Tilting car lift - Anyone have any experience of these?

Looks pretty unsafe to me, no thanks.

I’ve been considering one of these but they’re pretty expensive!

£500 / £1500 is enough of a difference for me but if I did get a two post then it's extra car storage underneath .....

I just can't find anything out about this unusual trolley lift.

Personally you would be better off with a set of mobile axle stands - which once you have the car on them will get you to a reasonable height off the floor at each end rather than just the one - secondly it will give you the flexibility to move the car around has needed - the tilting type stands will only be of use if the sill & floor pan section of the vehicle in question is structurally sound and if it has plastic sill covers / skirts you will probably have to remove them - a mid height lift can be had for circa £1k but these can restrict underside access or has already stated a 2 post lift can be sourced new for around £1500 if you have the ceiling / roof height which would be the better option

Sort of says it all really.

I have just purchased a set - I have just about every other type of mover / lift stand in the workshop but I have a restricted ceiling height of 2.8m

so I have this cradle - which is good for bodyshells etc but the frame can be slightly restrictive at times and its currently out on loan under another bodyshell







I also have this superb mid rise lift air over hydraulic fully mobile 2800kg - but these are very expensive and its the only one currently in the market that is fully mobile even with the car on it and at full height - great for getting the car to a good working height / flexibility but restrictive with underside access



I also have this heavy duty chassis tilter





I purchased the stands to give me a little more flexibility in the workshop for when I need full unrestricted underside access when applying underbody wax etc but also for moving bodyshells about - they came from here:

There is a light use version

cjautosheywood.co.uk/product/mobile-axle-stand-steel-wheels-cm05a/

Mid range version

cjautosheywood.co.uk/product/mobile-axle-stands-nylon-wheels-cm05c/

And a heavy duty version

cjautosheywood.co.uk/product/heavy-duty-mobile-axle-stand-cm05b/

You could of course always build your own version / set - happy to send you pics / measurements of mine once I get them unpacked or happy for you to call in and have a look but I'm a good few miles from you

I don’t have a garage yet, only a marque on a gravel patch in my garden so I’ve been a bit restricted in what I could use to get the car off the ground before placing axle stands under it

to rase the car using a trolly jack is near on impossible on the gravel, using the cars scissor jack was very tiresome and just not enough room under the car to place a bottle jack

so what I resorted to was buying two of those bike scissor jacks



I’d place one on each side of the car and lift the car off the ground



enough to be able to slide under an axle stand on each side



the axle stands would be placed on 1/2” timber for stability

in only a matter of minutes the car was up in the air, once I started using a cordless drill to rase the car, I’d first place a timber block in the scissor jack as a safety precaution before placing the axle stands




as I mentioned, at first I used to use my cordless drill to rase th scissor jack



I thought using my cordless drill to jack the car up would reduce the life of the drill,

so went to my local scrappy and picked up a windscreen wiper motor off a Free Lander,

I connected a rocker switch to the power cable, as the wiper motor had two speeds I also added another rocker switch to select low & high speed



these scissor jacks were around £55 each, but being made in China to a price, the thread on the scissor jack didn’t last long before the thread started slipping, even though these were rated to be able to lift 500Kg each so using two should of been well within lifting my car being only 800Kg

anyway I bought some Carbon Steel C45 Trapezoidal Lead Screws to replace the weak ones that came with the jacks



and nut





this was how I planned on welding the nut






welded this on one end of the Acme thread rod








as for turning the wiper motor in to the scissor jack more

I cut this jack handle off to use on my wiper motor








and a pin to keep it from unscrewing



till I get my garage built this is working well for me, when I do get round to finishing the garage, I’ll be thinking of other ways of getting my car off the ground