Moving right along Lance, I love the tool selection.

Before long you will drag home another project car, it's a sickness I tell ya :lmao:

You got yourself some nice tool there. I wish I had the room. It's looking good.

So I'm knee deep into my first project on the new lift, and thought I'd update you all with my experiences. The project was to pull the third member out of the rear axle to inspect and repair (metal in gear oil) and it involved getting the back half of the car up in the air and secure while lowering the rear axle enough to get the third member out from under the mufflers.

What I have found is the pad extensions for the chassis jacks are either too short or too long.

https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont..._070501-XL.jpg

The long extensions won't fit under the frame at ride height and the short extensions won't lift the car high enough to get my jack stands under the frame.

There are a couple of different options to fix this and I'll probably implement them both. First a shorter set of jack stands (preferably with a flat pad type top) would make this a LOT easier and second, a set of extensions machined about halfway between the long ones and the short ones in length would also help.

Here is what I ended up doing for now. I used two of the short extensions on each side and lifted the car from the #4 body mount position (right in front of rear tires) high enough to get my jackstands under the frame behind the rear tires. I then moved the chassis jack forward far enough to get out of the way and lifted it up high enough to just support the middle part of the frame as a safety measure.

https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont..._130933-XL.jpg

https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont..._070435-XL.jpg

At this point the car was very stable on the ramps and the axle was hanging low enough to get the third member out.

https://photos.smugmug.com/1985-Mont..._070354-XL.jpg

As far as doing the work once the car was lifted...none of this was an issue. I have plenty of room to move around both in between the ramps and outside of each ramp. My arms are long enough to reach in from the outside if needed and the ramps go plenty high enough that I never banged my head, not even once.

I like having a place right there to set tools and parts, this is especially handy when working alone and need one hand to hold a part and can set a tool or two close by to reach for with the other hand.

The lift is VERY sturdy and goes up and down with no binding or issues. Very pleased with it's operation.

I did have one other issue I had to address. The rolling jacks were almost impossible to move forward and back and especially if they got twisted sideways just a bit. It took me a while messing with the adjustments on the wheels before I finally figured out it was the wheels themselves binding up. There is no bearing or anything, just a solid wheel riding on a stepped solid axle, bone dry... Any sideways pressure on the wheel lodged it against the step on the axle and locked it up.

I pulled every wheel off and put a coat of wheel bearing grease on the axle stub and step and reinstalled them...the jacks glide almost effortlessly now up and down the ramps. HUGE difference...

As far as working in the rest of the shop, it's been great as well. The AC keeps it very nice in here even when it's brutal hot outside. I hardly ever even turn the lights on as there is a lot of light that comes in thru the (6) 48" x 48" windows up high on each wall. And the floor surface is just awesome. It cleans up great and is pretty tough as well. I dropped a control arm from about 5' high on it yesterday and while it put a mark in the clear coat on the floor...just rubbing my foot over the mark made it mostly disappear. I'm sure at some point the marks, scrapes, and gouges will start to add up but the easy thing is a simple coat of clear coat over the top will fix it right up again.

And no Greg...it does not hide whatever is dropped on it... It is very easy to find the nuts and bolts my fat fingers drop to the floor.

That right there is exactly why my shop with have a 2 post. :action-smiley-027:

Ultimately for a home based shop, or small biz, having both style lifts would be awesome, although costly and unlikely. The asymmetrical lift I have is great, but I would love to have a 4 post with rolling 3 ton hydraulic jacks for the ultimate in versatility. Just my .02

For the Jeep or Toyota, Uncle Rico? :lol:

Lance, looks like a great opportunity to install some V bands on the exhaust, you know you’ll be back in there at some point. :thumbsup:

Move the jack up so it rides on the top of the lift where the tires go. Works way better that way and gives full expansion at all heights.

Rotary has these lift blocks for their rolling air jacks in two different heights. I have 8 of the tall ones and 8 of the short ones. They are nice and "grippy" for lifting on a round axle, pinch rail, etc. and don't dig in or leave marks.



http://i1060.photobucket.com/albums/...psi41ke5fu.jpg

Yeah, but the drive on makes other things so much easier like wheel alignments, corner balancing, ride height changes, oil changes etc...


Yup yup...

I hear ya... You know the exhaust from the X-pipe back is still the same that was on the car when I bought it over 10 years ago... It's well past time for an upgrade on it in many ways, V-bands included.


That would be a 4" jump up on the whole jack assembly, pretty sure the pads wouldn't go under the frame at their lowest point then. Interesting out of the box thought though.

Keep in mind I'm still very happy with this lift. I knew I'd have to find a way around this very issue before I ever bought it. It is still WAY better than laying on the ground trying to do this stuff... :D

I really think the answer is very simply just shorter jack stands. I'm debating on either modifying mine or trying one of these sets.

https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon....L._SL1500_.jpg

10.71" - 15.6" tall

https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon....L._SL1500_.jpg

13" - 21" tall

Most stands (including mine) start at about 15" high

I have a set of the "big reds" --- they're real lightweight and a very small base.

I keep them in the trailer and use them more as a "chalk" to check the floor jack if changing a tire. They're "okay" but that small base -- under anything at an angle - that's dangerous. Dangerous enough doing that anyway.