I was curious if anyone has built a full sheet table and then used a pulley system to hoist it to their ceiling? I was hoping for some ideas on how to achieve that.
My table is going to be 60x111 and is framed with 2x6’s the top is going to be 1/2 OSB with a skeleton of 2x4’s to stiffen the frame m. On top of the OSB will be MDF “rails” to put the conduit on so I can slab larger pieces when necessary.
My question is:
What would be the best way to attach the lifting block to the ceiling? (My ceiling is OSB) I fear my table is going to weigh quite a bit, slimiest too much for this.
If anyone has suggestions or pictures of ideas I’d appreciate it greatly
Its a good idea, and I think I have seen someone on here do it before. It will be quite heavy I would assume, depending on how dense of a table you make. I wouldn’t recommend only securing to the ceiling OSB. You need to find lumber in the ceiling to attach to. Need to find the ceiling joists. If you can get up in the ceiling via the attic then you can add your own 2x4s in a few places that may help you.
I’ve been pondering exactly the same thing. I have access to the steel frame of the garage but need a way to take a 4 point rigid sling/cradle and get it up there out of the way. It’ll fit between 2 of the trusses easily.
You can do it with rope and pulleys. Many years ago, my father set up a pulley system to lift our train board (3/4 ply and 2x4 frame) up to the ceiling when not in use. Not sure of the exact setup. Will have to look through some old pictures. Raised and lowered with one rope with ease.
I’d be very concerned about the weight, and would only do it if I was able to attach to the rafters / joists / trusses above the OSB. There are “deep scan” stud finders that might be able to help locate them, and unless that OSB is finished, there may be exposed heads of nails or screws that may help locate them. Long thick lag screws and lots of them.
What is the lining on your garage? I’ve found that it’s often just easier to cut an inspection hole, take a look around inside and then patch it afterwards. Bonus points if you can use an existing hole like for a light fitting or socket (my garage ceiling has a socket for the garage door opener) or cover it with new lighting. You could also keep it open for potential future wiring purposes and put a thin MDF cover over it. Painted the same colour and with a nicely bevelled edge, most people wouldn’t notice it at all.
I’ve considered doing something similar in my fully lined garage at home. It’s not likely to happen in my case because most of the ceiling is covered up by the garage door when it’s closed and it would take a huge re-organisation of the layout of the garage to find a space for it.
This is what I would do, bearing in mind that this may not be all that useful or valid if your house is built differently from the timber framed houses we build in New Zealand.
I would identify which way the joists are running, measure from the edge of the hole to the edge of the joist then transfer that measurement to the ceiling. Do the same in the other direction and you should know where 2 joists are and what the spacing is. You can also measure the thickness of the lining you’ve cut through as well as the thickness of any battens, which will give you the total space between the ceiling and the joist itself. From there you can figure out how long your fasteners need to be in order to end up with a solid 50mm/2" at least into your joists. It would also be worth noting your batten positions and spacing here, too.
I would then try to get a pair of 2x4s mounted to the ceiling directly underneath the joists with 3-4 large coach screws/lag screws or a bunch of long timber screws and go from there. A quick googling shows 10mm or 3/8" lag screws being good to around 400kg/800lb when sunk 100mm into softwood. Pilot them to full diameter in the 2x4 and lining, then to 50% diameter in the joist itself. One of those screws could probably lift the entire table, so lifting the table in the 4 corners and having a screw near each lifting point would give a pretty huge safety factor.
As for the actual lifting part, I never came to a great conclusion on that one.
Edit: As for the weight itself, that’s not something I was super worried about because while the joists are only supporting a lightweight ceiling, they’re also supporting the entire floor above and the table itself would be less weight than 2 large adults standing above it. If you’re worried, you could always suspend the table above the ground by ~100mm with a bunch of ballast to double the weight and then leave it there for a week. That might work as a proof test of sorts.
Thank you to everyone for your suggestions. I have decided to go a different route and use folding shelf brackets to fold the table to move for storage.
