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This is the motorcycle lift I designed and built myself (with the exception
of one part I had welded by a friend at work before I decided to trust my own
welds). It is vaguely similar to many currently on the
market, with a few improvements.
 | All of the lifts I've seen on the market are constructed from angle-iron
with square tubes only on the most-stressed parts. Mine uses all Uni-Strut which is stronger without a big weight difference.
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| All of my pivots are 1/2" hardened bolts or threaded rod. Every store-bought lift I've seen uses no more
than 3/8" bolts.
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| Typical store-bought lifts only go down to about 5-1/2" and only lift to about 17". Mine goes down to 4.25"
(essential for my low-slung bike) and lifts to 19" (more if I could find a bottle jack with more than 4-3/8"
of ram travel).
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| My lift utilizes a pivoting base plate for the hydraulic jack. This keeps the jack pointing directly parallel to
its load. There is no sideways force on the jack ram anywhere in its full range of motion. I've never seen
this done on a commercial lift of this type. Instead, they position the jack bottle on a plate at a fixed
angle. This results in the force on the jack ram being parallel to the bottle at only one point in its range
of motion. At every other point, it is either too high or too low of an angle. That means sideways
pressure on the ram which is hard on the jack's seals, and is less efficient. |
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Here you see the lift in its full-down position. Note even the pivots for the
jack arms had to be moved to allow it to close this far.
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Here it is lifting the frame
of my Intruder from 4.25"
(note the 2x6 that was
under the kickstand to
allow clearance) up to 19"
off the floor.
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This is the whole picture.
Note that it's high enough
to just about put it in my
truck, if there was any
way to drive it off the lift. I
could plant a stool next to
this and work in comfort
all day (not that the Zuki
ever needs that). |
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