Hi guys, we about to build a new house and are in the process of drawing up plans, It's essentially going to be a 4 door garage with one being double deep and hence allowing storage for 5 cars, the one stall is also going to have a taller door and ceiling allowing a lift.

I needed to know whats the best setup for accommodating the lift:

1) whats the suggested ceiling height for the stall with the lift, seems like we can get 12ft without and issue, need to know if it's crucial to have it higher....

2) what sort of garage door mechanism is better, I know that the one with the lift will for sure have the wall mounted variety as opposed to the ceiling mounted, I was advised that the wall mounted motors and mechanisms are more problematic, Is this the case? I'd like to keep the wall mounted setups all across as it really opens the place us as opposed to the clutter of all the rails and motors hanging from the ceiling...

3) Is it suggested to go with a 220 ceiling outlet to run the lift?

4) finally since it will be a new fresh concrete pad, what flooring is best? I'm going to be doing some metal fab work in there, So it needs to be durable, We also located in Edmonton Canada so lots of slush, snow movement in the pad due to freezing temps will be present. So plastic tiles are out, and so is epoxy, so my options are down to porcelain tiles and poly aspartic flooring or Granicrete.... suggestions?

Thanks
Shalil

 

1) Go as high as you can. 10' is minimum. The lift you are going to use will dictate height of garage ceiling.
2) You only have to worry about garage door motor if your lift will be under it. The wall mount motors are fine - I know of no problems with them - I am installing one on my build.
3) Some lifts have to be direct wired. I don't know why you couldn't run an outlet if you had a twist lock receptacle. I just left a long wire on mine right now.
4) If you are welding you are very limited on flooring options. Plastic tiles, epoxy, polyaspartics, poly ureas, or poly aspartx are all out as they burn at about 300 degrees. You are limited to concrete and maybe porcelain tiles. I was going to do polished concrete but I am going with poly aspartx since I won't be welding in my garage.

Good luck! Sounds like fun.

 

I have a Jeep that stands around 7' tall and it will be worked on and often on the lift, other then that my 911 will be the other car worked on, the Jeep is what concerns me in terms of ceiling height....
I just looked into it and the ceiling across the garage is just shy of 11' probably around 10' 10" and the central bay will have a elevated ceiling around 12 ft.
My next concern is that it'll probably have to be a 2 post lift since that allows for the most access and in addition it'll require less height since the large portion of the height of the jeep is from the suspension and the 2 post will lift the frame rails as opposed to a 4 post drive on lift that will include the suspension height...