please read...everyone JACKSTANDS!

[DSMcrazy3]

One time the front passenger side of my car was up(no stands) and my friend decided to turn the handle on the jack. Luckily the wheel was still on, and i wasn't underneath...needless to say, I stole his girlfriend.

 

[Synapses]

I agree with alot of things said in this thread, but I also disagree with alot of it. I'm 16 and I bought my 92 talon n/t. The fact that I am sixteen has nothing to do with the fact that I can or can't fix a car. Yes it is true that as you get older your going to learn more, but that doesn't mean that because some of us are 16 were stupid and unsafe. When ever I need to fix my car I always use the ramps. It just makes sense. And its not like It is very hard to drive it up onto them, or jack it up and slip them under. And even if I have blocks behind the wheels i still always have my parking brake on and I put it in gear. I am 16 and I am attending BCIT (British Columbia Institute of Technology) I am in the service Technician course. So just remember, the fact is being 16 isn't a factor.

Also i would like to add, the talon is my first car and I love it, its fast, not super fast, but its perfect for what i want. and in time i would love to get an Eclipse

 

[Colossus]

I was working on my N/A a while back when I was 16 as well. I was up top doing something in the bay, while a friend was under it from the side. My jackpoint on the crossmember decided to slip, and the car dropped onto the jack stands. Boy did it scare the shit out of both of us. He had to go take a breather for a few. I used them that day, and ALWAYS do, but for some reason I didn't fully lower the car onto them. It only dropped like an inche or two, but the whole car moved. Pretty scary stuff.

 

[DSMcrazy3]

This thread puts 2 words in my head...Prayer time

 

[luk909]

Very sad for what had happened, but that reminds me of an incident that almost happened to me and my friend last year. We were working on the eclipse and we were changing my brakes and rotors. We jacked the car up but didnt decide to put any jack stands under it. My friend had his body under the entire brake rotor and I had my arms and head above the rotor trying to get a seized bolt out. For some reason I looked at the jack and noticed it on one side. It was leaning on one side and moving back and forth, basically just on the outer edge. I stopped him and we slowly moved away from the car. Right after that, it slipped. We have never worked on any car no matter how little or how big of a job it was, without the right jack stands.

 

[psychlow]

Well technically everyday we rely on the same concept to stop us from plowing into other cars (hydraulic fluid of a jack, brake fluid on a car).

Agreed - but the difference being that we have four calipers with two seperate hydraulic drivers as a redundant backup. Also, you only have to build pressure for a few seconds to stop a car, whereas you have to keep pressure built inside the jack for minutes or hours.

Not to mention, most floor jacks have WHEELS which is the main reason they're dangerous. It's usually not the hydraulics that fail, it's the car moving enough to make the jack roll out from underneath the car. Other than that, scissor-type and bottle jacks don't have enough surface area contacting the frame to keep the car from slipping off of them.

Jackstands have a steady base as well as a good contact area. I agree that you can use a jack in a pinch to change a tire, but you still need to be careful. I've read of severed legs resulting from limbs underneath a rotor while wrestling off siezed caliper bolts when only a jack was used.

For some reason, that reminds me of the pictures of the guy who throttled his engine up with the intake off and his hand near the compressor inlet.

 

[Vandy4g63]

yeah how the heck did that even happen?!? (the throttle intake turbo guy) I'm still unclear on that...

 

[marcmsj]

..

i was just thinking about this yesterday while working on my car. i was under there checking an oil leak while the car was only on the stock jack and i was seriously having a bad feeling about under there so i wasn't under there for very long. i was at my mom's house so i didn't have all my tools with me. i usually use ramps or jack stands cuz you really shouldn't trust a jack.

i remember pulling over one time to help this old lady with a flat tire. she was parked downhill and i had a bad feeling about jacking her car up but did so anyway. as soon as i took the tire off, the car rolled foreward and the nearly caught my arm under the rotor, luckily i moved it in time, but it wasn't gonna be pretty...

be careful guys...

