic verification regardless of how little the lift runs, and lightly used equipment has its own failure modes — lubricant migration and corrosion in particular.

It depends on the contract. Planned preventive visits, corrective repair and emergency attendance are commonly separable, so it is worth confirming which are included and what response time applies.

Occasionally, but it wears the equipment in ways it was not specified for. Trolleys and heavy items concentrate load and damage door equipment and car finishes, which is why buildings with regular goods movement usually separate it onto a lift built for it.

In the Tenka range, Tsuki works within an 800 x 900 mm shaft with no pit and 2,800 mm of overhead. Whether that fits a particular house is a survey question — where a shaft can land, and what the floor below it can carry.

No. The constraint is structure rather than floor area, and the compact models exist precisely for houses where space is tight. Tsuki needs an 800 x 900 mm shaft and no pit.

It keeps the whole house usable as a household changes, which is the part buyers and owners tend to value. Prawita Karya does not publish a figure for resale effect, because that depends on the local market rather than on the lift.

No. The difference is where the machine sits, not how well it works. MRL equipment is mature and standard across most mid-rise buildings. The practical difference is serviceability: working in a machine room is easier than working within a shaft.

It saves the floor area and construction of the machine room, which on a constrained site can be substantial. Whether that outweighs equipment cost depends on the building — it is a project calculation rather than a general rule.

Technically possible, rarely economic. The shaft, headroom and structural provisions were designed around the original configuration. Modernizing the existing installation usually delivers more for the same spend.