Have you seen ?

[Mr.Nutcase]

Have you seen a car/truck fall of the lift?
I Did see one a few years ago in school...
The other group had set the pick up points wrong, when they removed the diff,
the truck almost dipp

 

[DrkMtnDew]

thankfully i've only seen it happen on youtube...

 

[Mr.Nutcase]

I asked one I the tech I work with..
He said the lift had failed. The tech did not lock it.
the car was 90's Maxima, car did not look good

 

[ibedayank]

not fall but have seen exaust ripped off and other under damage done....by an EX boss that said I could not do it right....... bad things happen when 2 post lift arms are still under the car/truck and the lift is not all the way down and he tries to back the car/truck out of the bay

 

[adamsredlines]

Guy I worked with had a Taurus on a 2-post pad lift....he took the back tires off and it did a nose dive but THANKFULLY didnt fall, it just tapped the front bumper on the ground and stayed there. Lowered the lift down, put the wheels back on...and repositioned it. Could have been MUCH worse.

 

[Straightgrain]

Not off a lift but into a pit.

When I first started working as a mechanic, I got the work order to do an alignment on a car. Instead of waiting for a spotter, I sighted the left wheel onto the ramp over the alignment pit, and pulled forward. What I'd forgotten to do was check the right wheel/ramp placement, and before I knew it, the right wheel/side fell into the pit!?!

The whole shop came over to see the spectacle. Someone got the idea of lowering a jack into the pit, bridging the distance with 4x4s and pushing the car back out of the pit. It worked, but I never made that mistake again!

 

[theoldwizard1]

Years ago I worked in the garage at a local Sears store. Mostly 2 post, in ground lifts. One lift had a problem when coming down. It would jerk on the way down. I saw many cars rocking on the lift pads !

 

[ncautoshop]

I had a guy that was working for.me set a truck that was far to heavy to be on a xp10 (12,500lb). I walked in and realized what he had done and made a effort to get it down before the pads slid out (6" of adapter on rear, none up front on level frame) made it to face level before the the rear passenger pad kicked out.... as silly as it may sound one of the worst scares of my life. Had trouble getting under the lift for a month or so. Ripped the lift out of the floor and turned two lift arms into horse shoes

 

[xj31]

Only on youtube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=fvwp&v=zV3gp3S4pFU&NR=1

 

[Big Gus]

A few years ago, I watched an almost brand new GMC Envoy fall off a two post above ground lift. It happened as the truck reached the top of the lift's travel; one of the arms kicked out, and the thing came crashing to the ground. Thankfully, nobody was hurt. The truck, however, was totaled.

I will say that it was quite loud and one hell of a sight to see.

 

[tcsalvage]

iv'e seen the aftermath of two vehicles coming off lifts, one was a 96 buick century a garage was installing an engine in, when they dropped the last bolt out of the cradle the car went off the back of the lift on its roof. the other one was an 04 stratus on a old lift that the left side cable failed, post took out both drivers side doors and the roof. now you know why i always use jack stands under a lift.

 

[D9H 90V]

We had a new Chevy pickup almost do it, the coating on the frame rails was still a bit slick and one of the legs slipped out from underneth it, luckly it had a set of nerf bars on it and they kept it from falling,

We did come in one moday morning a found a pickup that was on a single post hydraulic lift with its nose in the air and the rear bumper on the ground, the tech left one of those stands under the front and the lift bled down over the weekend, he just raised it back up and all was well

 

[srmofo]

Ive seen it twice...search some of my old posts for pics. Updated the computer recently and I havent moved all my pics back onto it yet

Edit found one

 

[ncautoshop]

Still makes me cringe.
With that said what is the best tall safety stand practice? 1 in front 1 in rear or all 4 corners?

 

[eighthd]

Here a pic of one trucks that fell. My truck was being worked on and it fell off of the lift good thing there was a repair ticket written on it.

 

[bgott]

I had a '70s Ford pick-up spin off of a two post in-ground lift once. It spun around about thirty degrees when it was about four feet up. It didn't tear anything up, I just had to let it down and pull it around straight with a floor jack. It almost hit the car in the next bay, I got lucky.

 

[Hans]

I had a customer park infront of one of my old shop bays. He got out to go inside and left it in drive with the ebrake on cause it would stall in park or neutral. Well the ebrake let go and the van lunged into the bay of the altima i was working on. Car shot forward on the lift after being hit and slammed me in the head. I fell back on my *** and scurried back just enough to have my legs missed getting struck by the front of the car. Scariest day of my life. Heres a pic of it.

Ive also had some other close calls with no pictures. Had an older drive on lift with the hydraulic on-top that pulls a chain snap and dropped onto the locks with me underneath it. And at the Ford dealership I used to work at, someone set the lift on an excursion that shouldnt have been on that lift and it slid off ripping the lift posts out of the ground and coming down onto the middle of the truck crushing the roof. Both of those incidents where before i had a camera phone lol.

