Garage Lifts

[ryancassidy]

Lighting - Just finished this the other day....

My Daughter parks under the lift as that garage is only a 1 car garage so she needed some lighting below. Having just put in a new Wifi enabled Garage door opener, I added this..

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0748 ... UTF8&psc=1

From there, I've got a 6amp DC supply (think Laptop power supply), running to two 16ft LED strips that are attached to the bottom of the lift runners. They fire UP on the inside, so you loose a lot of the light, but they provide more than enough light to park the car underneath and they don't blind you (like they would if they were firing down) when you pull in. Nice thing is with that controller they come on when someone uses the garage door or walks by the garage door sensor.

I put in a bunch of LED shop lights on the ceiling which really help for working in the garage. They would actually fit under the runners of the lift, but once again, very bright and in your face while pulling in.

I am considering putting some led strips firing up on the outside lip of the lift runners (outside not inside) to light under the car, but I haven't fully figured out how much/when I'll be using that lip just yet. Right now the only thing that sits on it is the drip tray and I don't really need that.

Ryan

[dr bob]

Your solution sounds good.

With the two-post Max-Jax lift, and no parking underneath, my need is for uplighting that can be stuck onto a lift column or arm, maybe to the tub, won't be damaged if I forget to remove it when I lower the car, and doesn't shine on my eyes while working under there. The lift raises the jack pads on the car about four feet off the floor, allowing work underneath while sitting on a roller seat. Some have come up with some pretty interesting Rube Goldberg rolling seat options, with lamp arms that stick out with reflector heads on the ends. I'm more likely to find or fabricate something like a mag-base fixture that would stick to steel under the car, and would fold thin if it happened to be forgotten for the ride down. It might come down to a few strips of cobb or 5050 LEDs in narrow reflector sections 12-18" long.

[ryancassidy]

I missed that it was a 2 post...

Maybe something like this... rechargeable atleast, but I'm struggling to envision anything wired that doesn't become cumbersome or has the movement necessary with the 2 post.

https://www.eastwood.com/eastwood-cob-l ... gle&wv=3.1

I think they have to make some that you can move around like the old desk lamps too.

Up lighting is difficult especially if it's at or below eye level for sure

[Tom]

In my former garage, I had a 100-watt light bulb on a retractable reel hanging directly above the engine compartment. I loved that thing. In the new garage, the height of the ceiling prevented me from replicating that, so I reluctantly got a few rechargeable light wands. Fast forward a few years and I'll never go back to the old bulb. With the rechargeable lights, you can stick them anywhere and get all the light you need exactly where you need it, without the cord and heat, etc. The Schumacher SL184 is my go-to favorite -- super strong magnetic base, and small and flexible enough to put lots of light wherever you want it. Harbor freight makes a super nice Braun that's very similar, and actually better and cheaper, but I've had two and they both failed fairly quickly. The Schumacher gets into tight places and is nearly as nimble as the HF version, but I swear you could throw the Schumacher into a jet engine and it would keep working.

[dr bob]

My current installed options are...

-- a 1970's Blue Point flourescent-on-a reel worklight, with the reel mounted at the ceiling. It has a couple loop hooks that allow it to be hung on available dangly bits.

-- A collection of those blue Harbor Freight giveaway magnetic puck lights, on internal batteries.

-- A couple of the wand lights that Tom describes, magnetic base, but mine are not rechargeable.

-- A couple options on LED headlights. The simple/cheap kind good for many things, up to a mini Klieg lighting setup with rechargeable batteries.

-- Mini flashlights, some of that same Harbor Freight giveaway flavor, up to a few larger rechargeable pieces.

I've seen some more serious Cobb LED worklights, in a 6x6 inch reflector format and magnetic base, that might do the trick. Similar in function to those Eastwood puck lights but a slightly larger form factor. They are pretty darn bright though, and the "reflector" is more a holder and heat sink, and isn't good at limiting the pattern to something slightly above "glaring directly into my eyes" if placed on a lift arm just outside the car footprint pointing up and in. The roller seat has my hat just a couple inches below the bottom of the car and at gong-level with the lift arms if rolling around carelessly. So, not a lot of vertical room to angle lights up from underneath.

