Lift placement!

[HorseinAround]

Good evening, I’ve been lurking for a few hours and have read some great information but I can’t seem to find what I’m looking for exactly. I am doing a 28x41x12 and want to put a lift in the shop. Bay doors will be 10x10 on the 40’ side with there being a 28’ depth. I plan on putting the first door 4’ from the wall so I’ve got some space for benches or tool boxes and I also want the lift in the left side bay. My question is, with a 28’ depth, where should I place the lift in the bay? My concrete guy is coming tomorrow and doing 4x4 squares 8” deep for the lift post placement. I’m not sure whether I should place the posts in the middle of the bay or more towards the front or back towards the bay doors. I plan on going with the Atlas XH-9KOHX. I’d post a link but I’m too new!

Thanks for any and all help!

 

[gearhead1]

I measured my extended cab dually and put them deep enough such that I’d have 2 feet between the dually and the door if the door was closed. Every other vehicle I have is shorter.

 

[kaymccampbell]

Have your concrete guy put down a 10'x12' -8" heavily reinforced slab. It'll give you anti tip strength between the pillars, and allow you a chance to move your lift if you decide your first placement *****. I centered my lift in the bay and thought it'd be great. Turns out I'll be moving it back 1', cause some of our cars hang over a bit more than others, and make it a bit close to pass in front.

 

[clinebarger]

Of coarse 28' is the outside of the concrete, So you will lose @18" or more with the bay door closed.

With an Asymmetrical....Probably a little forward of center. Man that'a a shallow depth to work with!!! I consider 28' of real depth the minimum (30' building).

 

[HorseinAround]

Of coarse 28' is the outside of the concrete, So you will lose @18" or more with the bay door closed.

With an Asymmetrical....Probably a little forward of center. Man that'a a shallow depth to work with!!! I consider 28' of real depth the minimum (30' building).

It’s what I can afford, originally it was going to be 24’. The channels for the building are going to take up roughly 3” along the edge and the roll up doors will be just about flush with the outside wall. My 2500HD is 21.5’ long, I think I’ll have enough room to do what I need to.

How far forward would it be worth going?

 

[HorseinAround]

Have your concrete guy put down a 10'x12' -8" heavily reinforced slab. It'll give you anti tip strength between the pillars, and allow you a chance to move your lift if you decide your first placement *****. I centered my lift in the bay and thought it'd be great. Turns out I'll be moving it back 1', cause some of our cars hang over a bit more than others, and make it a bit close to pass in front.

Don’t think I can get away with that large of an extra slab, it would depend on cost. I’m not so sure that 4x4 will be big enough especially since I don’t know where I want the lift.

 

[clinebarger]

If you don't have work benches or tool boxes in front of the vehicle, You can make it work.

Asymmetrical lifts require the vehicle to be placed rear of center.

 

[CraigStu]

I would work backwards on this. Drawing on graph paper or PC program, place you largest vehicle so there is about 2 feet between it's rear bumper and the inside of the garage door.
You will do much more work ahead of the car than behind it. Then decide on symmetrical or asymmetrical and use their drawings to work out lift position. Generally an asymmetrical will have the posts just behind the rear view mirrors

 

[Falcon67]

Of coarse 28' is the outside of the concrete, So you will lose @18" or more with the bay door closed.

With an Asymmetrical....Probably a little forward of center. Man that'a a shallow depth to work with!!! I consider 28' of real depth the minimum (30' building).

My 24' is 23' 4" inside back wall to inside of door, so not 18".

Park your biggest vehicle in the proposed lift space. Mark where the steering wheel is because that is usually -more or less - where the vehicle will balance on a 2 post lift. That will give you a good guesstimate. For my 16' race cars, backed into the lift space, the center line dimension for the lift was 11' 8" back from the inside of the door. I can partially lift a truck pointed face in but the door has to remain open. That's the compromise in a 24' space with 240" long trucks. No way to plan the short space to allow either, not with an 8' ceiling. Race cars spend more time on the lift, so that's how it went.

 

[HorseinAround]

My 24' is 23' 4" inside back wall to inside of door, so not 18".

