VT Planner Elevator Setups Guide

An elevator setup saves the car group, performance profile, door timings, passenger transfer timings, and service model.

Fixed Setup or Parameter Sweep

When you create a setup, VT Planner offers two options:

• Fixed setup: defines one reusable elevator group.
• Parameter sweep: explores multiple alternatives by varying the number of elevators, capacity, or speed.

Use Fixed setup to:

• create a base case;
• document a specific alternative;
• run multi-run simulations.

Use Parameter sweep to:

• compare many variants in a single launch;
• explore capacity or speed ranges;
• rank alternatives by results.

Setup details

Complete:

• Setup name: name of the alternative.
• Notes: capacity assumptions, zoning assumptions, commercial constraints, or any relevant context.

Example name: Option A · 4 cars @ 2.5 m/s.

Group definition

Main fields:

• Number of elevators: number of cars in the group.
• Capacity: rated capacity by mass.
• Capacity in pax: derived passenger capacity.

Motion profile

Defines motion performance:

• Rated speed;
• Acceleration;
• Jerk;
• Start delay;
• Levelling delay.

Default timings can sync recommended timings based on speed when you are editing from the workspace.

Doors and Passenger Transfer

In Doors, define:

• Door type;
• Door width;
• Door opening;
• Door closing;
• Door pre-opening.

In Passenger transfer, define:

• Loading time;
• Unloading time;
• Dwell upper floors;
• Dwell main floor;
• after-transfer timings where available.

Service Zones

If the project uses zoning, review the zone editor before saving. VT Planner may block saving if there are conflicts such as unserved floors or inconsistent assignments.

If you do not define zones, the setup works as full group service.

Common service model fields and concepts:

• Full group service: every car serves the complete set of served floors.
• Manual zoning: allows service zones to be defined.
• Zone count: number of zones.
• Zone name: operational name of each zone.
• Floor assignment: floors served by the zone.
• Transfer: transfer floors when a strategy requires a connection between zones.
• Car assignment: cars assigned to each zone.

Save and Select Setups

Select Save setup to save the configuration. It then appears in Saved elevator setups, where you can:

• select the active setup;
• review Kind, Cars, Capacity, Speed, and Status;
• edit the setup;
• archive setups you no longer use;
• continue to Analysis.

Outdated Setups

A setup may appear as Outdated if it was created for a previous version of the building. Before running an analysis, save a new or updated setup for the current building.