I think a safety catch is incorporated in all the factory lifters, and is often hard to use, it appears. Ezee-lift's spring loaded unit has non-captive one that probably wouldn't pass OEM legal rules, as it is non self activating and could be lost.
I went through the entire routine myself 6+ years ago, and passed on anything that was spring loaded with either metal springs or air springs, because of the issue
Since we had airbags anyway, I decided to go air powered, although I did look at electric actuators also, which could have been made to work in a similar way. We have a 4" air cylinder under the rear of the van and a cable and pullies setup similar to the Ezee-lift. There is no airpower needed or used in the downward travel, just gravity with the speed regulated by a flow control valve on the cylinder exit side to atmosphere through an air toggle switch normally open port. The upward travel is controlled by the same switch, which is momentary, and speed limited and controlled by a flow control on the up travel exit side of the cylinder and anothor flow control on the inlet side to prevent too much airflow into the cylinder once it gets part way up and the force is way less, to prevent any speed change near the top.
In use, you just pull the pin and give the tire a tiny tug to go over center and it goes slowly down by itself, and is held down by gravity. There is no air pressure on any part of the lifter at that point, so nothing moves when you take the tire off. To move the tire up, you hold the toggle on while the tire is moving, and it goes up very slowly. We usually release the toggle just as the tire overcenters into position. The cable goes a little slack due to the overcenter, but it doesn't come loose. We can either just bump the toggle a touch to snug it, or not. There is no air on the system when it is up, either, so totally stable and no surprises.
We have used it trouble free for years, and wouldn't be without some form of lifter.
I think there are pix of our setup on this forum someplace, I will try to find them.
