General TR Hydraulic lift opinions/info needed

[Popeye]

Good points, all.

As a future owner of a four-post Bendpak, a few thoughts of mine: (None of my thoughts are correct, exclusive, etc... just my personal conclusions.)

1. Rotarys are awesome. Expensive. You can get pads to store a car on a two post lift, the pads are also awesomely expensive.
2. Need good floor for 2-post. Lots of torque / moment at the point where the lift attaches to the ground.
3. Four post lifts can be "mobile" - yeah right. But in theory you can get casters and wheel the thing around the garage. Or into your driveway. Not sure how practical this is, if moving a lift is more a controlled collision or a precise move. Point being, keep the height of your door in mind when selecting.
4. Ceiling height. I won't be able to stand under my car, but will be able to park under it.
5. Will you do a lot of work on cars - is a pneumatic hydraulic jack better for you? Jacking trays plus a cylinder jack require sufficient ground clearance. Problem with my Ferrari. (Joking...I wish.)
6. Consider installation or pick up. Most lifts are delivered by truck and you need a forktruck to unload - drivers don't want to sit around for a slow unload. My plan is to have the lift delivered to a Truck Depot, rent an appropriately long U-Haul truck, have the lift loaded with a forktruck, then take my sweet time unloading with my engine hoist.
7. Also with pickup - some lifts are packaged to be lifted from the ENDS of the box - a bit counter-intuitive. Lifting by the middle may damage / bend parts. Make sure the truck depot knows this; preferably before damaging your new goods.
8. Garagejournal.com has postings ad nauseum, very informative on the subject of lifts.
9. One more point (edit), there is a certification for lifts. ALI, https://www.autolift.org/ali-directory-of-certified-lifts/. Up to you if you want certification, but for my personal safety and property value, I will buy an ALI certified lift.

Again, my thoughts and opinions... yours may be different. (And that's OK! )

 

[Geo Hahn]

6. Consider installation or pick up. Most lifts are delivered by truck and you need a forktruck to unload - drivers don't want to sit around for a slow unload. My plan is to have the lift delivered to a Truck Depot, rent an appropriately long U-Haul truck, have the lift loaded with a forktruck, then take my sweet time unloading with my engine hoist.

For the price of pizzas and some Guinness I assembled a crew to unload my lift and put the 8 big pieces into position:

Instructions posted for all to see (and modify):

Everyone (even the FedEx guy) signed the bottom of the left runway... where I see the names & dates each time I pull into the garage:

No Guinness until the work was done:

One caution about 2 post lifts and IRS cars. I saved this pic from an eBay listing where an E-Type had been stored too long on the lift. The seller didn't even realize that the rubber mounts had finally failed and the entire rear end was hanging from the driveshaft:

 

[Popeye]

That is a nice garage!! (Love the floor. And love the gigantic cactus outside the garage door - a rare sight for someone in the wet Pittsburgh area!)

Good idea with beer pizza bribe. I plan to do the same, plus offer service of the lift for quick car work (e.g. oil change, brakes ... not rebuild front suspension over the winter).

 

[ichthos]

Thanks for all the input everyone. Looks like I have a lot to think about and read yet. Not sure what lift I will go for yet, but I will probably install the floor as if I am getting a two post so I have the option of deciding later.

 

[PeterK]

I have a Bend-Pak 4 post and use a (search for)" motorcycle scissor jack" on the jacking trays. Closed, the jack is less than 4" tall and it goes over 16". Very handy everywhere, even for jacking building projects. This is mine https://www.discountramps.com/motorcycle-lift-jack/p/MC-JACK/ although knocks off can be had on ebay for less.

5. Will you do a lot of work on cars - is a pneumatic hydraulic jack better for you? Jacking trays plus a cylinder jack require sufficient ground clearance. Problem with my Ferrari. (Joking...I wish.)

 

[Popeye]

Nice solution!

