elevated car storage ??

[SSAAHemiFan]

I am toying with the idea of building or buying a elevated rack in order to stack 2 car's in my shop.

I have found companies that offer custom lifts with elevators but the fact is I just need a plain storage rack.(no lifting mechanism).

NO work will be done on this rack it is just to save space. Would have to hold close to 4,000 lbs.

I have a BB 4 post with the caster package already . My plan is to use the BB to lift the car up and down and just push it on and off onto the storage rack.

Cars are restored so I have no desire to use a cheap 4 post for this purpose , I prefer to just have something at a fixed height that I don't have to worry about collapsing.

Anyone very seen anything like this for sale or is it something I need to build myself?

Obviously if it will cost more than $4k it would be easier to just buy another BB. I should be able to do it for alot less?

some ideas I have so far..--

- are buying a cheap used car trailer remove everything and just use the deck and add posts

- make my own rack and pay a certified welder to weld everything up and maybe a engineer to look over my plans

- copy the way my BB lift platform is made and just add 4 colums

any ideas or pictures of anyone doing this in there own garage would be great.

Thanks

 

[cyamaha2007]

we store a bass boat and cruising boat in the winter on a second story mezzanine at our farm. There are also a few old off road toys up there. We got it for scrap price at a factory auction. Its do able but i think it would be pricey if you cant wait on a deal. What kind of space do you have. You could buy a old mobile home frame off of clist and make it out of that.. I saw one of them turned into a 20ft bridge that you could drive on.

 

[german oldschool]

Hey I think you are looking for something like this?
http://www.groetz-fertiggaragen.de/stapelparkgaragen.html
These systems are pretty popular here in Germany because the garages here are very slight.If you have the opportunity to buy such a sytem i would recommend to buy it .What if another car falls on your Bugatti Veyron
because your welding wasn´t ok?
Greets Daniel

 

[JHunter]

Pallet racks. I use them to hold up a lighter vehicle than you listed, but the heavy duty pallet racks can be found for up to 2k per shelf. Basically put the front end of the vehicle on one shelf, the rear on another and your good. Or you could use it as the legs of the system you mentioned earlier, where you could build a platform across the shelves and roll the car on. A lot cheaper than buying a trailer and putting legs on it. You could put the shelf beams ubder the frame, or put the tires on the shelf beams (what I did). There is some welding involved (on the shelf beams in my case, to keep them from spreading apart), but you're basically using a pallet rack as a shelf unit, which is what it is, to hold a car.

Here's the idea - as viewed from the top
[] - upright post of pallet rack
== - shelf beams from upright to upright
{} - tires of vehicle (or frame etc)


[]=={}====={}==[]




[]=={}====={}==[]

 

[JDMopar]

I'm in the process of building just such a storage rack right now. Sounds like us Mopar guys think alike....lol. I got some old street light poles for free, and am using them for the upright posts. They are 5" square, with 3/16 wall thickness. I cut them to match the same height as the posts on my Superlifts SR7H's posts. I have 6 of them, and will use 3 in the front and 3 in the back. I bought four 8' pieces of 2x4 tubing with 1/4" wall thickness, that will have brackets welded to them to go between the posts side to side. I bought eight 12' pieces of 2x4 tubing with 1/8" wall thickness to support the runners. Capped over the top of that will be 3/16 thick checker plate steel that has been bent to be 18" wide like the runners on my lift. I will be able to park 4 cars in the place of 2 in my garage. So far, I have $1200 in the steel. I figure it will be about a hundred bucks to have the checker plate bent, and will find out when I pick it up on Monday. The welding may run $400-500, but it will be done right. I can weld......but it looks like where a chicken has $hit....lol. I called Superlifts to get some advice on the thickness of the decking, and also got some more advice that I had not thought of. The engineer there told me to be sure to temporarily tie the posts of my lift to the posts of my rack while transfering the car from one to the other. Even though it would probably work fine to do it without tieing them together, he said lifts aren't designed to roll cars on and off of at height. I will post pics when I get it painted and installed.

 

[rsanter]

I was thinking pallet racks as well

2 HD pallet racks spaced the proper amount apart and then make a couple of 'tracks' for the tires to ride in similar to what the lift has

attach to pallet racks and attach racks to the ground

bob

 

[Fish-man]

Hey I think you are looking for something like this?
http://www.groetz-fertiggaragen.de/stapelparkgaragen.html
These systems are pretty popular here in Germany because the garages here are very slight.If you have the opportunity to buy such a sytem i would recommend to buy it .What if another car falls on your Bugatti Veyron
because your welding wasn´t ok?
Greets Daniel

those are neat! how much they cost? i'm not sure if anyone in the U.S. makes those...

also it's too bad i can only read English!

 

[cyamaha2007]

If you used pallet racks you couldnt park another car under it...

 

[german oldschool]

@fishman unfortunately they don´t mention the price.If you want I can ask for it but I think these systems cost around 2-3k euro I really don´t know.
@ all really cool ideas who has got some pics?? I´m really curious.

 

[JHunter]

If you used pallet racks you couldnt park another car under it...

Why not? The uprights go outside the frame/body of the car on top, so a car underneath would fit. I've seen common shelf beams at 8 and 9 feet long - thats what determines the 'width' of the unit (as in passenger to driver side width, not front to back). I park my camaro under my jeep using pallet racks - it works fine.

 

[TooTall]

I made this from lumber and steel Strong-Ties. It's also bolted to the back wall. Cars are pretty lightweight. Only the bottom one has an engine and trans. the top one is pretty much just a frame and body shell. Cost was about $450, most of that in the steel ties. and lag screws.

Cheers,
Kurt O.

 

[cyamaha2007]

now that ^^^looks like a good use of space and materials

 

[german oldschool]

Yeah some really cool ideas and solutions

 

[tjec]

If you use pallet racks beware of a few facts;
A pair of beams that are 4"x96" are rated around 4000 pounds. The uprights are rated at much more but if the beams are not at floor level then you may lose some capacity. You could easily use the setup Jhunter has. For more stability you could use a beam at the very bottom that is only a few inches tall and then put the car on top of those beams. If you are looking for more information go to a pallet rack dealer.
http://www.edwardsstorage.com

 

[europeanplates]

Hello,

I know stinger lifts has this option. However when I was qouted it was more then buying multiple lifts. A quick look on CL found in my area (Seattle) a ton of companies selling pallet racking. Set up the correct way this could be a lower cost alternative and very strong. I am looking to store 6 cars in a 16 x 60 foot space using one lift. Sounds like the similar thing you are trying to do so maybe some other will chime in?

TYler

 

[akdiesel]

It's not rated for 4000# on each level but it could get you in the direction you are looking for.
I made this out of Unistrut and primarily for storing my snowmachines in the summer.
Each level could support 2000# on each level easily but I choose to give it more of safety factor and went with 1000# on each level.
http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=34840&highlight=diy+post+storage+lift