A great storage idea I found here...

I have a mezanine in my shop but only have ladder access to it and heavy items are akward and dangerous to try to carry up. I have a 20 ton press, engine hoist and a couple engine stands that are either in the way and not rusting or out of the way and rusting outside. I saw someone here who cut a trap door and rigged up a HF winch overhead on a track to hoist heavy things up and roll them to the side for storage. I'm sorry whoever you are that I couldn't locate the post to provide you proper credit for the idea.

I had a piece of 1 1/2" x 2" tubing 8' long for the spine and some 1/2" id bearings laying around for the rollers. I bought some 1 x 1/4" angle and welded it to the tube to make the track. The track was lag screwed into the beams with (6) 3/8" x 4" screws. I also had a HF 440 lb winch that I was not using.

I just cut a 3' x 4' hole in the floor with a circular saw and reinforced the cutout with 2 x 4's for the door. I cut the floor joists back 1 1/2" and framed the opening with 2 x 8. The door pulls completely out and is out of the way when lifting. My heaviest tools weigh less than 250 lbs and the winch lifted them easily up to the 2nd story floor using only the single line.

Nice work, that is a great idea. I brought my welder home from the store in the bed of my toyota pickup. I had to do something simalar with pulleys & rope. Please note its weight was 400+ pounds. I did 2 shive up 2 shive down to gain advantage. Lots of pulling later I got it up far enough to drive out from under. Wish I'd had something like yours, Maybe a touch more capacity.

I would like to know how many 1000's of those little hoists HF has sold.
I have one and a need for 2 more.

Like the bumper sticker "My other car is a xxxxx". My other HF winch is a 12' jib crane. Probably one of the handiest gadgets I have built for my shop. I have picked up a bench mill (750 lbs) and put in a pickup truck. This is a 1,300 lb capacity model.



Jim

More info on the Jib Crane?? would like to build one for my place.

this is a great idea. Defiantly doing this in my garage. What should i do to accommodate it. How big should i make the "hole"

Bevis said:

More info on the Jib Crane?? would like to build one for my place.

Click to expand...

First you have to make sure the vertical member you are attaching to is pretty substantial. Mine is 2 4x6 in a tee orientation glued and bolted together. It is located at the bottom by angles shot into the floor and at the top by a 4x12 ridge beam. At the height of the boom attachment it is tied into the mezanine floor which is fastened at the other end to a 12" block retaining wall that makes up the rear wall of my shop. Do I need that much strength? Don't know because I'm not an engineer but it has picked up a 750 lb load at the end of its 12' travel and put it the back of a pickup.








The beam is 2x4x1/8" wall tubing that has barn door track welded to each side. The track is rated at 450 lbs each so I should be good up to 900 lbs but I probably won't try to lift that much. I use a HF 1,300 lb hoist. The threaded holes used to attach the mounting straps are the perfect distance apart to use these trolleys if you get some longer metric bolts.
http://www.natman.com/prodinfo_itemdetail.asp?cat=8&sub=24&prod=53&catalog=1164&item=5063
The pivot is machined from solid stock and uses a 3/4" bolt top and bottom.
I have a brace in back that goes from the top pivot up to the 4x12 ridge beam that has a 3/4" turnbuckle to take up the tension.

I have $129 in the winch, the tracks were $39 each from Tractor Supply and the trolleys were less than $30 for all 4. All the rest was $0.45 per lb from the scrap yard. That and the car rotisserie were the best back savrers I have made for the shop.

Jim

sofob0909 said:

this is a great idea. Defiantly doing this in my garage. What should i do to accommodate it. How big should i make the "hole"

Click to expand...

How big is what you need to get up through the hole? I made mine ~ 4' x 3' because the floor joists were on 16" centers (4') and I had 3' between the cabinets down below and the flourescent lights.

Jim