# My two post lift project



## Mark Chandler (Nov 7, 2011)

Hello fellow detailers, having purchased a new to us house in January this year the first task, sort out the garage :thumb:

The house came with a nice double garage, well a modern double garage so two large cars and you cannot open the doors unless you park top and tail, so the plan, stick one on top the other 

Everything thrown in from moving, you can see the Ebay £275 screw lift in the background










The roof in the garage is a truss design so not able to support weight, so off down the sawmills and some 8" x 2" joists and put along side the trusses on one side, here you can just make out the extras joists.










These are only bolted to the existing 6" trusses at the ends, the trusses are then left free as designed, the floor above sits on the new joists only gives me a lot of much needed storage room although height is not great so really stuff to keep space.

I had to refurbish the lift, replace the 3 phase motor with a single phase, clean the screws up and free the arms, still needs painting but it works 










Then bolt in place










I now bolted and glued more 8" x 2" joists across the roof space so they landed on the edge roof timbers, approximately 1m above the existing truss level and chopped out the trusses below










To put strength back in I took a diagonal from the wall plates up to my new 8" x 2" joists where the centre trusses were cut out so I have effectively replaced with an arch.

A few days later and I am here










Little car 6' in the air, and loads of room which has been consumed by stuff that will go to the shed when its made.

I have also been painting the walls and floor as I go, due to the terrible weather progress has been slow and working around bits and pieces as I have needed the dry space.

Hopefully I will have finished and tidied up in a month or so, I can then get my cars clean !!!

Cheers Mark


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## herbiedacious (Sep 27, 2010)

Is it feasible to extend either the front or back of the garage to get both cars in end to end? I think you would soon get sick of using a 2 post ramp. A four poster would be less of a chore if there's room for one.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2


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## GTISnoopy (Jul 16, 2011)

It's very common in the USA to store one car up on a 4 post lift while having the daily below.
The trouble is you really need a 12 ft ceiling to be able to do this.
You can buy proper storage lifts rather than general work lifts. 
The benpak etc website is.good to see what types are available.
I use to store one of my cars on a 4 post over the winter. 
It's a good way of having a 'more car' garage in a small space.
But I personally would not store a car on a 2 post for any length of time I've read too many negatives to storing them this way.


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## Mark Chandler (Nov 7, 2011)

I chose an old school screw lift post over a new chinese one, it has large feet so the floor bolts more stop it moving about.

Leaving the Aston suspended would not be a good thing as the suspension is mounted on rubber, a long time lift would not favour this, my little car above is rose jointed for track playing only, this one can hang forever without detriment.

I still have a couple of feet above the little cars cage on full lift, when working on the Aston I will have to watch the roof closely, two post lifts are great for working on cars and take up much less room. If you have the jacking beams with a 4 post then the gap narrows.

Lift £275 + collection, single phase motor £200 Joists and boards £300.

I,m looking forward to removing wheels at waist height and building a nice exhaust from stainless exhaust in the summer on the Aston, little car needs a spruce up and sides repainted from stone damage, lovely to do at 1/2 height on the lift :thumb:


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## Mr Face (Jan 22, 2009)

Mark, you are indeed a wicked man giving me all these idea's how to spend the kids pocket and dinner money :lol:

I look forward to seeing all the developments in the near future :thumb:


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## GTISnoopy (Jul 16, 2011)

I see the first post has been updated.

I agree about for maintenance the 2 post has more uses. The width and location of the posts always puts me off them myself. I've had a 4 post for 30 years now and regular use a mates 2 post as well there is plus and minus for both. I'm going to use the 4 post on the new garage I have planned for the main reason its what I'm use to and as I'm down sizing from a 5 car to a 2 car garage I may use it for car storage. As you say a pair of jacking beams narrows the difference. Im also seriously looking into fitting an infloor flush scissor wheel free lift as well for the jobs that are harder on the 4post.

Only thing I can say about yours is If it was me I would have consulted a structual expert to make sure there is enough strengthened and not caused any issue removing what you have.
Really Nice to see a thread on here with a lift on it too.
Also nice to see you found one were the screw was not worn out.
Do you have much room to work on it on the side nearest the wall?


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## Mark Chandler (Nov 7, 2011)

Space is unfortunately at a premium, the lift is an old German zippo, very commercial and wider that anything I have seen on EBay, I have maybe 1 yard spare to the wall so tight but workable.

The lift itself is scruffy, it was serviced and had new nuts 6 months before being dismantled unfortunately the screws did have surface rust so blasted this off, then buffed with a wire wheel before oiling and putting back together. 

Not ideal but as the it will only be run maybe a dozen times a year the increased wear on the driven nuts may never affect me. New spindles are over £800 + vat each as special order, I was able to get some old stock which are of a smaller diameter from a later lift so if it ever does drop to the safety nuts I will have to swap out.

I did seek advice on the trusses hence not boarding over the existing ones but having a seperate joists which hold this, also bolting and gluing the additional beams and triangulating, in the end only 2 trusses have been shortened, when I cut the old parts out there was no deflection, the saw cuts did not open or close and that was with snow on the roof so I am happy that the strength has been retained, the picture does not show the end result clearly, it is now stronger in this area.

I could have removed 4 trusses, I choose to only remove where the roof of the car pops through, also gives me more storage.

The cars in this garage only get used occasionally as my toys, I have a £1000 v40 I drive every day  also gives me room for a decent work bench, pillar drill and lathe on the right hand side.


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## Obsessed Merc (Apr 10, 2011)

Excellent way to gain more space. A pretty brave project.
Well done !


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## TopSport+ (Jul 22, 2012)

very nice mate


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## spike810 (Nov 28, 2011)

mark chandler said:


> hello fellow detailers, having purchased a new to us house in january this year the first task, sort out the garage :thumb:
> 
> The house came with a nice double garage, well a modern double garage so two large cars and you cannot open the doors unless you park top and tail, so the plan, stick one on top the other
> 
> ...


looking for a lift myself but they are all 3 phase,is it that easy just to change the motor ?


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## Mark Chandler (Nov 7, 2011)

Motors are made to standard sizes so swapping out is not an issue, you really need to take the old one off, measure and and contact suppliers, mine was from EBay, it runs slightly faster than the original.

You could of course use a single to three phase converter however the start load can be heavy so you would need a hefty one which would be more expensive than a single phase motor although far easier to wire.

On a three phase you just reverse a couple of wires, for single phase it is strapped for forward and reverse so you need to work out this.

Before I committed the additional £200 on a motor I did try a smaller convertor which did not cut the mustard and strapping loads of capacitors to make up the third phase which got it spinning with no power.

You can buy new ones lifts on eBay for under £1000 which are already single phase, these will not be as commercial as mine but much easier to commission as ready to go out the box.

Waffling really, is it easy ? Well it was for me but I am good with my hands, cost wise if I factored in my time not a lot of difference, however the quality of the machine and robustness is much higher this way.

Regards Mark


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