THRILL FOR DANCERS

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 139, 9 December 1929, Page 9

THRILL FOR DANCERS

A FLOOR THAT RISES

(From "The Post's" Representative.) LONDON, 4th October.

By means of an installation costing some £10,000, the dancing floor at th<» Savoy Restaurant can now be raised a height of 25 inches at a moment's notice. Just before the beginning of the cabaret entertainment one night this week, a button-was pressed, and, to the astonishment of most of the guests, the whole space of polished flooring moved impressively upwards, while safety folding shutters glided into position at the sides to prevent the possibility of accidents. The rising floor is claimed to be the only one of its kind in the world, and is a remarkable example of hydraulic engineering. It weighs 1G tons and has a lifting capacity of eighth tons. The dance surface is of Balkan, oak, and the whole is raised by eight electrically controlled hydraulic lifting rams. ° Mr. Beeves Smith, managing director of the hotel, said that the management had decided to build the new floor to enable guests iv every part of therestaurant to get a better view of the cabaret entertainment than; was possible on the level, and also to enable the performance to be more dramatically presented. "The hotel ?s chief engineer, Mr. Paye," ho said, "working in cooperation with a well-known firm of hydraulic engineers, has completed the task in six months, and most of the work has been dono between 2 a.m. and 10 a.m., so as not to interfere with daily business. The installation cost about £10,000; and special hydraulic engines with hundreds of feet of-high-pressure, piping had to be built in. The floor is raised by the pressure of thousands of gallons of water from the artesian wells below the Savoy, forced up at a pressure of 9001b to the square inch.' 3