Park your biggest vehicle in the proposed lift space. Mark where the steering wheel is because that is usually -more or less - where the vehicle will balance on a 2 post lift. That will give you a good guesstimate. For my 16' race cars, backed into the lift space, the center line dimension for the lift was 11' 8" back from the inside of the door. I can partially lift a truck pointed face in but the door has to remain open. That's the compromise in a 24' space with 240" long trucks. No way to plan the short space to allow either, not with an 8' ceiling. Race cars spend more time on the lift, so that's how it went.

I have measured out two 4x8’ sections where it will be possible to put the lift. I figured 8’ would give me plenty of room to move the lift towards the front or back of the shop if necessary. 8” deep reinforced also.

 

[HorseinAround]

Here you can hopefully see the orange space for the lift posts.

 

[Falcon67]

48" x 96" x 8" ought to do it, yep.

Here's my test placement before drilling the anchors. I have a 12" x 12" grade beam running longways through the shop, and all but a couple of the anchors landed in that beam. Once you stand up the posts you can easily - carefully LOL - walk them around a bit.

 

[HorseinAround]

Got the concrete done, going tomorrow to get paper work done on the building since it’ll take about a month to get it installed.

 

[clinebarger]

My 24' is 23' 4" inside back wall to inside of door, so not 18".

Park your biggest vehicle in the proposed lift space. Mark where the steering wheel is because that is usually -more or less - where the vehicle will balance on a 2 post lift. That will give you a good guesstimate. For my 16' race cars, backed into the lift space, the center line dimension for the lift was 11' 8" back from the inside of the door. I can partially lift a truck pointed face in but the door has to remain open. That's the compromise in a 24' space with 240" long trucks. No way to plan the short space to allow either, not with an 8' ceiling. Race cars spend more time on the lift, so that's how it went.

Cool!!....Every building is likely different. When folks throw out numbers....It's usually out-to-out of the concrete.

I lose 20.5" of useable depth on my 30x40.

 

[clinebarger]

The picture of the door jamb & door track width will not load???....It's 11.5".....Add the 9".

 

[HorseinAround]

The picture of the door jamb & door track width will not load???....It's 11.5".....Add the 9".

Wow, that takes up quite a bit of space. I’m doing one of those tubular vertical A frame steel buildings. The rails are 2.5” thick and from what I was told the garage doors are almost flush with the outer wall.

Can’t tell if you have roof insulation from the pic, but what are you going to use? I opted out of the bubble wrap insulation.


Sent from my iPhone using The Garage Journal mobile app

 

[clinebarger]

Having it spray insulated.

I tried to reload the jamb picture....No go, Must have reached my limit for the day.

I have a 25x25 Pole style shop built out of Drill Stem & Casing......The framing doesn't take up near as much room as this 30x40 engineered Mueller building

 

[Falcon67]

Cool!!....Every building is likely different. When folks throw out numbers....It's usually out-to-out of the concrete.

I lose 20.5" of useable depth on my 30x40.

LOL 23' 4" was plenty until I bought that dragster that is 23' 11" with the nose cone on it. Without the nose it's 22' 8" LOL. Going to need a bump out.

I'll also add there was a bunch of blue painter's tape on the floor and a lot of Sharpie marks before I made the lift purchase. Making a couple of cardboard columns and using a couple of pieces of OSB to simulate the post bases goes a long way to visualizing the final setup. You can back over a cardboard column and not hurt anything

 

[JeffsJeeps]

Hello.
Can i get some thoughts on placing a lift diagonally in a corner?
I have a new 30x32 and am doing concrete soon. My split sliding doors open to 14' wide and 10' high. I feel that placing it up in the left front corner would still allow 3/4 of the floor to be used. I can back a vehicle onto it and have huge room to pull a nose or engine. Also the two posts will be situated near two back walls, rather than one post being out in the middle of the shop. Accessing this configuration would be a breeze, instead of trying to sliding over and trying to get straight if the lift isn't centered with the doors.
I'm limited with a ten foot wood truss, and realize i won't be standing under too many things. I just found a nice Eagle 2 post 10k for$1,200 but it had that upper cross bar at 11'6". I feel more strongly about the corner setting, and don't want to have regrets. Thanks for the input.
Jeff

 

[clinebarger]

With you ceiling height restriction.....You need a lift to accommodate that!

