jack69cutlass

I am about 2 inches short between garage door and wall. I was thinking about using metal ramps to back up onto in the garage, and maybe gain 2 inches to allow me to close the door. Maybe use lumber against the wall to hold the ramps in place? What do you think? I have a short garage space and it ALMOST fits. If I can gain the inches by ramping up, any other concerns for the car parked in this attitude for weeks at a time? Thanks in advance.

64Rocket

Don't know if the ramps will help. But I must say your garage is real small. My garage has about 3 feet in front of my '68 Cutlass and I thought it was small.

All you can do is give it a try.

Gene

MDchanic

It's worth a try, but I doubt you will lose 2" using a set of standard ~12" tall ramps.

You could always look up the overall length in the SPECS guide, figure the wheelbase and distance between the rear axle and rear bumper, and triangulate to find the amount of lift needed, if you want to cut out the trial and error.

- Eric

rocketraider

Heh. This reminds me of my uncle and aunt when they built their house in 1972.

At the time they had a 70 S coupe, and the house plans called for a garage. Garage was to share a wall with the formal living room. About halfway thru the build they decided to add a fireplace to the living room. The contractor put the chimney on the garage side of the wall instead of extending it into the living room side but did not extend the garage and utility room accordingly, probably because the footings and foundation wall were already in place.

That cut 3 feet out of the 20x20 garage. 17 feet = 204 inches. 1970 S coupe overall length = 203.2 inches meaning the S would just barely fit in there with the bumper on the chimney, and they could not close the garage door with the car in it.

That was when I decided, at 16 years old, that any garage needed to be at least 25' long.


But, I DK if you'd gain the 2" you need using ramps or not. In theory it could work, but might take some trial and error.

gearheads78

I say try and see what happens but I think the front will need to be in the air or it will take up more space. Think about the point of the bumper. If you bring it down its going to possibly stick out more. Now raise that point and you are bringing the angle of the face of the bumper closer to matching the angle of the wall. The higher you can make the point the closer you can bring the whole car to the wall.

Intragration

I see houses around here all the time that were built in the '50s with smaller garages, and have 1' additions on the front of the garages to kick the door out. These were probably added in the '60s or '70s when the cars got bigger. I think Gearheads78 is right, you're going to need to lift it pretty far to make it shorter overall. The initial lift is going to make it longer, you're going to need to take it even higher before it starts to make it shorter overall, maybe a couple feet higher. Good luck.

jaunty75

Simple geometry shows that you will need to raise one end of the car by about 2.5 feet. I presume your car is a 2-door as the lengths differed between 2 and 4-door bodies. Your car's length, according to the data in Setting the Pace, is 201.9 inches, so we'll call it 202 inches. That's the length you want to fit into the garage tilted up at an angle. So it's the hypotenuse of the triangle. The length of your garage is the base of the triangle, and, since it's 2 inches short, we'll call it 200 inches even, and the ramp you want to use represents the height.

So, using the Pythagorean theorem, the squares of the lengths of each side added together equals the square of the hypotenuse. 202^2 = 40,804. 200^2 = 40,000. Their difference is 804. The square root of 804 is 28.4.

So you would have to raise the car by almost 2.5 feet (28.4 inches) to get it to fit.

joe_padavano

I think once again, math is your friend. Assuming your car is 203" as in the example above, raising one end 12" results in exactly a 0.4" reduction in length. Remember the formula for the sides of a right triangle: C^2 - A^2 = B^2

If C=203 and A=12, then B=202.6. Not a meaningful reduction. If the ramps are 36" tall, B=200. Make them five feet tall and B=194. You're not going to get there from here.

Run to Rund

I'd look for a way to make the garage longer. Move the door, or thin the rear wall by removing sheetrock, adding more 2x4 sideways and cut the original ones down, etc. in the needed area. It is risky to have the car on such an incline and expect it not to try to slide down the ramps.

Rickman48

And noone's taking taillights or trunklid into consideration.
At sometime they come into play.

jack69cutlass

I was not expecting so many thoughtful answers and suggestions overnight. I am impressed. In light of math facts (that I could not calculate on my own) I have decided to explore carpentry on the house side of the garage, maybe remove some sheetrock and make a cut-away for the nose. I only need about 2 inches. I am a lot better at demolition anyway!

More background: I have a 3 car garage, but the single door side has an intrusion into the garage, from another room in the house. Putting the Cutlass on its own side will keep it safe from kids and bikes, while opening up the big side to family matters.

Thanks a lot guys!

MDchanic

Darn, you guys beat me to it.

I just had a free moment at work to pull out a piece of scrap paper and do some calculation.

With a 202" overall length, 122" wheelbase, and assumed 48" rear overhang, I got 28" needed for a ramp height to raise the rear bumper 31" and remove 3" of length, which would pitch the car up at an 11° angle.

- Eric

Octania

Take the front end of the car off
It'll easily be at least 2" shorter
While you got that off, you might as well clean and paint everything, right?

Well, you can't put that clean stuff back on that nasty old frame, now, eh?

"shipwright's disease"

:-)

gearheads78

HAHAHA best answer yet

garys 68

Frame up sort of a bay window cantilevered off the back of the garage. You can add a couple feet and it wont be butt ugly.