It may be that some sticky 12V LED strip lights will go in a sectioned PVC pipe, with a couple magnets and some small chain or micro-cable to hang from the tub while I'm working. Or maybe in a routed channel in a piece of 1x lumber or large doweling. Rubber chair leg/cane tips on the ends. I'll get a little more creative next time I have the woodworking power tools out.

Right now I'm stuck to a chair with a no-lifting-anything mandate while some stitches heal up. Plenty of time to bother you all and brainstorm solutions to not-really-problems. The idle mind and all that.

[ryancassidy]

So this is a long time coming....

Still working with the lift, Its been rather busy so my time has been limited.... But here is what I've learned..

My Lift - Nationwide Ext Tall

• Comes with a 30amp Motor with a 20amp Plug (Yeah.. Go Figure. lol). So even though I ran a 20amp Circuit (was told 15amp) every blue moon it trips the breaker... Maybe I run another wire/plug one day, but note to self.

• You REALLY need to bolt these things down. Way sturdier. I can't imagine having a car up there unbolted.

• Get the pack of shims too. Lift operates way easier when its square and plumb.

• Grab a Laser Level - $30 from Amazon. Makes leveling much easier as a 4ft Level doesn't show as accurate as I know it could be. Lift doesn't have to be perfectly level, but I like it to be as there is more even weight distribution.

• Practice using it... You need to get a feel of the locks and when you can release or when you can lock the lift in place. Sounds easy, but give it sometime to get used to it

• Dollars to Donuts your installer won't adjust the lift properly for you. But the lift will also work differently with the Car on vs the Car Off (Mine does). So I'd adjust it with the car on the lift (bottom lock of course). All the locks need to "Click" at the sametime or as close as you can get them.

• I've got a 1.5" slope to my garage. If yours is sloped anymore you will most likely need some plates to help level the columns to the same plane

• The Ramps are stupid heavy and short... My guess is any Porsche will need race ramps or something like it, to get up to the lift effectively.

• I ended up installing lights under the ramps.. 2, 16ft LED Strips that I wired to come on when the Garage Door light comes up. Makes pulling underneath way easier.

• I ended up getting little plastic caps for the column bolts and some Yellow Safety tape to mark key column heights/releases etc.

More to come.. hoping to get a few pictures here soon. I ran out of time adjusting this weekend as I'm at the limits of the front cables (I can't adjust any more slack out of the longest one and the shortest one I can't add anymore slack to it). So I need to do some more thinking about the relation of the ladder bars to being level and then relation to the cables. Right now it is dead level (less than a 1/64" difference) when on the locks and 1/8" off of level when on the cables, but all 4 locks don't engage at the sametime still. They did when there was no car on it though it's a Thud Thud... I'll get it.. just need to muck with it more...

[Tom]

Great post. Your list should come with every new 4-post lift. They sell them like they are car elevators where all you need to do is push the up and down button, but the reality is all the things you listed. One thing I'd add to that list is to be careful about weight distribution. My lift is rated at 9000 pounds, but only if the tires are positioned exactly at the strongest points on the runners. The manual shows how the limit decreases very quickly as you move away from those spots. Short, heavy cars, like my old 450SL, can exceed the specs if not positioned well, and the runners can start to sag eventually if you exceed the limits.....

The ramps that came with the my lift were all steel, super heavy, and super steep. Pretty much unusable. I ended up getting long Porsche-friendly aluminum ramps from Summit Racing.

