DIY Guide: Homemade Car Lift Plans

If you have time and creative thoughts, you can try for a homemade car lift plans. For details, keep reading the article.

Certainly, the best car lifts are the most expensive. If you want a tool that can lift more than 10,000 lbs, you’ll need to spend $3000 or even more. Unfortunately, not all people have the ability to spend so much money on their car lifting tools.

Does that mean that poor people can’t have their own car lifts? Not necessarily. If money is a problem, the best solution is to build your own car lift. To do this, you must first know the weight of your vehicle and the resistance of the materials you’re going to use.

The height and thickness of the structural profiles can play in your favor or against you. So, you’ll also need to do some structural calculations to ensure that your invention will work.

To make your own homemade car lift plans, you don’t need to be an expert. You only need enough planning and money to buy the required materials. In this detailed guide, you’ll learn everything you need to know to make your homemade car lift work as well as those commercial models.

What is Homemade Car Lift Plans

Homemade car lift plans are all preliminary preparations you should do to build your own lifting tool. That includes choosing the design and materials correctly. Homemade car lifts are much cheaper than commercial models. Best of all, you can include all the features you desire in your final design.

Car lifts are basically metal structures powered by a hydraulic system. Their main purpose is to facilitate revision and repair work, providing more lifting height than regular hydraulic jacks.

Car lifts can raise a car through their wheels or pinch welds. Pinch welds are metal ridges or flanges welded to the car chassis. They serve as support points for hydraulic jacks and portable car lifts.

So, before starting your homemade car lift plans, you need to know what kind of car you have. So, take a look under your car and check if there are pinch welds or not. Low profile car lifts, like portable models, require pinch welds for support.

On the other hand, column car lifts can raise cars without pinch welds. However, some of these models can’t lift low profile cars, because their lifting arms are very high.

So, if you want your lifting tool to work, you should also know the distance from the floor to the bottom edge of the chassis. In order not to make mistakes, you can’t ignore the most important details.

You should gather as much information as possible on which to base your design. Starting building and realizing that you made a mistake is the worst thing that can happen to you.

Next, you’ll find a step-by-step guide on how to install a car lift. with all the things you need to do to build a perfect homemade car lift.

Step by Step Guideline: Homemade Car Lift Plans

Certainly, there’s a recipe for success. At least, to build the best homemade car lift. All you need to do is to follow one by one the advice in the following list.

Take Some Measurements

First of all, take some measurements of your car, including width, height and distance between each wheel (between support points). It’s also necessary that you know its weight. So, if you don’t have access to a car scale to determine the weight, you can search on the Internet.

Determine the Type of Car You Have

For lifting purposes, there are two types of car lifts: with or without pinch welds. Whatever the case, you should also know how much weight is distributed on each wheel or pinch weld. You need that information for your calculations.

Choose the Right Material

Before performing your calculations, you should also know the material you’ll use to build your car lift. The best material for these cases is steel. In the case of support elements, a thickness between 5-6 mm is recommended.

Whichever material you choose, you should know the elastic modulus, length and inertia of the profile.

Start Calculating

Once you have the necessary data, it’s time to design. First, draw a sketch of your lifting tool. Then convert that sketch into a “free body diagram”.

A free-body diagram is a graphic representation of the forces and displacements that act on a particular body or structure. If you have no idea how to do this, ask an engineer friend who can do the calculations for you.

From the free body diagram, you’ll get other forces known as “reactions”. To verify if your design will work, enter the reactions and material data in structural design software.

The software will help you determine the minimum specifications for each structural profile so they won’t fail trying to lift your car.

Make Some Blueprints

If the calculations say your idea works, it’s time to do some serious blueprints. You can use CAD tools to do it. You can even make a 3D model if you want.

Buy the Materials

After that, calculate the amount of materials you’ll need. You’ll also need to buy a power unit, high-pressure air hoses and hydraulic pistons to power your homemade lifting tool. Make sure that the total expense doesn’t exceed the cost of a commercial lifting tool. Remember that the main purpose of doing this is to save money.

Start Building

After buying the required materials and equipment, it’s time to start building. You’ll need tools to cut, drill and weld the metal parts. Make sure you have everything you need to get started.

Make Some Tests

After building your homemade car lift, you must do some tests. That way, you’ll determine if you need to make some adjustments. If everything goes well, you can already enjoy your car lift and show it off with your friends.

Conclusion

Certainly, the key to not making mistakes is good planning. Don’t start building anything, without first verifying that it will support the applied weight. That’s why it’s so important to do some previous calculations.

Don’t choose low-quality materials to save costs. If something fails, your car will pay for the consequences. If you carefully follow the advice in this step-by-step guide, you’ll certainly succeed in your project.