Thursday, November 8, 2012

My problem, not your problem

I have the most ridiculous garage in the world.

Built around 1960, it is neither large enough for the road yachts of the time, nor is it the 1920 style 'shack' garage that might have enclosed a Ford Model T and still require you to climb out the trunk, it is so narrow.

Instead it is a decently sized structure about 1-1/2 car widths, but with a Model T sized rollup door. My VW Beetle fit fine; in fact it slumbered there with spurts of work on it for almost six years. But this garage is ill suited to being storage, shop space, and parking space. It could be any of them, but not all three. There is space above the rafters used for storage, and the size inside is decently large, owing the ceiling joists that leave open space up to 96", the standard interior dimension. Enough space to work on a bus.

Except for that dang door. Its wide enough for anything but a 66 T-bird, but the frame around the door is only 73" high, and of course, the roll up door sags down slightly below that, which means it is at the perfect height to clock me right in the brain box if I neglect to duck. (Ask me how I know.)

General Dimensions of the Type2.

Well, the T2b, Ferdinand the Bulli stands a tip-toe at 77 inches, which would not only prevent entry, it would  simply gouge up the top if I tried. If I loaded it with rocks and every neighborhood kid I could find, I might get the suspension to squat down, but I doubt I'd get it low enough.

So I'm going to take off the wheels. Either have the treads unmounted from the rims and ROLL it in, hoping I don't wreck the rims in the process, or pull the wheels off, put 'skates' on the brake discs and drums and roll it in that way, much lower to the ground. Once inside, it will be up on lifts, hopefully right up to the 96" limit so that I have plenty of elbow room to work underneath. With a stock ride height of 11" of the body above the ground, I need to think in terms of how I'm going to raise it by 19" for a grande total of 30" of clearance underneath, enough for a talented luau chick to limbo under. But when was the last time that you met a jack stand that could handle a 30 inch rise?

So we're back to buy, borrow, fab, or custom. Let's see what's on the market. because it would make life much easier on this project to have 30" working space underneath.

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