Mike J

I did the same thing for a buddy a few years back when I built his garage, we did not worry about the weight but alignment of the mounting points.

In some ways, if you have to worry about making sure the center of gravity is right at the center of the lift, there is not enough safety margin in the lift for it to be safe. One of the reasons I bought an oversized 2 post lift (rated at 9000 lbs) is that I do not care if the car is hanging way back, or forth, or even not centered - the lift can handle it, and should be able to handle it. Sure you will put twisting torques on the columns and thus load the base plates and anchors, but that loading is much less than the yield strength.

I more worry that I have the car in a position that makes it fit the arms and is easy to get to where I need to be. On my lift, I can vary about 1' back and forth, and about 4" side to side for the arms to hit all the right places. I marked the floor with landing stripes so I know if the car is in the right position.

Not sure if you are pouring the slab, but you can run some conduit to the recess as well so you can run the hydraulics and cables to the lift under the floor - that is very handy.

Cheers,

Mike

gtroth

I'm not at all worried about getting the load exactly centered other than to determine the optimal place for the lift. It's very stable and even 1' off center wouldn't concern me.

Here's where I ended up - 52" in from the garage door. I chickened out just before the pour and added 2" to my 6" gaurd band (margin from door to the cars). Better to loose some shop space in the back than not be able to close the door with the cars up:





Here's a few more pics of the build. It's basically all I hoped it would be. Oil change and lower valve cover gaskets so far. Clutch pedal lever nex. Plugs & wires after that, then suspension.









This is much handier than I thought - push a button and a 4x8 workbench appears in the middle of my garage:

Mike J

Nice work - and I see that the hydraulics are run in the conduit in the floor - it looks great and I like the ideas of the table!

I should put a lift like this with my two post lift - what a combo! I can use the sissor to support engines while I lift the body with the two post. Hmmmmm.

Cheers,

Mike

gtroth

Thanks! Yeah, I think you should 'nest' the two lifts. Never heard of doing that before, so you need to try it and let us know how it works out. Though I bet you'll miss the wheels of a tranny jack. Anywhere else you need me to help spend some of your money on speculative ventures? ;-)

Another area I think the scissor lift will excel is detailing. Lift her up to do the sides, valences, and rockers and you can walk all around it.

jimbo3

I'm a little late to the party but, for anyone still interested, total weight on the front axle is 1241 and total weight on the rear axle is 1984.

gtroth

Thanks. That's 38/62, F/R.

IXLR8

Absolutely top notch and the way these should be installed for an elegant "ramp-free" installation!

That is the way I would have done it if I chose to go with a scissors lift. In the end, I wanted full access to the underside of any car I wished to put on it and went with the MaxJax.

IXLR8

If you know the weights on your front and back wheels, I generated this C of G chart based on distances between the axles and lift points and the distance between the lift points. Its been a while since I've done a weight & balance on an aircraft, but the principle is the same. So if you find that they are in error, PM me.

The C of G location is in inches forward of the center of the rear outermost lift point.