I've worked in shops with lifts placed diagonally in corners.....It *****! These were much bigger buildings where you had the room to maneuver the vehicle.

My 25x25 Pole style shop has sliding doors....I really dislike them! Sure, They're maintenance free for the most part. But I can't open both bays at once.

 

[firebirdparts]

With 28 feet I would put the car dead center in that 28 feet and the lift accordingly.

 

[FIVE_LITER]

Hello.
Can i get some thoughts on placing a lift diagonally in a corner?
I have a new 30x32 and am doing concrete soon. My split sliding doors open to 14' wide and 10' high. I feel that placing it up in the left front corner would still allow 3/4 of the floor to be used. I can back a vehicle onto it and have huge room to pull a nose or engine. Also the two posts will be situated near two back walls, rather than one post being out in the middle of the shop. Accessing this configuration would be a breeze, instead of trying to sliding over and trying to get straight if the lift isn't centered with the doors.
I'm limited with a ten foot wood truss, and realize i won't be standing under too many things. I just found a nice Eagle 2 post 10k for$1,200 but it had that upper cross bar at 11'6". I feel more strongly about the corner setting, and don't want to have regrets. Thanks for the input.
Jeff

Not being able to pull straight into door to get to a lift *****. I'd do it if I had to but I'd be pissed every time I had to do it.

 

[fiataccompli]

I'll follow this thread with interest. My garage is finally close to completion & even though I was pretty sure where I wanted the lift, I keep waffling. I plan on an asymetric type and though I want to be able to work on almost any vehicle, my primary subject vehicles are older Fiats that are 12-14' long & maybe 5-5.5' wide. I have 30' depth (in my case, that ends up being about 28.8' inside) and the main bay area of the building is 36' wide with 3 doors. I believe my original idea was locating the lift posts 11' from the back wall.

I noticed the comments about additional depth for the posts. My concrete/construction guys also created a deeper than 4" area (3'x3') where I originally thought I'd put my posts. That said, since all the lifts I'm looking at call for 4" concrete at a strength 1000psi less than what we used, I'm not sure it would be such a problem if I put the lift in another location.

 

[lakeroadster]

That said, since all the lifts I'm looking at call for 4" concrete at a strength 1000psi less than what we used, I'm not sure it would be such a problem if I put the lift in another location.

Not only is it not a problem, it's better. There is no need to make the concrete thicker where the posts go on a new slab pour.

The ideal slab is as flat on the bottom as it is on the top.

Making the slab thicker at the lift columns leads to shrinkage cracks where the dissimilar concrete thicknesses are.

The biggest factor in a successful slab is proper compaction of the sub-grade that is tested for compaction. More on that in my build thread link below.

 

[fiataccompli]

Making the slab thicker at the lift columns leads to shrinkage cracks where the dissimilar concrete thicknesses are.

The biggest factor in a successful slab is proper compaction of the sub-grade.

makes sense. So far, I'm pleased with my concrete guy's work (I say "so far" because he'll be back for an HVAC/compressor shed pad, the approach to the garage & some other driveway drainage work soon). He came back & put saw cuts on a grid (12'x12', I don't remember) & so far it looks great. I am lucky also in that the entire building is on a deep cut. I wasn't lucky paying for all the excavation, but in terms of nicely compacted soil it's good!

 

[MAYOR28]

We just finished out 28x40, with 2 10x10 doors on the 40' edge. Take a look at my thread in the signature.

I tried to "Future Proof" our shop, so I planned for more than just a 4-Post lift. I had 'runners' installed when they poured the floor, they are 8"+ deep, 3' wide (about 22' long) to accommodate a 2 post or 4 post.

I ended up going with a 4 post for now, but have yet to locate it finally in the space. I have it withe ramps right at the door right now, but I plan to slide it away from the door about one foot.

..