I've had a Bend Pak scissor lift for a couple of years and have been very pleased with its versatility.

Since winter is coming, and my garage is filling up with snowmobiles, I thought it would be a perfect time to 'justify' buying a 4 post lift to stack my Z06 and my Camaro for the off-season.

The lift is a Bend Pak HD-9 (the wider of their current options).

Rough dimensions are 121" wide (outside to outside) and about 174" long (excluding the ramps). I contemplated buying their 'ST' version that is about 103" wide, but that version wasn't wide enough between the crossbeam supports to fit the 76" (tire) width of my Z06. Close, but no cigar.

I bought a 110v for versatility - I'm planning to have a winter layout and a summer layout for the garage. FWIW, a 220v is also available and is supposed to raise the car faster. IMO, the 110v is plenty fast, raising my Z to the top safety lock in about 55 seconds.

Max lift height is 70" which gives you about 78" to the bottom of the car (5" for the ramp height and 3" or so of normal ground clearance).

My ceiling height is 121". The pic below shows the Camaro and the Corvette on the 2nd to the highest safety stop - it could go up another 5" or so, but the hood of the Camaro would hit the garage door.

I considered other brands - Backyard Buddy, Rotary, Revolution (Rotary), and Direct Lift. In the end, the combination of price (about $3500 installed, including casters which allow one to move the lift around), reputation of brand, (auto) air safety locks, enclosed cabling, adjustable ramp width (between 37.25" and 44" inside to inside), and optional rolling bridge jack made the BendPak the best option for me. (plus, the blue matches my other lift )

BendPak web page:
http://bendpak.com/products/automoti...lifts/hd-9.php

Bought it locally (Shakopee, MN) from a company called Benco (no affiliation with BendPak). They made their lives easy by bringing a truck with an on-board hoist.. Would be difficult to get the larger sections off the truck without some type of lift (engine lift would work). 2 guys took about 3.5 hours to set it up. The install was fairly basic really, but IMO, only 'easy' after watching someone do it. It would have taken me a lot longer.

Here are some pics of the Z/Camaro on/under:






Easily lifts my pig of an X5


All in all, I'm very happy with it so far.. I should have bought this 5 years ago.

 

Nice...very impressive! Congrats.

 

Looks good, I'm glad to see the X5 fits on it, but it appears as though nothing would fit under it with the x5 on it.

 

You are correct - nothing (I own) would fit.

When we built our house, I should have had the sense to have 12' min ceiling height.. oh well.

The good news is that the X is my daily and would never be 'on top' of anything else. I also don't have to do any maintenance on it, so it won't likely be on the lift very often.

 

Nice! Looks like a cozy fit! Is it a pain to get in and out of the Vette with the car parked above? Hit your head yet? My garage ceiling is pretty low too and I'm still on the fence about putting in a lift.

 

Actually, I hit my head pretty good yesterday grabbing something out of the passenger side of the Vette.. It's something that one has to get used to.

Re getting in/out, it's not too bad. I have enough spaces in the garage that I won't be parking underneath the lift with the Z in the summer, but even if I had to, it would be fine.

Re the width, they do make a less wide version (-ST) that would work for most cars. My Z has too wide of a footprint in the back to clear, but most other (Pcars for example) cars would fit easily (like my Camaro - tons of room).

10' is plenty high for most cars that you'd want to work on - X5 types notwithstanding.

If you're going after a service-type lift, a scissor might be a better 'fit'. I love mine.

 

I know I'll hit my head when I get a lift. I'd have to line it with foam or something.

The ceiling in my garage is only 8' 6"!!! I'm trying to stack my lowered Lexus GS and S2000. Technically I have about 2 inches of space but practically speaking I don't know if this would work. Before you buy a lift, does someone come and "certify" the garage to make sure there is enough space, power, etc?

 

In short, no.

Measure twice, buy once.

If your GS is 56" high and your S2000 is 51" high and the deck is 5" high, you're about 8" into your ceiling. I don't see that working.

And that doesn't take into consideration the actual locking heights of the lift - which vary depending on how you setup the post-ladders. The lock might be at 55" and 60" and you have to use the 60" one.

So, the formula is really to add these together:

Height of lock above your lower car height - ??
Height of upper car - ??
Deck height - 5"
'Off the lock height' - 1"

 

The car height is less because the suspension is lowered but it looks like the deck height negates that. I didn't realize the deck was 5". Oh well...

 

Hey HIRISC! Thanks a lot for the endorsement! We used you for our testimonials page. Hope you don't mind! Come check it out.

 

No problem, I'm a BendPak fan as you already know.

Here's a review I did on the MD-6XP scissor a few years back.

Tip for you - use Boardreader.com to sniff out references to your brand on forums:
http://boardreader.com/s/%22bendpak%22.html

Cheers

 

Thanks for the link HIRISC. It's great to see another BendPak fan.

Great work on that ramp & lift install. Appreciate that you took the time to write us a review. Also, you have an awesome lookin' 'vette! Thanks again man!

 

nice lift and nice rides.

 

Thanks Dino.

I bought another BP 4 post for the shop.. this is the taller/longer HD-9XW.

The MD-6XP scissor is now serving as jackstands for my Factory Five project.

 

Well done! Love that shop picture best of all!