Headquartered in the Spring Arts Tower, Los Angeles Elevator Services is one the few family owned elevator companies in L.A. In fact, if you’ve been in an elevator in DTLA in the last nine years the chances are high that the Brown brothers have serviced it. Michael Brown along with his younger brother, Scott, started their elevator repair business in 2004.

The Brown Brothers then recruited another brother making them a three man team of brothers responsible for the lives of thousands of people every day in Los Angeles.

The workings of some of our elevators can become complicated and require special maintenance and mechanics. The buildings of Downtown Los Angeles, many being roughly 100-years-old, require routine check ups and repairs on a regular basis.

While most people just ride in the cab or catch a glance of the shaft or “hoiseway,” elevator drive mechanisms can be quite complicated.

In the beginning, elevator drive mechanisms were powered by steam and water hydraulic pistons or by hand. Then came the “traction” elevator, where the cabs were pulled up by steel ropes over a deeply grooved pulleys. The weight of the car is balanced by a counterweight literally “a ton of bricks.”  More rare are two elevators that are built so that their cars would always move synchronously in opposite directions, using each other’s counterweight, those were the good old old old days.

Still, elevators are all different and with each building comes its own requirements like different number of floors, dimensions, capacities and usage patterns. Elevator doors protect riders from falling into the shaft, the most common configuration is two panels that meet in the middle, and slide open laterally, but there are still a few one slabbers around left from the 70s.

Some elevators hoist up to six thousand pounds, go as fast as 22 miles per hour, and stretch to the sky over 190 stories. Although most of the elevators in Downtown aren’t that fast or vast, our historic elevators do come with timeless aesthetics, brass fixtures, marble flooring and beautiful paneling. Not to mention they are located in some of the most artistically handcrafted buildings ever designed.

Los Angeles Elevator Services is currently working on an elevator that has been out of use for over 25 years and is considered historical. “We bring these old elevators to life.” Brown continues to grow his portfolio and work with clients in Santa Monica Torrence, San Pedro, Long Beach and Santa Barbara.
When asked about his working relationship with his younger brother, Scott, Brown said, “I don’t know what I would do without him. Actually to be honest with you, if he didn’t work with me I’d probably be working for someone else right now.” While Los Angeles Elevator Services is not necessarily a family business, Michael Brown keeps it all in the family. Two of his five siblings work with him and hopes to get his daughters interested in the trade.

“In order to make yourself successful, you have to persevere. Be committed.” says Brown.
When Brown first started in this industry he was a sort of door-to-door salesman; knocking on doors to solicit business, and even worked pro bono in many cases just to make a name for himself and to display his handiwork. It paid off. Nine years later he now employs seven people to work alongside him in the field.  He recognized that being an entrepreneur in this city would be a struggle but along the way many people have used their resources to help Brown build his dream.

Michael Brown began as an aircraft mechanic while in the Army over 25 years ago.
His company now specializes in service, repair and modernization of elevators. Rest assured the Brown’s have any elevator safety anxieties taken care of by preventing any unforeseeable mishaps such as breakdowns or worse by delivering dependable and qualified elevator services fueled by years of experience.

5 MYTHS ABOUT
ELEVATORS

Riding on elevators evokes anxiety for some – so we asked Brown to help us dispell some popular elevator myths.

MYTH 1
Do you believe
elevators are held up by
only one rope that can break, leaving passengers in a free falling car?

TRUTH
Elevators are supported by multiple steel cables.
Each cable alone can
support a fully loaded car. The only elevator fall due to a complete cable system failure occurred during the 1940’s when an airplane crashed into the Empire Sate Building severing all the cables on a particular elevator.

MYTH 2
Is it true that an
overcrowded elevator
will fall?.

TRUTH
An overloaded car
will normally not move.
The doors will stay open and a buzzer may ring until enough people get off of the elevator to reduce the weight.

MYTH 3
Some people believe the hall doors will open when an elevator is not there.

TRUTH
The elevator is designed so that the car controls the opening of the hall door. When the car arrives at a landing, the car door engages the hall door and the car door operator then opens both sets of doors. If the car is not at the landing, it cannot trigger the hall doors to open.

MYTH 4
Some people believe that if an elevator is stuck between floors that they are in danger of falling and should try to get out.

TRUTH
Attempting to leave the car on your own could result in serious injury. Elevator cars are designed to be “safe rooms”, and the safest place is inside the car. You should ring the alarm and utilize the emergency telephone if the elevator is equipped with one. You should only leave the car with the assistance of professional rescue personnel.

MYTH 5
Pushing the call button repeatedly will make the elevator come faster.

TRUTH
Patience is a virtue