[ryancassidy]

Thats a really good point... Mine is one of those cheaper non bendpak lifts (I didn't want to have to use an air compressor for the locks frankly) so lets just say the Manual wasn't as detailed! So that's good to know. Interestingly the GT3RS fits with about 2 inches to spare on either side and is perfectly centered front to back

QQ I guess on your cables.. Mine have a jam nut with a fender washer on the top and bottom of the Column Top plate for the cables.. Many I've seen only have the nuts on top. If I remove the nut from the bottom, that would give me the extra cable length I need to get the locks all banging at the same time and the lift dead level on the cables. Anything jump out at you as bad or wrong in removing that lower nut/washer and putting the nut on top so there are two on top acting as jam nuts?

[Tom]

On mine, the cables only have a washer and one big nylock nut on top (no nut under the top of the column). So double nutting the top sure feels better than a Nylock, but I'm no engineer....

One piece of potentially related trivia. Porsche tow hooks have reverse threads for a related reason. They do that (as I understand it) because metal cables are twisted clockwise, such that when the are pulled tight, they will want to twist counter-clockwise. So rather than have a tow cable apply unscrewing forces on the tow hook, they reversed the thread so that the cable will tend to tighten the hook rather than loosen it. Unless your cables have swivel ends, that same principle would apply to the top nut on the cables. The cable will work to twist the bolt counter-clockwise (loosening it). Armed with that, it still feels like double nutting would be better.

If only there were an actual engineer on this thread....

One thing I do with all critical fasteners if put a bit of torque paint on them so you can see at a glance if a nut is starting to turn. Maybe not a bad idea for critical lift fasteners too....

[dr bob]

I used to be an engineer, but surrendered my cali license a decade or more ago. So a non-pro no-liability opinion at this point, maybe more like a casual discussion.

The wire-rope cables are not "twisted", but rather a bundle of maybe lightly twisted internal roped or counter-twisted layers, sometimes with a spiral-wound wrap on the outside intended only to keep the inner bundles together and protected from abrasion. If you still feel strongly about the possibility of the cables twisting as they move and maybe stretch some, use two thick grade-8 washers (think "die washers" from an industrial hardware store) between the lift frame and the nylock nut, and grease the mating washer faces to make a flat bearing. You can add a thin jamb-nut under the nylock but it's way overkill. Don't get grease on the threads of the cable ends when the nut will sit. There may be a cosmetic benefit to putting a nut on the other side of the frame, but it's more likely to harm than good if tightened, especially with the double-greased washers as a bearing. Just close enough to keep the end from flopping in the frame if the cable is totally relaxed. I expect a spring-tensioned sheave to keep that slack from happening normally.

Lubricate the cables with a wax-based lubricant like spray chain lube. It cuts down on inside wear in the cable bundles. Keep the outside of the cables clean, as dirt that gathers on the wrap will be forced into the bundles as the cable flexes and rolls over the pulleys especially under tension.

Do the initial cable "stretching" with the car on the ramps and elevated only a few inches, and not sitting on the safety stops. Most home-use four-post lifts seem to have one or maybe two cylinders doing all the work, and cable routed underneath to all four corners. One cylinder means there are somewhat different lengths of cable participating at each corner, so getting that initial stretching done is needed before you get serious about adjusting ramps for level.

As much as I like laser levels for convenience, consumer laser levels lack accuracy. The easier and cheaper answer is a "water level", something you can find near stud finders at Home Depot if you want a fancy one. Else a length of cheap clear vinyl tubing long enough to droop-stretch from one corner to all others will do fine. Small tubing works fine and can be easier to route and wrangle. Use water in it with a few drops of food coloring, and some binder clamps to hold the ends without pinching off the tubing while measuring, another pair for pinching while transporting so the fluid doesn't fall out. Level the columns first with shims (Most Important Step...), then the ramps after the cable stretching is done. The water level means you don't have to be able to 'see' the targets at the other corners; just set one end at the highest corner, then shim and adjust the others to get things perfect. If you are married to the laser level method, remember to "shoot" every reading from both directions, and halve the measured differential (error) as you adjust. Use blue painter's tape and a sharpie marker to keep track of your readings regardless of the tool you use.