Lift position for raising your R65

[daveschile]

What's the consensus on where to place the lift when bringing your bike into a back-saving elevation for service?

I just bought a harbor freight lift.  It was cheap and uses a simple hydraulic bottle jack.  It has two arms with rubber pads that go under the bike.  Looks like it works well with one arm under the oil pan, and the other on the raised center-stand.  Will I destroy anything with this positioning?

David

[Bob_Roller]

The oil pan is cast aluminum, the bike weighs about 400 + pounds, I don't think I would use the oil pan as a jack point .

[montmil]

In the folded position, the bike's weight may bend and/or twist the centerstand causing an imbalance. Lifting at the alloy oil pan may not be wise either.

Me, I'm concerned about those small motorcycle/ATV lifts sold by FH and other sources. With a bike up on one, and a good tug with a breaker bar, the bike could come a crashin' down. And how do you secure the bike while it's jacked up on such a small area?

Just my [smiley=2cents.gif]

Guess my R65s need to go on a diet as they both are over 400 pounds.

[Luca]

You could probably make some wooden supports to go over your lift that would cradle the bike by the frame, but as Monte said, be careful about putting any real grunt into your work with the bike up on a stand like that.  The only properly sturdy points for lifting are the frame tubes and of course the wheels.  If you were to get the bike up on a platform with a ramp, you could easily tie it down... and since the centerstand is in the center of gravity, it makes tilting the bike on the front or rear wheel and blocking it up so it doesn't tip forward/backward easy.

With that kind of jack I'd make some sort of failsafe to hold it up once elevated--in case your hydraulic bottle sprung a leak.  Only thing worse than a puddle of oil on the floor is a pile of Beemer.

[nhmaf]

Though I prefer to used some wooden supports to lift on the frame, it isn't always easy to do with these bikes.
You *can* lift the R65 with such a lift as long as you go slow and use a little bit of common sense.   I do end up with one of the lifting pads on the engine sump.  The other lifting pad pushes up against the frame at the centerstand mount, by inserting a small piece of ~5/8" plywood in between the (2) spring hook points on the centerstand.

You *DO* want to secure the bike (or anything that you put on these lifts) with a ratcheting tie-down or two once you've got it up at the right height.   As long as one is aware that it isn't as stable as the bike is when sitting on the ground, you can still do alot of work - I pulled off the wheels and forks and reinstalled everything afterwards with the bike on this stand just this week.





Piece of wood inserted here allows good weight sharing and good balance:


As long as you don't work like an idiot, you can get alot done-