1. Home
  2. ⏣ General Metalworking
  3. Using Air Bags to lift ramps

Using Air Bags to lift ramps

I have never used air bags before (the lifting type), but I think my latest project would benefit from them.

I have a "chassis dyno" in the shop, and it uses two ramps that you drive the car up, then once the drive wheels are on the dyno rollers, I lift the ramps up with floor jacks to be level, and place stands under the ramps. Once the car is in place, only the non-drive wheels are on the ramp, so the lifting load is easily manageble with a floor jack on each ramp, lifting them each evenly. I would estimate the max load the air bags would EVER see to be 2500 lbs.

The problem with using the floor jacks is... quite simply it is clumbsy, and can be slow.

Here are my obsticles. The ground clearance is about 4" where the lifting must occur, and the distance it must lift is about 14" total, or 10 inches from the lift point.

As far as I know, this would eliminate any hydraulic bottle type jack because of the stroke required.

I googled "lifting air bags" and have contacted a couple of companys for some initial pricing info, but I suspect it will be expensive. I can live with the jacks if it is priced out of my league, but I need to investigate this fully before I abandon it.

So, does anyone out there have some positive advise, of HELPFUL pointers of things I might be overlooking? Maybe some resonably priced vendors, or applications that may work also?

Thanks for the interest!

Reply to
rbce2003
Loading thread data ...

Sounds like you need a custom assembly that would be just like a floor jack, except maybe the bottle could be vertical. The jack bottle could go near the high end of the ramp, and a linkage could extend out to the 4-inch clearance part of the ramp.

Single controller/pump, some hydraulic line, and you'll have a very slick professional-looking setup.

Dave

Reply to
spamTHISbrp

Could you adapt a pair of scissor jacks? The type that are OEM on GM pickups come to mind. Maybe tie a pair together with a common shaft and motor drive it?

Reply to
Bill Marrs

Hunter front-end alignment racks have used air bags for years. Go to a chassis/tire shop and look one over.

-Carl

Reply to
Carl Byrns

Another thing you might look into is hooking in a hydraulic cylinder on each ramp to lift them at the same time. They make manual hand pumps if you don't want to use an electrical one. I believe that the mobile dynos (i.e. Mustang?) use this kind of system, but with a rather extensive system to life more than the ramps.

Reply to
AHS

Perhaps some type of linkage that would allow you to use a hydraulic or pneumatic cylinder laid horizontally or at an angle.

Shawn

Reply to
Shawn

Air bags from a semi suspension will go nearly to 4", without the regular gear that goes with them. There's also smaller airbags for cab suspension, I believe they'd do what you need. And there's in-between bags that are intended as helper springs for medium duty trucks, a friend of mine put a set on a truck for about $250. If you want the name of those, I'll give him a call.

John

Reply to
JohnM

Well, you could always chew a hole in the floor to mount hydraulic jacks or cylinders in. You could also just buy a pair of air-over hydraulic floor jacks, which should be faster and able to work in tandem, and might even be able to be set in place semi-permanently. I don't know if there are any short/small bottle jacks that make use of telescoping cylinders - seems unlikely.

Reply to
Ecnerwal

formatting link

Reply to
Ned Simmons

PolyTech Forum website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.