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Truck Hoist Makes Good Shop Door Hoist
For the past 20 years or so, 90-year-old Neil Thomson has been enjoying the use of a shop door hoist he made from a dump hoist taken off a 2 1/2-ton Ford grain truck.
He adapted it to open and close a 16 by 16-ft. shop door. The fully insulated shop is 24 by 36 ft.
"There's a 2 1/2-ft. by 8-in. dia. hydra
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Truck Hoist Makes Good Shop Door Hoist FARM SHOP Miscellaneous 31-5-39 For the past 20 years or so, 90-year-old Neil Thomson has been enjoying the use of a shop door hoist he made from a dump hoist taken off a 2 1/2-ton Ford grain truck.
He adapted it to open and close a 16 by 16-ft. shop door. The fully insulated shop is 24 by 36 ft.
"There's a 2 1/2-ft. by 8-in. dia. hydraulic oil storage tank directly below the 4-ft. long ram. A 3/4 hp electric motor powers the hydraulic pump," says Thomson.
The 4-ft. long ram is able to open the 16-ft. door because Thomson used cables and pulleys to quadruple its reach. He positioned two pulleys at the bottom, on each side of the ram, and two pulleys up by the ceiling. A steel cable runs through the pulleys and up over the ram. The end of the cable attaches to the door.
The insulated door consists of two 16 by 8-ft. sections (hinged horizontally across the middle with five homemade hinges). The end of the cable attaches to the door.
The door moves up and down in a track made from two pieces of 1 1/4-in. angle iron welded together, making it a 2 1/2 by 1 1/4-in. track on each side of the door that goes up and across the ceiling. Thomson used three roller bearings on each side.
"There are three little 1/8-in. jigs on each side, positioned in the last few inches where each roller stops when the door is fully closed. This forces the door tight against the framework of the wall."
Between the set of tracks that sit on the shop ceiling, Thomson mounted two rods with adjustable, threaded ends. These rods ensure the track width stays constant.
"To lower the door, there's a bleeder valve built right into the hoist that you open," he says. "It feeds the oil back into the reservoir from the ram. By adjusting the valve, you can adjust the speed of door movement in either direction."
Thomson says he prefers the hydraulic system over an air system because "air has a bad habit of leaking out. Hydraulics will only leak extremely slowly," he adds.
Thanks to the oversized door, Thomson can drive the biggest combine or dual 4-WD tractor into the shop.
Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Neil Thomson, P. O. Box 1130, Eston, Sask., Canada S0L 1A0 (ph 306 962-3963).
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