Harbor Freight’s Pittsburgh Steel Motorcycle Lift must be one of the tool retailer’s most popular items. It’s certainly well-known among us motorcyclists. Despite many dismissing it, it’s proven to be a durable, reliable, and cost-effective staple in home garages and professional shops alike.
If you’re like me, you don’t have $800-900 to drop on even the cheapest air-powered lift, nor the beefy air compressor needed to power one, so the venerable Harbor Freight lift is your best option by far.
Sourcing the lift
You can get the lift brand new for $450. That’s not bad, but of course, this is Harbor Freight we’re talking about, so there are often coupons and sales to get it for much less. If you’re really bargain-hunting, you can often find used ones in great condition available on Facebook Marketplace, Craigslist and the like for $250 or less. I bought mine from a friend, and it was like new.
It’s totally worth it, regardless of what you spend, and the lift easily lives up to its reputation.
That said, the wheel vise included on the lift is a weak point. It seems like an afterthought, and isn’t very well designed. It’s small, doesn’t provide much clamping strength, and does very little to help keep the bike secure and upright.
On top of being too small to be useful, it was simultaneously too large, and made contact with the brake rotors on my Z900RS. This combo made the vise completely unusable for me.
The wheel vise had to go, and an upgrade was in order.
We have the technology, and we can rebuild it. Better…stronger…faster.
Enter the wheel chock
Harbor Freight just happens to sell a killer motorcycle stand/wheel chock. It is rated for 1800 lbs. capacity, and is rock solid stable on its own, especially when paired with a rear stand. At $63, it is a fraction of the $300 price tag of similar wheel chocks.
It’s incredibly easy to mount the wheel chock to the lift, so you can upgrade the lift without breaking the bank, and transform it into a legit workhorse.
What you’ll need
- Harbor Freight Motorcycle Lift
- Harbor Freight Motorcycle Stand/Wheel Chock
- Tape measure or ruler
- Marker
- Center punch
- Mallet
- Cordless power drill
- 1/8″, 1/4″, and 1/2″ drill bits (or a stepped bit) suitable for drilling steel
- Lubricant to use as cutting fluid
- Socket and/or combination wrenches
Modifying the lift
With all your tools and materials assembled, you’re ready to get to work modifying your lift. LFG!
1. Assemble (and test) the Wheel Chock
It’s a good idea to assemble the chock first, and test it to make sure it works for your bike. This also gives you the chance double-check for defects. It includes easy instructions, and has very few pieces, so we’re not going into the step by step on its assembly.
Even though you’re mounting it to the lift and don’t need the front support arm, I suggest leaving it attached. It helps square the chock up to the edge of the lift, and gives you two additional strap attachment points for securing the bike to the lift. Also, if you want to use the wheel chock free-standing on the ground or in a truck or trailer, all you have to do is unbolt it from the lift and you’re good to go.
2. Remove the original clamp
Easy as that. Bust out a socket wrench or driver and a combination wrench, and remove the nuts and bolts holding the original clamp in place. Toss it aside. You won’t be needing it. Ever. Because it sucks.
Save those nuts and bolts, though, because you’ll be reusing them.
3. Mark where the Wheel Chock will go
Place the chock on the lift, take some measurements to get it centered, and use a marker to mark where you’ll need to drill the mounting holes.
There are seven mounting holes in the wheel chock base, but you won’t need all of them. I marked only the four outermost holes of the base, since there are four bolts from the original vise to reuse for mounting. You can drill more holes and use more bolts to mount it, but four will suffice.
Get your center punch and mallet, line it up to the center of the marks you made, and pow! Punch those centers. Punch ’em good.
It’s likely that one or more of these center marks will fall on the ridge of the diamond plate embossing. This makes accurately punching the center mark, as well as drilling the holes in the next step a bit trickier, but get as close as you can and it should work out. We’re using a 1/2″ drill bit for the holes, which is actually a bit bigger than the diameter of the bolts, so you’ll have some leeway. Not a lot of leeway, but a bit. You can drill or cut slightly oval holes if you want a bit more room to align things.
4. Get Drillin’
Time to drill the holes to mount your wheel chock to the lift.
A stepped drill bit is ideal, but if you don’t have a stepped bit, you can just use multiple bit sizes to get the job done.
