I eluded to this purchase in my race car build thread, but thought it would be more appropriate in this sub-forum. https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/build-projects-and-project-cars/1988-nissan-200sx-se-v6-endurance-race-car/179200/page1/
As the title states, I have fulfilled a lifelong dream of owning a lift in my home garage. Before becoming an engineer I was a Master Technician for Nissan, and was never without a lift for 10 years. For the past 8 years, I have been working on jack stands, and hated almost every second of working under the car. Been eyeballing lifts for a long time now and finally pulled the trigger. Being in a residential garage (over sized 2 car), I definitely have some limitations, and every lift choice is full of compromises.
2-post would have been preferred because I think they're superior for service work. Unfortunately, no full height 2 posts are even installable in my garage due to ceiling height. Additionally one would probably require saw cutting/adding/reinforcing concrete to meet the minimum thickness requirement that often isn't present in a residential garage. 2-posts also use up the most width right where you need it most (where you open car doors), and would make parking my wifes car next to it very difficult.
Mid-rise lifts. Quickjack, Maxjax, and mid-rise scissor lifts are all pretty cool. Quickjack isn't much taller than jack stands, but is very portable. Maxjax are less portable, nearly the cost of a real 2 post, and would also require reinforced concrete. Mid-rise scissor lifts are awesome, but block transmission and exhaust work, and would never be able to stack cars. Ultimately I didn't like the trade offs of any of the mid-rise options.
4-post is definitely the biggest, heaviest, and unfortunately the most expensive. In my garage the ceiling height unfortunately is not high enough to stack cars (8'-9"). If I planned to stay in this house longer, I would invest in re-framing in the attic and raising the ceiling a foot or so. Hopefully the next place I move will have a taller garage ceiling. Considering I'll take the lift to the next house I live in, I didn't take the inability to stack cars as a knock for the 4-post. 4-post seems to be the safest option, best for storage, still allows for transmission and exhaust work, and can work for wheel-off work with a bit extra hassle. 4-post lifts are also movable on the included caster set. Being able to move the lift is a huge bonus. Ultimately I was sold on the 4 post because of these reasons, and the acceptable trade-offs.
Once I landed on the 4-post, I then had to sort through about 8-10 different brands that appear to all be made in China of very similar construction. I'd have liked to get a high-quality brand like challenger, rotary, wildfire, advantage, etc... but the cost of these lifts was $2000-3000 more for the same thing. At those prices, I would not be in the market, unfortunately. One reeeeeeeeally crappy thing is that apparently the cost of all lifts went up by about $1000 each in just the last year alone. That's unfortunate. Of all the Chinese brands, Triumph cost about the same as the rest but shipped for free, came with casters, jack tray, and drip pans. It also came with aluminum ramps, which were extra on the other lifts and about 40lbs less than the steel ramps. I couldn't find anything better about any of the other Chinese brands so settled on that one. It's the Triumph NSS-8, 8,000 lb lift, standard size. There is a compact version of this and an XLT version that both cost a few hundred more. Bought it from Mechanic's Superstore. They were good to deal with, but the lift took about a month longer than their estimate. That didn't bother me.
Unloading was a bear. The one runway with the hydraulic cylinder is so heavy that its very sketchy to try and pick up with two people. I couldn't have done this by myself and without a cherry picker. We had to disassemble it on the trailer and take it one piece at a time. My drive way is sloped. I also opted not to have it delivered to my house because it costs money.
Here it is in my garage in pieces.
Here's my daughter worrying that I'm going to hurt myself. She's not wrong. This is sketchy. Highly recommend a second person and a cherry picker. I just had my cherry picker and my wife and daughter to watch me, comment about the danger, worry, and be there in case I need an ambulance called.
Thankfully once bolted together, the danger decreases dramatically.
Then ran the cables, installed the locks, and ran the hydraulic line. Herein lies the two poor quality issues I ran into. The holes for the lock shaft didn't line up between the crossmember and the runway. I had to drill one new hole in the runway, not a huge problem. The bigger problem was that the 14mm X 6an adapter that they sent me was totally wrong. 14mm did not thread into the pump, too big. A few trips to the hydraulic supply store and I found something that threaded in smoothly, which was British thread (why? I have no idea). The thing fit together but once the hose is screwed on, it slowly drips fluid upon operation. I'm going to give the place I bought it a chance to correct this... I've heard they're good about sending replacement parts on lifts that have issues so we'll see what happens. Not going to knock them for this just yet, but be aware if you buy a lift like this you may run into some quality control issues that are frustrating.
Bam, there it is. Here goes nothing!
SUCCESS!!!!
Next day I assembled the casters, and rolled the lift forward 1 foot, so that my ramps would clear the garage door. Then I flipped the race car around backwards to see if I could get the car all the way up and not interfere with the garage door operation. It worked.
Just ordered a 30ft long LED strip light that I plan to line the runways with so that I can actually see something under the lift, then... I'm going to pull the transmission on the race car... NOT on jack stands, for the first time.
