easy car lift for the home

[pee]

have any of you guys seen this?
www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?t=149332&f=23&h=0
if you think the idea is good can you add your comments so we can get this stuff built.
it's being prototyped with my ultima so if its good for this it should be good for all other cars.
cheers all
p

[pee]

www.kwiklift.com/features-all.htm
The people looking to make a lift like this will be looking at around £500.

Any thoughts or ideas would be nice
Cheers Pee

[gtr-gaz]

Too late for me I'm afraid, Pee.

I put a pit in my garage a few weeks before Xmas.

Gary

[eliot]

gtr-gaz said:

Too late for me I'm afraid, Pee. I put a pit in my garage a few weeks before Xmas. Gary

So how do you go about doing this? - Just dig a big hole?

[BobM]

eliot said:

So how do you go about doing this? - Just dig a big hole?

Generally also have a brick/block wall.

I did see some nice GRP mouldings to go in pits at Autosport on Saturday, with inbuilt lights, sliding seats/shelves etc. Looked quite neat. Should also solve the problem of water seeping in. I did pick up a leaflet which I think had a website address on it but it looks like SWMBO has 'put it somewhere safe'

[canam-phil]

Inspection pit liner. Not much info but has a phone number.

www.mech-mate.com/

[skid]

I put a pit in my garage and had to do it 'properly' as it was during the building and therefore inspection process.

Now I am very glad I did it correctly as working under a car needs to be done safely.

The spec from an engineer was to use double thickness walls of 100mm (4") midium to high density concete blocks, sat in a proper damp proof membrane 'tub' which lips up and over the floor DPM and then back fill between the wall and vertical DPM with concrete.

PLUS.. very importantly are the garage wall foundations deep enough???

Basically it was explained to me that the base of the wall inner foundation which you then take a 45degree line down into the sub soil must not cut through the hole where the pit is. (God that's hard to write, much easier to draw)

If this isn't so then you run the risk of the whole garage structure, floor, foundation and soil slipping down into the pit, oh and then the car you're working on coming down on you just for good measure!!!!!

Please, please, please anyone building a pit do it properly. Failure, if you are lucky, could just devalue your house when it's inspected during a sale, or it could kill you. Horribly!

Anyone want to discuss further or wants a sketch of my poor explanation then please PM me and we can chat. I paid for engineering advice, you can have it for free.

Mark

[gtr-gaz]

eliot said:

gtr-gaz said: Too late for me I'm afraid, Pee. I put a pit in my garage a few weeks before Xmas. Gary So how do you go about doing this? - Just dig a big hole?

Basicly yes.

Although I am fortunate enough not to have foundations under my garage to worry about!

I have (or had. It almost demolished the house last spring when a huge branch fell!) a 100 year old ash tree 2m from where I wanted to site my garage.
This meant the foundations would have had to be at least 3m deep. Not practical, so I laid a 6" reinforced concrete slab and built a garage on that.

Gary