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MG MGA - Car Hoist
| I have just taken delivery of my car hoist. I asked you all for opinions many months ago. Whilst I would have enjoyed the benefit of 2 or 4 post hoists, I simply did not have the room in the garage with all the other kit that includes: the car, 2 workshop benches, lathe, engine hoist, spare engine, spare gearbox, compressor, welding equipment, 2 bicycles, racking, cupboards, bbq (winter storage only), double ladder, single ladder, air-to-ground unguided missile box (no missiles - fired them in 1975 - Sneb) - now stores all my MGA spares, dismantled shower cabinet, etc. The kit I bought came to just under £1100 including delivery. It is mobile, so I can winch it vertical against the garage wall when not required. It lifts to just over 1 metre which is okay for my needs. I have to say that delivery was brilliant. Ordered it Monday afternoon from the Midlands; arrived Wednesday morning: http://automotechservices.co.uk/garage_scissor_lift_as-5500.html Steve  |
| Steve Gyles |
| Steve, Your garage is boring! Mine has similar equipment but with the addition of an essential ingredient! Grog fridge, engine hoist, extra grog fridge, spare engine, another grog fridge, spare gearbox, emergency grog fridge, compressor, boxes of grog (fridges full!) welding equipment, 2 bicycles, racking exclusively for grog storage, cupboards full of grog, etc. etc. What was that about a hoist? Barry (Hic!) |
| Barry Gannon |
| Barry.....I have a grog fridge..the product of a power failure and a month of internal breeding whilst overseas. I nearly got consumed when I opened it......Have you had a few incidents? Steve....followed your original thread on subject but decided to go the way of Dominic and bought a high lift jack ,tall stands and a sleeper .....I looked a huge number of hoists ,incl. ones like the one you bought but felt they obstructed the underside access too much. Used the jack ( 850mm lift and cost about A$550 ) a number of times..it is a beastie but system works well . I just fitted an alloy fuel line, two fuel pumps and and surge tank under my 74 jeep ( New EFI system ) ...about 10 hrs work ...and found I could get the creases out of the bod quickly when i resumed vertical. Very pleased.... |
| Neil Ferguson |
| Steve, Looks good for servicing brakes, front suspension, diff etc. What is access like around the centre of the car - clutch, gbox and prop shaft? Mike |
| Mike Ellsmore |
| Mike Time will tell. Once it's opened up there is quite a bit of space underneath. There is a German video showing it on Youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_IbLy2ixAo&noredirect=1 You can see the accessibility of the underside at just after the 5 minute point. Steve |
| Steve Gyles |
| Steve, That German video is very informative even though I don’t speak the language. Looks like an mgtf in the clip. Product looks impressive, keep us informed how you get on with it. Richard |
| R A Evans |
| The lift looks great Steve. For reasons of old age and general youth deficiency I find that I really do need to look out for something similar. I have found that I even tend to jack up the front end of my car to adjust the tappets or indeed do any kind of work under the bonnet (hood) So let us know how you get on with the lift Steve. It must be so much better to be able to sit comfortably beneath the car to work on it rather than the "crawling on my back beneath the barbed wire in no mans land" technique that I am forced to use at present! Neil, how does your hi lift jack and sleeper system work? (Is it a railway sleeper?) Cheers Colyn |
| Colyn Firth |
| Colin....'creeper' should have been the word.. Well cushioned with an adjustable head rest and wheels ....comfortable position and no back squirming required to get to the required position. I jack up the front first and install the two front stands and then around the back and same again. I bought 3 tonne double pin stands and all is good and stable .......but Steve's hoist looks very good for most work .I was impressed. |
| Neil Ferguson |
| Colin....'creeper' should have been the word.. Well cushioned with an adjustable head rest and wheels ....comfortable position and no back squirming required. To get to the required position. I jack up the front first and install the two front stands and then around the back and same again. I bought 3 tonne double pin stands and all is good and stable .......but Steve's hoist looks very good for most work .I was impressed. |
| Neil Ferguson |
| Barry I am sure we can empty a few of those grog fridges in March! I forgot to mention the Shelley jack Museum! also the blast cabinet. It is worth also mentioning at this stage that I had visions of leaving the hoist parked permanently under the car. Well, there isn't much additional width there. Probably an inch either side clear of the wheels. I would have to employ all my air-to-air refuelling skills to line up the car each time. Steve |
| Steve Gyles |
| Steve, You could lay a couple of wide scaffold planks (same thickness) beside the hoist and just drive in. Barry |
| Barry Gannon |
