A southwest Iowa municipal fleet manager asked us last summer how his crew should prepare for the delivery of two automotive two post lifts. He had ordered the lifts through his purchasing office, arranged the freight with the shipper, and then realized nobody had thought through what happens at 7 a.m. when a 53-foot dry van backs up to a public-works bay with 6,000 pounds of steel on skids. That question turned into a full safety-first walkthrough that we have since used with a dozen other fleet operations. This piece is that walkthrough — freight, unloading, forklift logistics, and the small mistakes that turn into big incidents.
Every automotive two post lifts order ships with delivery instructions, unloading support, and installer follow-through.
How the freight arrives at a fleet garage
Most automotive two post lifts ship LTL — less than truckload — from the manufacturer’s warehouse to your destination. That means the shipment is one skid or a small stack, sharing a 53-foot dry van with other freight bound for other addresses along the same route. Delivery times are wide windows: usually a four-hour window, sometimes an all-day window, especially in rural southwest Iowa where the truck may be making three stops on a two-hour drive between towns. Plan for the driver to be late or early, not on-time.
Each 10,000 lb lift skid weighs about 2,000 lbs and measures roughly 8 feet long by 3 feet wide by 3 feet tall. Two lifts on one shipment is 4,000 lbs of skidded freight. The driver will not unload it for you — LTL freight is delivered curbside or to the dock. Anything beyond the tailgate is your responsibility. That is where fleet managers get surprised on the first shipment. Ask us how before delivery, not the morning of.
Lift gate service versus dock delivery
If your municipal garage has a truck dock at loading-dock height, LTL freight lands cleanly with a pallet jack rolling straight off the truck onto the dock. That is the simplest scenario. Most southwest Iowa public-works buildings do not have a dock. In that case you order lift-gate service — the truck arrives with a hydraulic tailgate that lowers the skids to ground level. Lift gates are rated to about 2,500 lbs. A single lift skid is inside that limit; a stacked delivery is not.
Order lift gate service on the freight ticket if you do not have a dock. This is a $75 to $150 upcharge on most LTL shipments and it is worth every dollar. Without a lift gate, you are trying to unload 2,000 lbs of automotive two post lifts from a truck bed at chest height with whatever equipment you have on hand. That is the accident scenario nobody wants to explain to the safety officer afterward. Order the lift gate. Every time.
Forklift capacity and fork length for lift skids
Once the skids are on the ground, moving them from the driveway to inside the bay is a forklift job. A standard warehouse forklift with 42-inch forks and 4,000 lb capacity handles a single 2,000 lb lift skid without stress. What matters more than capacity is fork length. An 8-foot skid needs forks that reach at least 40 inches under the load, ideally 48 inches, because the balance point on a lift skid is not centered — the columns are heavier than the arms.
If your municipal fleet does not own a forklift, most southwest Iowa communities have a rental yard within an hour that will drop one for a day. Cost is $250 to $400. Alternative: a skid steer with pallet forks handles the same job well enough. Do not attempt to move automotive two post lifts skids with a pickup truck, chains, or a farm tractor’s front loader. Every one of those improvisations has hurt someone we know. Rent the forklift.
Inspecting freight before you sign the delivery ticket
The single most important thing you can do at delivery is inspect the shipment before you sign. Walk around every skid. Look for punctured shrink wrap, scored steel, dented columns, or missing corner boards. If anything looks damaged, note it on the delivery receipt in writing before the driver leaves. Take photos with a timestamp. Once you sign clean, freight-damage claims become almost impossible to recover. Do not sign clean if the freight is not clean.
Freight damage on automotive two post lifts is not always cosmetic. A bent column can fail a straightness inspection and require replacement. A dropped skid can misalign the arm gears in a way that only shows up during commissioning. We inspect every install on day one for freight damage that survived the initial delivery inspection, and we file claims when we find it. But your first line of defense is the ten minutes you spend walking around the skids with the driver still on site.
Staging inside the bay before install day
Once the skids are inside the shop, stage them out of the way of daily traffic. Automotive two post lifts skids take up floor space — about 24 square feet per lift plus walk-around. If the install date is two weeks out, the skids need a home that will not obstruct the bays that are still producing revenue. In a municipal fleet garage that means the parts side, or the corner behind the workbench, or the loading dock. Not the middle of the bay.
Do not disassemble the skids until install day. The wrapping and strapping protects the arms and columns from scratches, dust, and the incidental bump from a passing forklift. We have seen crews eagerly unwrap the columns the day after delivery and then chip the paint before install. Every scratch is a corrosion starter in a salt-belt Iowa environment. Keep the wrap on until we arrive. That is the small habit that keeps the equipment looking new after five winters.
Install day equipment and the crew that shows up
When our install crew arrives, we bring the drill, the anchors, the shim kit, the fluid, the torque wrench, and every consumable needed to complete the job. The one thing we do not bring is the forklift. We ask the fleet garage to have a forklift or skid steer on site for the day so we can move columns from the staging area to the anchor points and hoist the top beam into position on an overhead installation. That equipment coordination is part of the pre-install call we make about a week ahead.
The crew is two installers for a single lift, three for a bank of two or more. Time on site is six to eight hours per lift. The bay is not usable for other work during install because the drill dust and hydraulic priming demand a clean work area. Plan around it. Automotive two post lifts install cleanly when the site is ready and coordinated; they install messily when the fleet garage tries to keep other work going in the same space at the same time. Give us the bay for the day.
What we handle and what you handle
The clearest split we can offer municipal fleets is this. You handle: freight receipt, lift-gate service, forklift on site, electrical rough-in, and clearing the bay of daily traffic on install day. We handle: install labor, anchor drilling and torque, hydraulic fill and prime, commissioning tests, safety walkthrough with your crew, and the signed install packet for your compliance file. Everything on our list is included in the quote. Everything on your list is your responsibility to coordinate before delivery day.
If any of the items on your list feels unfamiliar, call us and we will walk your operations team through it. We have delivered automotive two post lifts to every county in southwest Iowa at some point over the years, and the coordination playbook is well worn. Related reads: our install guide and municipal fleet safety piece. Call 800-674-9302 to schedule a delivery walkthrough.
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