2 Post Lift Overhead Height Question

[Grizzlyman]

I am building a house with a 36 x 40 garage. I want to install a two post lift, top cross bar style. I have searched and read a lot of threads regarding this topic but I'm still undecided on how to achieve my overhead clearance. My house will have a 7/12 roof pitch with 9' ceilings. I'm going with a 7/12 on the garage. I don't want the garage to over power the house so I would like to keep the garage ceiling height to 9 or 10'. I have quoted 20' of flat trusses and 20' of scissors trusses. The garage will be 40' deep so I was going to use the flat trusses the first 20' and scissor trusses in the back half of the shop to gain overhead clearance for the lift. Can I get by with a 9' ceiling in the garage and have enough overhead clearance with the scissor truss? The largest vehicle will be a 2500 HD 4x4 on the lift. I am 6' and would like to be able to raise the cars high enough to stand under.

 

[Rodhotz]

not gonna happen, mine is at 10' and i can't get under it without having to stoop over, but then again i am 6'4" so no matter what rack i use i am stooping.

 

[pattenp]

The only numbers I can throw out to you is to have at least 12' to 12 1/2' of height at a distance of 6' to 7' left and right of the center of the lift. Which way will the lift be orientated to the scissor truss? Clear floor 2 post lift only lift a certain height because of the overhead bar. A rough number is 74" lift.

 

[fflintstone]

you need an honest 12' for a truck on a hoist.

 

[Grizzlyman]

The only numbers I can throw out to you is to have at least 12' to 12 1/2' of height at a distance of 6' to 7' left and right of the center of the lift. Which way will the lift be orientated to the scissor truss? Clear floor 2 post lift only lift a certain height because of the overhead bar. A rough number is 74" lift.

If that is the case a 10' ceiling would suffice. My scissor trusses shows a rise of
5'2". So if I have a 10' ceiling it would go up to 15'2" in the center of the truss. Not sure what the drop is out to from the center. This is a copy of my scissor truss from the quote. The lift post will be to the left and right of maximum center height. i know I will have enough clearance in the center of the ceiling not sure about 6' out on either side.

 

[Rodhotz]

That is the problem i have with mine...the hood and trunk want to hit before the lift is all the way up. you will need the at least 11' on each end to clear. the peak is no problem it is the down slope that causes the problem.

 

[joebiodiesel]

Maybe you should pick your lift, then decide on a ceiling height. I have 14 ft walls, and put in an extended height Atlas lift. For the first time in my life I can stand erect under a vehicle on a lift, including my Dodge 2500 Diesel.
Joe

 

[zoowho2]

I am building a house with a 36 x 40 garage. I want to install a two post lift, top cross bar style. I have searched and read a lot of threads regarding this topic but I'm still undecided on how to achieve my overhead clearance. My house will have a 7/12 roof pitch with 9' ceilings. I'm going with a 7/12 on the garage. I don't want the garage to over power the house so I would like to keep the garage ceiling height to 9 or 10'. I have quoted 20' of flat trusses and 20' of scissors trusses. The garage will be 40' deep so I was going to use the flat trusses the first 20' and scissor trusses in the back half of the shop to gain overhead clearance for the lift. Can I get by with a 9' ceiling in the garage and have enough overhead clearance with the scissor truss? The largest vehicle will be a 2500 HD 4x4 on the lift. I am 6' and would like to be able to raise the cars high enough to stand under.

answer is no..go to mohawk for all the lift info you will need.
I have the same set up you do and my red car is 40" tall and I cannot use a lift and have room to stand under it and I am 5'9" My p/u truck would have been impossible so at 40" the red car was extremely iffy so I gave up on the idea of a lift and saved a lot of bucks..5k or so

 

[RTcat]

Grizzlyman,

Click on my picture in this thread. http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=200220

Not sure of the techinal name for this truss (I call it a "coffered" truss) but this is what I used in my shop. Shop is 10' high ceilings except where these trusses are. They have a 3' rise. IIRC the 3' rise runs for 14'. Truck/vehicles fit up into this area nicley. Total truss width (width of the shop) is 32'. I waited on drywalling unitl after the hoist was installed so the crane on the installer truck could get maximum height to stand up the columns. Enjoy your building process

 

[Grizzlyman]

Grizzlyman,

Click on my picture in this thread. http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=200220

Not sure of the techinal name for this truss (I call it a "coffered" truss) but this is what I used in my shop. Shop is 10' high ceilings except where these trusses are. They have a 3' rise. IIRC the 3' rise runs for 14'. Truck/vehicles fit up into this area nicley. Total truss width (width of the shop) is 32'. I waited on drywalling unitl after the hoist was installed so the crane on the installer truck could get maximum height to stand up the columns. Enjoy your building process

Thanks for the info. Yes, they are called coffer trusses. I looked into these but felt the scissor trusses would work out better for my application. I am also looking at air over water in the ground lifts. This may simplify things and give me more room in the shop.

 

[pattenp]

The rise at center is 5'2" so at 6' from center it will be 3'5", and at 7' from center it will be 3'2". The rise per foot is 62"/18' = 3.444". With 10' walls and the lift placed centered with the peak there should be no problem. Even 9' walls should work, but the 10' would be a safe bet. Just look at some 2 post lift specs for what you may want to make sure of the width and height.