 

[Harvey Melvin Richards]

I worked in a tire shop way back in High School. We had one lift that would jump the last 10" if you weren't real careful. Many times we would have on of the pads fall in the lifts blast to the top. Nothing ever fell off though. It was always a **** your pants moment.

 

[Jeeper]

Rockauto had one in their newsletter...

http://www.rockauto.com/Newsletter/index.html

 

[chickenhauler]

Ok, now I've just about completely eliminated the thought of buying a lift.

 

[Big Gus]

Ok, now I've just about completely eliminated the thought of buying a lift.

I wouldn't let this thread discourage you from buying a lift. If used and maintained properly, a lift is actually quite safe.

 

[adamsredlines]

Lifts are amazing...just like any tool, if used properly are safe.

I've heard of guys losing fingrers with lawnmowers, arms with chainsaws and drowning in pools...but I wouldnt let that discourage me from owning any of the above....just gotta use them properly.

 

[ncautoshop]

While on the subject, saw this on facebook today. The poster evidently is very confident this is acceptable lift use. What is your thoughts?

 

[greasemonkey44]

^ what an idiot; hope its at least on the locks
i prefer working at chest height anyway.....also what is the shop foreman thinking? that tech is a pig

 

[ncautoshop]

The cost of failure in that situation could be tremendous. Cost of the lift, damages to a customers vehicle, possible floor damage, and worst of all a injury or death that was unnecessary. I learned my lesson, if the lift isn't able to lift the vehicle, use a bigger lift. Hopefully those working under that truck make it home safe tonight, it may set there 100 years and never fail, or it might sit there 10 minutes and fail.

 

[scottv]

The back of the truck is loaded I would have done and have done the same thing.

 

[dankicksass]

I was working with a guy for a while who dropped a brand new F350 King Ranch on its nose a few years ago. They had to bring in an offroad forklift to get it un-wedged, the truck got caught on the roof structure. He took **** everywhere for it, for years.

 

[countryroad82]

Back when I was in tech school, we had a guy from the mechanic shop come over to the body shop to use our lift as all thiers were full. He was dropping the cradle on a Taurus, had the car on the lift, the cradle supported, removed the last bolt on the cradle and proceeded to send the car backwards into the wall. Not a pretty sight at all. Needless to say the car got to visit the body shop side before it left the school.

 

[upstater]

While I worked @ a Saturn dealer outside Boston, we had a "technician" (I use the term loosely) improperly place the arms under the body of a very good customer's '95 SL2. It was wet out, so the cars were damp. I don't know how the car got in the air, because it was only being supported by the plastic undercladding.
The issue was that he casually kicked the arms under the car, not ensuring they were placed on the jack points. Good techs who have been working on a given car brand for a long time know when the lift points are successfully covered. This tech didn't have that luxury.
After it was in the air for a few minutes, the car just sort of slipped off. Short of gun shots, it was the loudest noise I've ever heard.
I know the car needed some bodywork and maybe a few suspension things replaced, but from a 5' 6" height, it didn't do that much damage. And nobody was hurt.
This event was the beginning of a long spiral downward for the "technician."

 

[Hans]

While on the subject, saw this on facebook today. The poster evidently is very confident this is acceptable lift use. What is your thoughts?

not saying its the smartest thing to do, but i do that on a daily basis. i work in an older truck shop, with mostly ford diesels. i only lift it till i hear the first lock click then let it down on that. ive never had a problem doing it this way at the shop im at now or when i was working at the ford dealership.


but then i usually dont go as high as it is in that picture.

 

[Nova_Guy]

I saw a car drive off in the pit at a Speed Lube I worked at. He shot in the door without anyone leading him in. He dropped the passenger side off in the hole and jumped out and asked how are we going to get my car out of that hole. We told him he needed to call a tow truck it was his problem.

 

[BigAl62]

Yup, at my previous place of employment a guy dropped one and at my current employer one guy dropped 2 (and he still has a job!).

 

[chumley360]

I've seen one truck fall off a lift at work because no one bothered to make sure the feet were actually contacting the frame. We also had a guy get out of a F350 "forgetting" to put it in park. It proceeded to drive into a lift with a Ranger on it. Well the Ranger ended up in the F350's bed. All the cool stuff happens on my day off.

 

[oilslick]

I had arms kick out half way up on a lifted dodge I shouldnt have been picking up , it landed on its feet no prob but I then decided to check into the arm swing locks found teeth worn out, wadda ******* for not keeping up on my lift maint.

 

[srmofo]

I had arms kick out half way up on a lifted dodge I shouldnt have been picking up , it landed on its feet no prob but I then decided to check into the arm swing locks found teeth worn out, wadda ******* for not keeping up on my lift maint.

I wish my lifts had arm swing locks.