Automotive Service Centers Mashing Legit Lifting Points?

[OK-944]

I’ve seen enough examples of the “official” lifting points of our cars having been bent, mashed, and otherwise physically compromised - to have reached a speculative conclusion about this…that these effects are likely caused, or at least facilitated - by otherwise well meaning folks at automotive service centers.

The lifts at these places can often come up underneath a car rather abruptly - enough so that the weight of a given car will effectively spike momentarily…possibly to the point of causing instantaneous excess pressure on the lift points, thereby causing them to deflect.

Think of this situation being akin to what a technical climber faces - that when a fall occurs when one is attached to a rope, and that rope is in a state of unstressed “slack” for a portion of the fall - its at the point that the rope suddenly becomes taut that, depending upon the distance of the actual fall…that a climbers effective weight can suddenly increase dramatically.

On the 1985 1/2 944 which I’d owned previous to my current ‘87NA, the frame rail “lifting point” locations were somewhat mashed inwards - and although during my period of ownership I’d continued to use these locations successfully and without compromising them further, I suspect that this good outcome is the result of the relatively slow rise of my “Easy Lift” low-rise car lift…and ingenious design by the way which involves no hydraulics, but instead utilizes a system of worm drives and parallelogram arms, only requiring an electric drill of at least 8 amps (or equivalent) to make it work. Furthermore, by changing the speed of the drill, I can modulate the rate of lift.

I think its the use of the above mentioned lift which has allowed me to successfully and confidently use the two raised “bumps” just behind the front wheel wells - which I gather are not official lifting points but are instead part of a unibody locating system for use during the car’s manufacture. Indeed we DIY-ers have been warned specifically not to use these bumps - which I suspect directly relates to what might happen to them were they to be subject to the very abrupt initial upwards contact with a heavy duty commercial garage lift.

At any rate - just some food for thought!

[curtisr]

Food for thought indeed. I missed one such point when looking over a 924s that I eventually purchased. While there are 'work arounds' this was a cause for concern when needing to lift the car at just such a point. I live. I learn.
Thanks for the post.

[v2rocket_aka944]

In a past life I worked on a lot of 944s and never saw one of these mounts damaged that wasn't run off the road/track.

Even if the shop lift moves quickly, there is still going to be a delay of the suspension unloading before all the weight is actually on those points.

I use the "humps" behind the front wheels almost exclusively to jack the car up. Maybe my car being from CA most of its life and avoiding rust has something to do with it ?

I have had my car since 2005 and have not had any issues lifting here.

[djnolan]

Do you mean the rocker panel or front fender was smushed by the lift? I have had this happen on 3 different 944 I have owned.

[Dano944]

Before I took ownership of my late father-in-laws ‘83, he had the 944 serviced at the service center that serviced his Acuras and Fords, and the lower rocker panels are slightly crushed on both sides in the center. Sadly this shop had NO CLUE where to place the hoist arms. But the crushed lower rocker panels are barely visible so I just don’t look at them.

[OK-944]

Dano you might just want to get a closer look at those "slightly crushed" locker panels at some point, as the metal in those locations might have been made more vulnerable to corrosion through breaches in existing factory undercoat and galvanizing layers. Likely not as much of an issue for you in Cali. as it would be for me here in Vermont with all of our road salt...but maybe you should still at least take a look - especially given that corroded rocker panels are a real pain to fix, especially if this corrosion had been allowed to develop and worsen over time.