 

[NHBandit]

It never ceases to amaze me how many guys who are planning on having a lift don't plan their ceiling height to compensate. They find a way to work around a ceiling that's too low for the sake of "looks" or something on those lines. I can understand the need for short lifts for guys who have an existing garage but when you're starting with a clean slate shoot for the moon ! I suppose if you're only going to use your lift for brake jobs & roating tires it's cool but if you plan to stand up under your vehicles a short lift won't magically allow you to do that. You are still limited by how high you can go before the roof of the car hits the trusses. No putting a vehicle up with the hood open either. Garage doors ? They will be in the way if you plan to work in the nice weather with them open. I knew all this upfront when I designed my new shop having dealt with it in the past. Here is my new shop. 12' walls with scissor trusses and 10' doors. I can do anything I want on the lift with pretty much any vehicle I want other than maybe a high cube conversion van. It's nice to be able to just run the lift up until it hits the stops without having to get the wife to watch & tell me when to stop.

 

[pattenp]

NHBandit, the OP is building a house with an attached garage and I'm sure he has some design limits to stay within. He not building some monstrous shop like you have hooked to his house just to have the lift fit. I can fully understand your position with what you have.

Edit: Well I assume the garage is attached.

 

[Rodhotz]

Mine was existing so i have what i have. Had i built ir it would have been 15' walls and 13' doors so my fork lift would have fit in it.

 

[Grizzlyman]

NHBandit, the OP is building a house with an attached garage and I'm sure he has some design limits to stay within. He not building some monstrous shop like you have hooked to his house just to have the lift fit. I can fully understand your position with what you have.

Edit: Well I assume the garage is attached.

Yes, you are correct, my garage will be attached to the house so I do have some limitations with my ceiling height. I need to maintain a smooth transition. Garage door height and placement will not come into play. As I said before, my shop will be 40' deep. The area where the lift will be placed is 20' x 36'. The garage doors will be where the flat trusses are placed. I could go a little deeper with the scissor trusses. I need some flat trusses to install the HVAC system in the attic and some storage. It sounds like I can go with a 10' garage ceiling and have enough room for the 12' lift post and plenty of room to fully extend the lift. Keep in mind I will be centering the lift under the highest point of the scissor truss ceiling. My ceiling will be the opposite of what is show in the above photos.

 

[McKay]

You should be able to get more pitch on them scissor trusses for not much more money. Usually if you have an 8/12 pitch roof they give you a 4/12 pitch on the bottom. In a small part of my garage they are actually installing my scissor trusses today. My truss span in this area was 36' wide. There are 21 trusses in this area and to make it a 5/12 it was only $200 more for them trusses which gave me another 18" or so in the middle so I would ask. To go to 6/12 was $800 more. I really did not need that much more so just went with the 5/12.

 

[NHBandit]

Oops... I wasn't aware it was to be an attached garage. Of course I still wouldn't have a problem with a garage that's bigger than the house but the wife might.... I also live way out in the country in the Tennessee foothills so what the neighbors think or any silly zoning ******** doesn't apply to my situation. I guess my main point I was trying to make was directed towards folks that think a short lift is going to solve all their problems. They never take into consideration that the roof of the car still limits how high they can go until it's too late to build a taller garage. It sounds like the OP has this covered. Keep us posted on the progress.

 

[rsa]

Given a 36' wide garage and 7/12 roof, this looks easy peasy to me. Disclaimer, look at my sig.

Before you talk trusses, you absolutely need to plan both how you're going to insulate and ventilate and how much you're going to insulate. The truss you showed is pretty much useless from an insulation standpoint over the top plate—unless you're going with rigid foam insulation on the exterior of the roof, which isn't a bad idea.

Scissor trusses aren't the best choice for insulating. I like parallel chord trusses that can have a ventilation channel and uniformly dense pack the rest with lots of cellulose. They can also give you a little more vertical clearance.

Yes, the parallel chord truss makes the wall taller appearing on the exterior, but a 9' wall plus the parallel chord truss is about the same exterior height as a 10' wall with a standard truss.

BendPak has generally complete measurement diagrams of their lifts. Get SketchUp and start drawing rough clearance tests. Here's a quick and dirty example. 36' wide, 9' walls, 16" parallel chord truss, 7/12 pitch roof. This is very rough, but shows you have more than enough room for a lift with the 14' crossbar height and maybe even a 16' crossbar height. The rectangle in the middle of the SketchUp is 16' tall by 12' wide with the height at the center being 19' 6". Heck, you could lower the roof slope or even go to 8' walls if you wanted to reduce the mass of the garage and still have room for the lift. Even if you needed trusses deeper than 16" there should still be plenty of room for the lift.

There are other trusses you could use. Enlist the help of your truss designer, tell her what you told us and let him go at it, you might be surprised what she comes up with. As possible examples, see the top two trusses in this picture I found on the net.

Alternatively, you could go with a shed dormer on one side of the garage to increase the headroom over your lift. This one isn't particularly attractive IMO, but you get the idea. Whoever designs the dormer details needs to know what they're doing for them to look natural.

I hope this gives you some ideas.

 

[Grizzlyman]

I was wondering if I would have enough room for insulation with the scissor trusses and have ventilation issues.