| Barry It's an option, but I think spending the money on a block and tackle to hold it on its side will be the preferable way to go for me. I tested it today. I have to say the instructions were useless and obviously written by Elf & Safety. Told me everything not to do at the beginning of each section, including not lifting children, but not a coherent word on how to connect and operate it. For example it just said connect the pipes. 2 plastic pipes were the same bore and, although different colours, no indication of which of the 2 connectors to connect them to. I actually found out by studying the German video and freeze framing. Diagrams very poor. Every part was numbered, but no instructions saying what each number was! The air pump connector thread was poorly tapped. Fortunately I had the correct tap and was able to run it through. It works fine, but very disappointed with the documentation. Steve  |
| Steve Gyles |
| Not ""Elf & Safety"" mate But is Lawyers 4 U If you dont tell people what NOT to do then the legal guys will sue for every penny they can get. One day "I have a dream" we will ban everyone of them and give them a proper job that adds to our output and then normal people can get on with enjoying life with our kids going on outward bound trips and school outings. Are you in the "get rid of the lawyers club and get enjoyment back into life club" mate? By the way that looks a bit on the complicated side for a simple lift! |
| Robert (Bob) Midget Turbo |
| Bob Totally with you. We need to get rid of a lot of bureaucracy, ambulance chasers and the general attitude amongst the population that you are owed a living by the welfare state. Sorry, political speech over. The hammer in the photo is for keeping the kids off the hoist! It is actually an easy bit of kit once you have sussed it. No electrics. 7 bar of air pressure from the compressor. Totally foot pedal operated. Press hard on the heel and the ramp goes up. Release and stops. Press the toe lightly and the ramp lowers very slightly to lock the black diagonal bars in place (red air line tube). Press harder and black air tube comes into play, rotates a lifting bar to clear the black diagonal bars clear of their stops and hoist continues to lower. Steve |
| Steve Gyles |
| Well said Bob |
| J Bray |
| Thanks John Seriously thinking about actually getting a movement together and making the government stand up and be counted. the main problem to start with is convincing a general public why we are in the current situation. Generally they blame Europe! I think we need legislation that states we are responsible for our own actions!!! If we freely choose to ride a bike and fall off it is not the fault of the bike!! |
| Robert (Bob) Midget Turbo |
| Bob Seems you need to do an epetition. Just get 100,000 signatures and your topic gets debated in Parliament. http://epetitionS.direct.gov.uk You should get half a dozen on this BBS. Steve |
| Steve Gyles |
| Steve, the Elf and Safety stuff isnt aimed at people like you. Its aimed at the idiots who have successfully claimed for compensation against companies like Macdonalds because they burnt their lips on the hot coffee they had just bought and they hadnt been warned it may be hot! And the other idiot who had just bought a new motorhome and when travelling at 50mph decided that he could press the cruise control and then get up from the drivers seat to go make himself a cup of coffee. Apparently he successfully claimed against the makers as they hadnt explained that the cruise control didnt work like an auto pilot! It makes you wonder whether the idiots are the claimants or the legal system who find in their favour?? Count me in on the petition Bob Colyn |
| Colyn Firth |
| Sorry guys ..you cannot win this way. Too many lawyers sitting on the green leather who will protect the right of the universal dorks to sue for everything ..as long as the legal profession gets a cut. I watched with amusement a few years ago in the UK as it struggled to reform the system of buying/selling houses ( one of the worst in the world ) under Blair ( bloody LAWYER ) and came up with an even more tortuous bureaucratic system which protected the conveyancing fees of these parasites. Lawyers are needed but.....!!! |
| Neil Ferguson |
| Steve, I think the new hoist requires a project http://www.edisposals.com/is-bin/INTERSHOP.enfinity/WFS/Disposals-Public-Site/en_US/-/GBP/ViewProductDetail-Start;pgid=MieqQ4wkQg8000ArvQ_8K1sp0000YivWvhdp?ProductUUID=hjTAqBIQH7sAAAEskcZaBeSf&CatalogCategoryID=uW7AqBELbsEAAAD_vUBpc4dn&JumpTo=OfferList Regards...John |
| J Bray |
| John It won't fit in my garage. Also, I don't think my spare 1500 engine will get it going fast enough! It is XS456. It flew with 56Sqn in Cyprus. Not one I have flown. Closest was XS457. Each squadron had a dozen or so F6 single seaters and one operational 2-seater. The one on my F6 sqn (11 Sqn) was XS416. For anyone interested in the Lightning, the T5 cockpit was very tight with side by side seating - closer together than the MGA seating, probably similar to the MG PA series. The instrument panel was about the same distance away as the MGA panel. The left seat had conventional controls (throttles for left hand and stick for right hand). The right seat had a left hand stick and right hand throttles. One of the big issues was pilot size, especially thigh to kneecap length. If this length was too great you would lose your knee caps on the cockpit canopy arch if you ejected. That is why most Lightning pilots were small, usually about 5 ft 10 inches maximum. A number of pilots went on to become test pilots for Airfix. Steve |
