You can find them at car repair shops, in wheelchair lifts, and even on skyscraper construction sites. They use water (or other liquids) to increase the force available to lift things.

At Jack Junkies, he got a bay with a new four-post hydraulic lift for $25 an hour — and it came with a 200-piece tool kit. “They even had a torque wrench I needed,” said McBride, 59, a self ...