My garage ceiling hoist

[James Biddle]

Here's the hoist I recently installed in my garage. It's intended to help me load/unload the truck, work on my tools, and load bigger blanks onto my lathe. The fixed portion consists of 10' section Unistrut mounted with Unistrut brackets, all rated at over 2,000 pounds. The brackets are bolted through the drywall to doubled up 2x4's laying on top of the bottom of the roof trusses. The 2x4's span 12' and are supported by 6 trusses and a doubled up 2x6 one one end (already there for some other purpose). I used a Unistrut angle brack at each end to limit the travel of the trolley. The 4-wheel trolley is also Unistrut and rated at 750 pounds, the weakest link. The hoist is a Warn Works Pulzall, with a capacity of 1,000 pounds. I have the 120 vac model, but it aslo sells in a 24 vdc version. It features variable speed via the trigger, LED load indicator, ON/OFF switch and a forward/reverse switch. I decided on this unit to have the flexability to use it eslewhere on different applications.
My first real tryout was to lift my new 530 pound MM16 bandsaw off the floor and put it on 4x4's to install casters. The hoist lifted the BS easily and smoothly. The ceiling did not appear to deflect at all (note that the drywall cracks next to the Unistrut are from a bad mudding job and were there before I started the project).




http://home.comcast.net/~jbiddle/pics/hoist4.jpg

[Aaron Berk]

Now that's awesome, I don't know what I need one for yet, but I want one.

[Robert Chapman]

Very nice! When I saw your earlier post I thought that you had hung your BS on your garage door opener. This is a very well engineered project.

[Andy Casiello]

That's cool! Nicely done.

I have a hoist on the ceiling in my shop too - although it's just hung by a single 2' pipe installed over my bench area. I used it to hoist my tablesaw to add a rolling base - and as you can see from this photo I used it to hold up the base of my workbench as I kept fitting the base leg tenons into the mortises in the top. Makes life a LOT easier with heavy objects in the shop..

[Dave Lehnert]

That's cool! Nicely done.

I have a hoist on the ceiling in my shop too - although it's just hung by a single 2' pipe installed over my bench area. I used it to hoist my tablesaw to add a rolling base - and as you can see from this photo I used it to hold up the base of my workbench as I kept fitting the base leg tenons into the mortises in the top. Makes life a LOT easier with heavy objects in the shop..

Is that one of the Harbor Freight units? If not, what brand?

[Andy Casiello]

Is that one of the Harbor Freight units? If not, what brand?

Yep, it's the HF 880lb capacity. Got it for about $ 80 with a 25% discount coupon. It works great, and seem pretty well made (knocks on wood)..

[Alan Schaffter]

I have a hoist (HF on Ebay) on an I-beam I use to lift stuff up to and down from my second floor shop:





It stows vertically, out of the way inside when not in use:

[Andy Casiello]

That's cool! Great system!

[James Biddle]

I have a hoist (HF on Ebay) on an I-beam I use to lift stuff up to and down from my second floor shop:
It stows vertically, out of the way inside when not in use:

That's a pretty cool system. I have a friend with the same 2nd floor access issue you had. How would you convert your system to work with a ceiling only 3"~4" above the door?

[NICK BARBOZA]

Alan,
do you have any further detail or pictures on that setup? i really like it! the engineer in me is drooling!

Nick

[Mitchell Andrus]

Alan, now THAT is way too cool.

[Mitchell Andrus]

That's a pretty cool system. I have a friend with the same 2nd floor access issue you had. How would you convert your system to work with a ceiling only 3"~4" above the door?

I'd imagine you could mount the beam on rollers, lock it into place and then roll the hoist out the door.

[Gary Lange]

I remember as a kid pulling a lot of engines with a 4"X4" laid over the beams in Dad's garage with a chain wrapped around it and an old chain hoist.

[Ed Blough]

I just caution everyone that trusses are not engineered to support weight other than the normal roof loads. My GC son-in-law makes a good living fixing garage celling that have collapsed because people either hung junk from the ceiling joist or piled too much up overhead.

On one job the customer to did enough damage that the county came in and condemned the whole house. To his dismay the insurance just shook their head and walked away.

My opinion if you need overhead storage or a ceiling hoist build the support for it external of the roof truss structure.

Take that for what it is worth.

[David G Baker]

James,
A friend of mine has a similar hoist set up in his pole barn. He put a 6x6x16' in the attic across the trusses and mounted a barn door track flush with his ceiling. The track has heavy duty rollers in it and a HF hoist mounted to the roller bracket. He uses it to skin deer, load a 500 pound weight in the back of his truck for traction weight and for lifting heavy items.