| Steve Gyles |
| Steve, if John had suggested that you bought this for a project instead of the English Electric Lightning. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrpJmNRrVHI You could have avoided the expense of buying the car hoist as the project has its own built in system for raising itself above the ground. We built some great things back then :-) Colyn |
| Colyn Firth |
| Personally would of gone for one of the two seat Skyhawks the Kiwis have been trying to dispose of for the past few years |
| S P Rossetto |
| Steve, If Jeremy Clarkson can park one on in his front garden, you have a duty to do the same! John |
| J Bray |
| Sorry to butt in but here we go again http://is.gd/6NWfdZ Now who do we think will pay the bill for these lawyers? Just a guess on my part but I think cruising will become substantially more expensive so it is joe public I would expect. Alternatively we may never again have the option and another form of entertainment will be takem away from us!! |
| Robert (Bob) Midget Turbo |
| I have brought this one back from the archives to provide closure. The hoist I had purchased was a tight fit within the car's wheel track, making every day parking like landing an aircraft dead on the centre line. I had therefore stored the hoist on its side against the wall; not ideal for routine maintenance tasks. I have now built a couple of ramps that fit alongside the hoist and are just higher than the hoist, making the process simpler. An added bonus is that the car is now 4 inches higher for all routine (non-hoist) work, saving my poor old back a good deal of anguish. Steve  |
| Steve Gyles |
| Still looks like a fairly precision job to park on the ramps so I assume you have a long and straight approach to landing! I have to make a sharp 90 degree turn to get in my garage |
| dominic clancy |
| Dominic I have a 20m straight run. I can lean over the right door to run the right wheel just inside the black tape. To back it up I have 2 inline plumb lines hanging from the garage roof that I line up with a suitable part of my right wiper arm. Also, when the first plumb line touches the windscreen I am correctly parked fore and aft. Easy once you have done it a couple of times. Steve |
| Steve Gyles |
| Good for you Steve! Take a look at my post (above) to you on 13/Jan/2012! How's your back? Barry. |
| Barry Gannon |
| Barry Yes, thanks Barry. Your idea has been at the back of my mind for the last 15 months. Just another job to get done. Where does time go when you are retired?!!! Steve |
| Steve Gyles |
| Just to complete this old thread. With Spring arrived in the UK I finally got round to using my hoist to do the servicing. What a difference to lying on the cold concrete floor! The only problem encountered was that with this hoist the car gradually moves longitudinally, in this case towards my garage door which eventually I had to open! Not enough length in my garage to permanently move the ramps and hoist forward without obstructing access through the door at the other end. In hindsight a scissor hoist would have been more practical. Steve  |
| Steve Gyles |
| The hoist that has proved very popular with MGA owners in Melbourne is the Big Red Jacks scissor hoist - suitable for normal suburban garages. So far 7 MGA Register members have bought them to my knowledge. Priced around the $A1850. Dimensions on the following post. Mike  |
| Mike Ellsmore |
Big Red Jacks scissor hoist dimensions. |
| Mike Ellsmore |
| Careful Steve, you will wear the hoist out at this rate! Hope you are not planning on using it EVERY two years?! Neil |
| Neil McG |
| Well spotted Neil. Last year was a write off, hardly used the car. Spent most of the year planning and being involved in my daughter's wedding using wedding cars sevenoaks. Deciding to get married in Florence rather than the UK doubled the effort required. I don't know where the time went. That said, the big issue is that this hoist is not ideal for the MGA despite it being listed as suitable. It does not fit inside the wheel track of the standard car. Though I would add that it can be slid in from the side but not many of us have the luxury of the space in the garage that is required. It is only because I have the disc wheel axle with the WW modification that it will slide in from the rear. It was for that reason that I built the wooden ramps. This has allowed me to keep the hoist permanently in place between the parking ramps. Now that I have it properly set-up it will get a lot of use. A more powerful air compressor would be beneficial but mine just about copes. I guess I have been bit of a guinea pig in this project and I hope others who want to go this route find my thoughts and experiences useful. If I was to go through this again I would likely opt for Mike's version. Steve |
| Steve Gyles |
This thread was discussed between 11/01/2012 and 11/03/2014
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