The revision of EN81-1 and EN81-2 to become EN81-20 and EN81-50

1998 saw the last full edition of EN81-1/2 published in order to satisfy the requirements of the Lifts Directive. Since that date more than 400 experts in lift technology have been rewriting those two base standards and in 2014 that work will finally come to fruition with the publication of EN 81-20/50. This paper addresses the reasons for some of the changes, elaborates on the major differences to the new EN 81-20/50 standards from their EN 81-1/2 counterparts and outlines the implementation of these documents which are set to become the first global prescriptive standards for lifts.