Inground Lift Installation

With an inground lift the mechanism lives in a concrete pit below the shop floor. When it's down, you'd never know it's there. This is what dealerships and high-volume shops run.

These are the most involved installs we do: saw cutting, excavation, pit forming, reinforcement, drainage, hydraulic routing, a concrete pour, cure time, then mechanical and electrical. It's a multi-day project that needs people who've done it before. Our crew is silica safety trained for the concrete and OSHA 10 and 30 trained for the excavation. See all lift installation services.

The Process, Pit to Pour

1. Site survey: slab conditions, utility locations, drainage, and structural constraints. On new construction we work with your GC to spec the pit.
2. Saw cutting and excavation: slab cut, concrete removed, pit excavated to depth. Dig boxes go in for excavation at depth. Pit dimensions are model-specific.
3. Forming and reinforcement: steel-reinforced forms to spec. Drainage, conduit, and hydraulic routing are built in during forming, not patched in after.
4. Mechanical set: carriages, cylinders, and hardware positioned and aligned in the pit; scissor mechanisms assembled and calibrated in place.
5. Hydraulic system: power unit installed (usually in a separate mechanical room), lines run, system filled, bled, and pressure-tested.
6. Pour and cure: the pit is poured flush with the existing floor and cured to spec. There's no shortcut for concrete cure.
7. Final assembly and test: above-floor components installed and a full operational test under load.

Inground Lift Types

Challenger: EV1020XP9 (9K express service), EH10, EV1020, and EW10 series (10K), and EV1220 and EW12 series (12K; EW models are the wide versions). Below-mount cylinder and Quick Cycle versions are available. Complete kits or individual components, flush-mounted in new or existing concrete.

Looking at a flush-mount scissor, a surface-mount scissor, or a scissor alignment lift? Those have their own page: scissor and mid-rise lift installation.

Keeping an Inground Lift Running

Inground lifts have their own problems because the mechanism lives below grade. We service below-grade cylinders, fix pit drainage (failed sump pumps, clogged drains, and standing water that corrodes everything in the pit), recalibrate carriage alignment, and repair or replace warped and damaged flush-mount covers. See lift inspection and repair. Replacing an old inground lift? We handle the removal and pit abandonment too.