4 post lift build

[Mad Ax]

OK, here's a quick something I've had in mind for a couple of years and never got around to doing.  I'm due to go away for a bit on Tues, and didn't want to get stuck into anything long-winded that I'll only resent having to leave when I fly away, so I thought I'd give this a go tonight.  I had a quick sketching session and figured I only have to cut and glue a handful of styrene tubes to build the bulk of the project.  So here it is - a super-quick (60 minute) usable 4-post lift.  (note that this is a lift rather than a ramp - I had a ramp in mind but it requires an awful lot more styrene tube and some styrene sheet as well.  Maybe another day).  This isn't about scale perfection, it's really about getting another touring car into my scale workshop without increasing the footprint :)

So, all I've used so far is 3 packs of Evergreen 255 square tube and 1 pack of 256 square tube, and some glue.

I cut 3 lengths of 255 in half (that's from about 357mm to about 178.5mm).  Four of these make the vertical posts, and two make the longitudinal runners.  Don't panic, it will all make sense later.  Basically this gives me a total headroom of about 150mm beneath the lift at its maximum height, which is enough for a regular touring car.

Then I cut two more pieces of 255 into 260mm lengths.  These are my lateral supports - what the car actually sits on.

I forgot to take a pic of all the bits before I assembled them, but imagine I have 6x 255 at 178.5mm length and 2x 255 at 260mm length.

I then cut 8x 15mm length of 256 square tube.  These are my sliders, and will allow me to adjust the height and length of the lift.  I forgot to take a pic of all the pieces before I assembled, but you can probably imagine the 16 pieces of plastic I have right now:

6x 255 at 178.5mm

2x 255 at 260mm

8x 256 at 15mm

 

Next, I assembled everything like this:

The lighting isn't good for photos in my studio, but basically you can see my two lateral supports (260mm 255) glued onto the 15mm slider pieces.  The sliders move freely over the longitudinal runners (you can see these running horizontal in the direction the car is facing).  Remember, consecutive numbers of Evergreen square tube will telescope over one another.  This allows me to adjust the length of the sliders, up to about 150mm, to cater for different chassis lengths.

Once the glue was dry (or, actually, not, because I'm too impatient to wait), I glued the four remaining pieces of 256 onto the ends of the longitudinal runners.  If you're planning to do something similar, it's important to glue stuff in the right order - otherwise you end up with some sliders that you can't slide on.  It's also important to be careful with your glue as you want the sliders to remain slideable, otherwise you've just got a static car stand, which is about 13.7 times less impressive and goes from "zomgs that's so cool!" to "meh, that's lame, dude".

Into these upright sliders are fed the remaining pieces of 255 at 178.5mm.  These are the posts.

Now, you might be thinking, Ax, there is a design flaw here.  When you place a car onto this lift, the vertical sliders will slide down the posts and the liftwill collapse and the car underneath will get a very scale dent in its very lexan roof.  Yes, you are right.  The final steps are to drill the vertical sliders with a single 3mm hole all the way through both slider and longitudinal runner; then, drill a sequence of 3mm holes through each of the vertical posts at neat, regular intervals.  Then, cut 4x 3mm styrene bars and insert these through both slider and vertical post to prevent the sliders from moving.  I haven't done this yet since a) the glue is not dry enough to go under the bench drill and 2) I am too lazy to go up to the workshop in the dark and the rain to drill some holes.  I will do this another time.

In the meantime, here is a pic of a pickup truck levitating over the lift.  It is not in fact levitating, I had hold of it with my other hand, which you cannot see thanks to a clever trick photography and me having the camera too close.  However it gives you an idea of how the second car will sit on the lift.  Note that in the final product it will not be levitating, it will actually be sitting on the lift.  At this point the glue was not fully dry so I did not want to rest the car on the lift.  Plus the liftwould have collapsed thanks to not having any holes or pins made yet, see above.

Truck levitating with the power of human hand:

 

Next trick is to remove the vertical posts so I can drill the holes, then cut the pins.  Then I have a functional 4-post lift.  I may even cut some square feet from 1mm styrene sheet to glue to the vertical posts, although this is not essential - it should be sturdy and stable enough without them.  Finally, the whole thing probably wants painting - although I expect the paint will rub off when I move the sliders along the runners.  Maybe some plastic dye would look better.