Even with the center mark punched, it can be tricky to get a hole going with the larger bit. Instead of trying to force it, start with a smaller drill bit and start a small pilot hole. Once you have a pilot hole that’s a millimeter or so deep, a larger bit should have an easier time cutting into the metal.
Tips for drilling metal
If you’ve never drilled metal before, know that it generates a lot of friction and heat. You’ll want to use a lubricant on the drill bit and the surface you’re drilling. Doing so will reduce friction and heat.
This will prolong the life of your drill bits, and reduce the likelihood of the drill bit binding or welding to the material. With lubrication and less friction, it will make the drilling process itself easier. Plus, the metal shavings created as you drill will get suspended in the lubricant, making cleanup a bit easier.
You can use a dedicated cutting fluid or oil for this, or you can improvise a little (this is a DIY project, after all). We’re not doing heavy machining here, and just need enough lubricant to remove heat and make the drilling process easier.
This is a case where something is better than nothing. WD40, canola oil, or lightweight motor oil, while not perfect, will get the job done. I ended up using a mix of WD40 and some extra 5w20 motor oil I had on hand with good results.
Apply lubricant liberally and frequently. It’s best to be ahead of the curve and reapply lubricant to the drill bit and the hole as you go, before you start to feel friction, see smoke, feel the bit binding, or any other signs of trouble.
Take breaks as needed
Depending on the drill you have, drilling through steel like this can strain the drill’s motor and batteries. If needed, take a few breaks, like when you pause to reapply lubricant, to let the drill’s motor cool down some. It also helps to have spare batteries charged and ready to go.
Take your time drilling and don’t try to force the drill through the steel. Just let the drill and gravity do the work. Pretty soon you’ll have some fresh shiny holes for mounting the wheel chock.
There’s going to be metal shavings and lubricant on the the lift, so clean up the surface with some shop towels and brake cleaner before continuing.
5. Mount the Wheel Chock
With the wheel chock in place on the lift, make sure the holes line up and that the bolts fit through straight. If they’re too far off and you won’t be able to fit the bolts through or fasten them, mark how much you need to enlarge the holes by, and do some more drilling or cutting.
Once the mounting holes line up nicely, all you need to do is bolt the chock to the lift. Here’s where you reuse the bolts from the original wheel clamp.
That’s it. Now you have a nice upgraded lift.
Servicing the front end
I have received feedback and questions regarding this lift modification and the need to elevate the front wheel in order to perform service on the front end of the motorcycle. The prevailing thought is that this setup doesn’t work for that.
That’s somewhat true. This setup is ideal for the majority of work where you’ll need the bike stable and upright, but less so for front end work. Tasks like oil changes, coolant changes, chain and sprocket service, brake service, and changing the rear tire (which occurs far more frequently than needing to change the front tire) are a breeze with this. You do need to do some ingenuity and workarounds when it comes time to service the front end.
You have a few options to handle this situation:
Option 1: Don’t even use the lift to service the front end
That’s right. You did all this work for nothing.
Not really, though. This is probably the quickest and “easiest” way to take care of front end service. Use whatever combo of rear stand, front stand, or jack you have to get both ends elevated, and just perform front end service without the the lift.
You’ll spend more time hunched over and on the ground, though, and that sucks, which brings me to the next option:
Option 2: Remove the wheel chock from the lift
Unless you blow through front tires and fork seals at an alarmingly high rate, you’re probably only going to be performing service on the front once or twice a year. Removing the wheel chock for those instances isn’t much of an inconvenience.
Just remove the bolts and the wheel chock, roll the bike onto the lift, and employ jacks and front stands. To me, this is a bit less stable than using the chock, so be sure to use straps for an extra stability.
Option 3: Roll the bike backwards into the wheel chock
Some bikes have a narrow enough rear wheel to roll the bike into the wheel chock backwards, then get the front wheel elevated at that point. This seems pretty unstable, and I don’t recommend it. If you do, use caution, and utilize additional jacks, straps, etc. to maximize stability.
Option 4: Forgo the wheel chock entirely
Just get a front paddock or head lift stand, and call it a day. It’s not quite as quick, easy, and convenient as having the wheel chock, but it solves the problem. If you’re doing a lot of front end work, this might work better for you, so go for it.
Front paddock stands and head lift stands are super portable, too, so they travel well, and can accompany you on your adventures with ease.
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