Nowadays, stairlifts are becoming increasingly popular. There is a wide variety of stairlifts available suited to your home. Whether it be a curved or straight stairlift, Halton Stairlifts have the perfect solution for you.
Here at Halton Stairlifts, we offer a range of lifts to meet your needs. However, it can be confusing to know which one is best suited for your home as well as the key requirements that they need to fit seamlessly onto your staircase.
Throughout this blog, we will be exploring the different types of stairlifts available, the differences between straight and curved stairlifts as well as discussing whether straight stairlifts are faster than curved. For more information, read on.
Differences Between Straight and Curved Stairlifts
The main difference between the two stairlifts is the rail. Stairlifts come in various shapes and sizes to suit your home; sometimes it can be confusing trying to differentiate between them all. Straight stairlifts are lifts that are made for staircases with no turns, landings or curves and come with a straight track.
However, curved stairlifts are completed with custom-made tracks for staircases with landings, curves or turns. Curved stairlifts tend to be more expensive than straight stairlifts due to their bespoke designs.
To travel around a corner with your stairlift, you need a special rail that bends at the same angle as your staircase so it is the perfect fit. The bespoke design of the rails means that the rail takes up less of your stair space.
All curved stairlifts come with made-to-measure rails whereas straight stairlifts don’t. This, therefore, means that the cost of curved stairlifts is higher compared to straight stairlifts.
Are Straight Stairlifts Faster Than Curved?
Here at Halton Stairlifts, we design our lifts to ensure that they travel at an appropriate speed. Your stairlift will always be controlled by you, so you can rest assured that you are in control. If you ever need to stop your stairlift for any reason, you can do so with ease.
New and reconditioned stairlifts travel very slowly at around 0.15 metres per second which is equivalent to 0.34 miles per hour. We believe that it is important that your stairlifts move at a slow rate to ensure that all of our customers feel safe and comfortable as they travel up and down the stairs.
On average, straight stairlifts normally take around 30-60 seconds to complete your journey up and down the stairs. But, are curved stairlifts faster than straight ones?
Curved stairlifts are built for staircases with landings, bends or curves and are made to measure to fit seamlessly into your home. Due to this, your stairlift will probably take longer to reach the top or bottom of your stairs.
Straight stairlifts, however, don’t need custom-made tracks when they are fitted to your stairs. This is because straight stairlifts don’t have any bends or curves therefore a straight track can be fitted to your staircase. Because straight staircases are one straight run, you are more likely to get from A to B more quickly.
Overall, straight stairlifts are slightly faster compared to curved lifts as they have no bends or curves whereas curved stairlifts do. The installation time for straight stairlifts is also much quicker compared to curved lifts. This is because straight stairlifts don’t require custom-made rails and can be fitted straight onto your staircase.
Factors That Affect the Speed of Your Stairlift
Although straight stairlifts are relatively quicker than curved lifts, there is still a range of factors that can affect the speed of your lifts. For example, there are a variety of factors that can affect the speed of your curved stairlift such as:
- The length of the track
- Additional parts (custom-made tracks)
- Automated swivel seats
These are some of the reasons that can affect the speed of your stairlift. Automated swivel seats can impact the operating speed of your lift by enabling the seat to rotate automatically at the top or bottom of your stairs.
Curved Stairlifts
Here at Halton Stairlifts, we offer a wide range of curved stairlifts suited to your home. We are a Checkatrade-approved company and provide excellent quality stairlifts to allow you to travel up and down your stairs in a stress-free way.
We offer both new and reconditioned stairlifts for curved and straight lifts, so you can rest assured that there is an option for you. All stairlifts are constructed in our workshop by our experienced engineers who ensure that the stairlifts meet your requirements.
We offer a wide range of curved stairlifts suited to your home. The curved lifts we offer are:
- Halton Style Curved Stairlift
- Halton Curved Signature Stairlift
- Halton Signature Plus Curved Stairlift
- Halton Ultimate Curved Stairlift
- New Halton Dual Rail Curved Stairlift
- New Halton Heavy Duty Dual Rail Curved Stairlift
- New Halton Infinity Curved Stairlift
- Hinged Rail Stairlifts
And much more! For more information on the curved stairlifts we offer, make sure to check out our curved stairlifts section on our website!
Straight Stairlifts
If you are someone who suffers from mobility issues and feels like you would benefit from that extra bit of support, then our stairlifts are the solution for you. Here at Halton Stairlifts, we offer slimline stairlifts that are designed for straight stairlifts to fit seamlessly into your home.
Completed with stop-start technology allows your lift to move effortlessly up and down your staircase. All our stairlifts run on batteries in case of a power cut no matter the type of stairlift. Some of the straight stairlifts we offer are:
- Reconditioned Halton Slimline Stairlift
- New Halton Slimline Stairlift
- Halton Heavy Duty Stairlifts
- Halton Sit and Stand Stairlifts
- Halton Synergy Straight Stairlift
And more. Here at Halton Stairlifts, we have over 22 years of experience in this industry and we go above and beyond for our clients. We offer a free home survey, no-obligation quotes as well as no-pressure selling. Finance is also an option so you don’t have to worry about paying for your lift as there is an option for everyone.
Neil is the founder of Halton Stairlifts. He has years of experience installing stairlifts across the UK. With an eagerness to help those with mobility issues get up the stairs, Neil understands how important it is for a seamless and straightforward approach to installing stairlifts to help those in need quickly.