Repurposed Air Bags

[JimT]

(Not sure if this fits best in "Things that may help others" or "Your daily blog" or where?)

So late summer last year I replaced all 4 tractor air suspension bags. One had a small leak and the rest were looking pretty rotted. Now, I'm the type of person that doesn't like to throw things away if they might still be useful. Ever since then I've been playing with ideas to repurpose these airbags. First I thought I might put 1 or more to use in my (hobbyist) wood shop, perhaps as some sort of table/workpiece lift. But I have very little free time to spend in the shop and couldn't quite figure out what to do.

Then a few months back I spent more time than I would have liked on my back under the tractor working on exhaust components. So that got me thinking about simple ways to lift the tractor. There are wooden block ramps. Works fine as long as you can drive it up onto the ramp. But If you need a stationary vertical lift then this wouldn't work. There are plenty of electric and/or hydraulic solutions, but I'm not looking to spend the money on something like that, which I probably won't use that often. I also don't have access to electricity where I park my tractor, but I do have air.

So that brings me to the topic at hand. Repurposing old air bags as a vehicle lift. This is very much a work in progress and any thoughts or ideas are welcome! This is also something I would consider as a hobby project. That means: I'm mostly going to use parts and pieces I have laying around, I'm not going to spend much money on dedicated parts, I'll work on it as time permits.

The basic concept:

Take (1-4 or more) used air bags, build a sturdy base for each. Connect them with quick connect air hoses and utilize them as a lifting mechanism. Solid wood shims can be used to adjust the starting height with heavy duty blocking to be used for the safe working height platform. That's pretty much all I have thought about so far. Just need a good air supply to raise the airbags and some kind of release valve for controlled descent. As for keeping the air bag oriented properly during operation, I was thinking about a small plate on the top with 3 springs pulling down to the base. Since it's only raising maybe 3-6" I figure that should be enough to keep it from leaning and blowing out sideways. That's the simplest solution I've come up with so far, but might not be the best.

Another approach would be to have some sort of scissor mechanism that raises with the lift and has locking teeth or something to prevent reverse movement. This, along with a few other parts, could allow the air bag to raise 3-6", lock the load in place and deflate, then continue to raise the load from the new starting height. While this method would be a bit more complex, the scissor/locking mechanism could perform double duty to keep the air bag level as it inflates. Just as a caution to others reading, such a ratcheting/locking mechanism would only be used for the lift and proper jack stands or blocks would still be needed to ensure a safe working environment.

Thoughts? Concerns? Ideas? Modifications? I'll all ears!

Again, this is a hobby project that I would like to use to lift my tractor, but also use in other ways, such as lifting my pickup truck, or lifting a platform with my lawn tractors, or whatever I can apply it to. So it should remain simple, versatile, small, portable and very inexpensive.