LIPS- a few Light to Heavy Round Doors

Huw Eastwood

Lips made countless grades and styles of rectangular doors over the years, but until recently I wasn’t aware of these two lighter variations on their round design.

Lightweight Lips-Vago- never seen anything of this 20 bolt model before- it’s very similar appearance to the Fichet Torino I posted a while back (Location Unknown)

Medium Lips with some nice details in the photo- see how many you can spot. This ones in one of the main central banks in Brussels

Heavy- this is a left-hand version of the 40-ton door illustrated at the back of the well known Vincent Eras book. After many bank take-overs and name changes, I’m pretty sure this one’s what is now the main AMRO Bank, Rotterdam

wylk

A collection of such images was found at http://beeldbank.regionaalarchiefdordrecht.nl/index.cfm?fuseaction=search.doquery&field1=trm_naam&value1=brandkasten&tohistory=1 which may need to be run through the Bing translator.

This might be a good time to ask, is it “Lips” or “LIPS”? If the latter, is it an abbreviation for something?

wylk

The Rotterdam bank is explored in http://www.rotterdam.nl/Clusters/Stadsontwikkeling/Document%202013/Plannen/Coolsingel%20119/tekeningen/Bouw-%20en%20kleurhistorische%20verkenning.pdf

I tried to translate it using Google but it’s too big. Does anybody know of a free way to translate 22 MB of PDF?

Huw Eastwood

Well memory fails again- a quick look at the 40 ton door in the Vincent Eras book reveals its actually the same one hinged left hand.
there’s also this shot of it on the vertical turning and boring mill

And this one of a factory fitter doing final finishing work

BTW- LIPS is the surname of the companies founder, so it can be written Lips but the company always used capitals as their registered mark.

Huw Eastwood

Here’s a nice old nostalgic shot for the LIPS thread

wylk

This image also seems to show a Lips door at some sort of exposition –

Huw Eastwood

Most of these had the hinge carriages exposed with the fixing studs or bolts on show- all neatly concealed with trim on this one.

Nice colourful impression from 1910

wylk

The first image looks like early 1960s, I’d guess (clothing style and architecture). But notice on the right there seems to be an electrical cord snaking through the doorway. This was common in the early days of electricity, being an add-on. My impression is that this practice continued for some time due to concerns over having a hole in a vault wall to pass wiring; the vault should be hermetic. A conduit could allow flood waters to enter, for example. Or it could allow other havoc by evil forces (e.g. somebody might try to push explosives through the conduit to blow the vault apart).

But well before the 1960s I thought the common practice was to somehow get power (and alarm circuits and possibly ventilation) into the vault using a secure method of some sort. So this picture seems unusual.

Huw Eastwood

wylk

I believe those last two images are from Madrid, Spain. Currently the Cervantes Institute at calle Alcalá Nº 49. The interior has two levels and seems quite attractive. Some web sites claim this is actually in the Bank of Spain across the street.

Do we have any members in Madrid?

Huw Eastwood

wylk

Another view of the Madrid vault interior:

Huw Eastwood

An intricately stepped rectangular Lips door, sadly in an abandoned state with the pressure handwheel missing.

mercury

It is a shame to see the door in such a state of disrepair.

I notice that the pressure bar mechanism uses a cylinder with a cutout on the ends of the bars, that mates with a pin on the door jamb.

I don’t recall seeing a setup like this before, I’m used to seeing an offset pin on the pressure bar end that mates with a cutout on the door jamb.

Is the pressure bar setup on this door unusual in this way?

Huw Eastwood

Well spotted mercury, the cut-outs and pins are indeed reversed. Lips seemed to use both configurations, this for their heavier doors but the more common pins on the door cams on their lighter range doors.

Huw Eastwood

Few more close shots of their 40 ton door (the one shown in the Vincent Eras book). I’m having a total clear-out of stored pics of all locks/keys safes etc, so will be posting around relevant threads as I find/delete them.

An unusual view from inside

Huw Eastwood

Deliveries of their 26 ton and 37 ton round doors

nathanbonstein

great photos and info,all you gentlemen are great
thank you

Huw Eastwood

Another old nostalgic pic of doors and frames under construction in the Lips factory.