 

[Tybalt]

There is another option out there for floor mounted units, a single post lift. I ran across this in a picture linked on another site and dug around until I found the source.

https://aclifts.com/products-2/park...single-post-car-lift-model-m1-4-5-and-m1-6-5/

It looks to be a decent option if space is at a premium (why I've been dithering around and not pulled the trigger, see posts #3 and #15). I'm still playing around with how to get the four poster in there and not have too bad of an obstacle course of lift columns to maneuver through and it's just not looking good. The big downside is price. There are two big factors driving that, first is that being a single post everything in the lift and column support is extra beefy, the second is that it is a US made unit, not imported. Time to start playing around with another set of layouts using the single post lift and then do a balance of a better fit vs costs.

 

[Bremer]

Bringing this thread back (well, actually, it's not that old).
I may be in the market for a 4 post lift soon. I'd like it to have the versatility to accommodate both the TR3 as well as my half ton truck (about 5000 lbs). After some measuring I found that the issue lies in the difference in track width between the two vehicles. A narrow track width lift will work for the TR3 (39'' between tires on the inward side), but it's too narrow for the truck (82'' between tires on the outward side). Conversely when choosing a wide track lift.
The only lift I have found so far that could handle both is the Bendpak HD-9 with adjustable width between ramps. Certainly a nice lift, but I wonder if there are others.
To the members with a 4 post lift, can you confirm that your width between ramps is fixed? Is there perhaps a safe modification that could be made to make it adjustable?

Thank you!

 

[Geo Hahn]

...To the members with a 4 post lift, can you confirm that your width between ramps is fixed? Is there perhaps a safe modification that could be made to make it adjustable?!

Mine (Eagle Lift but typical Chinese 4-post) is 'fixed' in the sense that there is no provision to change the width. I can certainly see ways it could be done, but I would be reluctant to modify something that will be holding a ton or two over my head.

 

[Bremer]

Ok, thank you.

 

[BRSLimited]

Just an FYI, when you drill the holes in the floor for the bolts you want to drill all the way through the slab. If one on the bolts messed up when your putting it in you can never pull them out, you have to drive them down through to put another bolt in. Also if you ever move and want to take the hoist with you then you can knock the bolts through the floor to make it easier to lay the posts down. It's a real bear to try to lift it off the bolts. I've learned that lesson the hard way.

 

[Rut]

Just an FYI, when you drill the holes in the floor for the bolts you want to drill all the way through the slab. If one on the bolts messed up when your putting it in you can never pull them out, you have to drive them down through to put another bolt in. Also if you ever move and want to take the hoist with you then you can knock the bolts through the floor to make it easier to lay the posts down. It's a real bear to try to lift it off the bolts. I've learned that lesson the hard way.

Im currently building a house and shop and the specs for 2 post lifts (10k#) require a minimum of 4” of 3000 psi concrete. That said I incorporated 6” footings for my lift on the advice of the concrete contractor because in his experience the mounting bolts would not be secure if the holes completely penetrated the slab. The securing bolts/studs are the type that are driven into the slab to make them expand. I’ve attached a link to the style being used.
Rut
https://www.concretefasteners.com/1...MIjLnutOnb2QIVQbXACh0ngAYjEAQYAiABEgL6g_D_BwE

 

[BRSLimited]

That is the correct style bolt to use. My advise is from experience installing lifts and yes I trust my life under them after they have been installed. If you talk to the lift installers they will all say to drI'll all the way through, it has no effect on the strength of the concrete.

 

[mgedit]

Well I decided on a 4-post lift and could not be happier. Major advantage for me is being able to store 2 cars in our rather prolonged non-driving season. TR6 fits easily, but the TR3 take a bit of care to make sure wheels are properly positioned. I added a large mirror on a bit of an angle and painted the edge of the ramps white. Makes it much easier to drive on with the TR3, and it is useful when other club members come to use the lift

Cheers, Mike

 

[Rubicon]

I went with a 2 post maxjax. It’s a 6000lbs one but it’s portable, so all you have to do it set where you want the post set the anchors and voila done. And if you have multiple vechilces that are different width all you do is another set of anchors and your good to go. I’ll try and get some pics of it set up, but a quick google will show you one as well