Abstract: An improvement to a conventional hydraulic automobile lift, particularly adapted to lifting an automobile having a suspended, "dead" rear axle. The conventional lift included saddles for cradling the wheels, forks connected to a hydraulic ram for lifting the vehicle axle, and a shifting mechanism for engaging the wheel saddles with the axle forks. The improvement incorporates the step of extending the shifting mechanism-actuated lifting interface between the axle-fork assembly and the wheel-saddle assembly, so that damage to the vehicle undercarriage from the axle forks is avoided when using the wheel-lift mode upon a vehicle having limited clearance around a "dead" type rear axle.