 

[2GeNTSi]

Are we talking about mainly the scissor jack? I'm a little unsafe when it comes to supporting the car but not to this extent. I would NEVER work on my tranny with just a scissor jack, I would jack it up with a floor jack, put two stands on either side and leave the floor jack their for extra support. With all the moving of the car when trying to mount the tranny, something will fail with just a scissor jack.

Typically I change the oil or take a quick look under my car with just a floor jack on the front crossmember but that will change.

 

[Defiant]

Typically I change the oil or take a quick look under my car with just a floor jack on the front crossmember but that will change.

For most of that stuff, I just use Rhino Ramps and wheel chocks.

 

[paranoidTSi]

The problem with ramps is overshooting (going over them)...I've done it with my talon..side skirts didn't like the ramps very much. On the opposite end you have undershooting, if you don't get up the ramp fast enough and stop right before reaching the top they can shoot out from underneath the tires and hit whatever is straight ahead of the car.

Though I do believe they are the safest, they are also a pain in the ass at times...but I guess its better to damage the car or things around you than to kill yourself.

 

[quiksilver38]

this is how i do it, I'm 16 also. i heard another story obout using only a floor jack and that super dangeous. i did that last week when i welded up my exsaust with only a floor jack but my dad was there watching me.

 

[Defiant]

The problem with ramps is overshooting (going over them)...I've done it with my talon..side skirts didn't like the ramps very much. On the opposite end you have undershooting, if you don't get up the ramp fast enough and stop right before reaching the top they can shoot out from underneath the tires and hit whatever is straight ahead of the car.

Set your inspection mirror on the ground next to the ramp, where you can see the tires. Or, use the reflection in the paint of the other car.
The Rhinos hold the ground pretty well.

 

[Burnett03]

Damn shame.

All it takes is for the car to slip off that jack right in front of you one time and you realize that jack stands have always been a good idea.

Not to be a dick, here, but 1) Why was a 16 year allowed to be working on a turbo DSM by himself?

why not? A kid will appreciate the car more if he has to work on it, and learn. I was building motors on my dsm when i was 16. Im confused

 

[L2RTSiAWD]

i did that last week when i welded up my exsaust with only a floor jack but my dad was there watching me.

If the jack fell all he would be watching is you getting crushed.

 

[xarnyz]

My 2 ton jack just started deciding to release pressure on its own for no reason.. like 5 minutes after its been holding a car up. I never know when its going to decide to let the car down. So I just use it for the initial lifting onto a jackstand now.

 

[quiksilver38]

If the jack fell all he would be watching is you getting crushed.

yea i guess

 

[Mr.Tao]

Jacks were only meant to jack up things. Hence the name Jacks. 16 year olds are reckless and most are still primates.

 

[SpooledGSX98]

I had a quick scare the other week. My buddy got a flat in his Yukon, and he didnt trust the crappy jack that came with it. So I brought a normal floor jack from the house to come help him. The pass. rear tire was flat, the Yukon was parked on the shoulder, but wasn't perfectly level. Didn't seem like it would be any problem, in & out in no time. I put the jack on the rear end and started going up. Just as it started to get adequate room..... :Creeeeeeeeeeeeeak....BANG!: folded the jack right over, with me under it.

Ripped the jack out of my hands, bent the frame of the jack (it sits like a 3 wheelin' lowrider now) Got a cut on my tricep from something.

I couldn't imagine what a car coming down would be like. Just take extra precautions fellas.

 

[Omega]

I've had a couple jackstands fail on me too. The cheap ones split at the weld. I now use 8X8 railroad ties.. FAR more stable and there is no way you can crush them. I use 4 per wheel to get it high enough to work on anything I want. I have also found that supporting it by the wheels is preferable.

 

[sjgYFZ200]

I like ramps, because they get it higher than my jack will allow me to go, and two it does feel safer. However if I just put them on my driveway or something, the whole ramp moves when the tires make contact to it, the ramp just slides forward. I found that putting them on the little lip where my driveway meets the concrete slab works good, but man, if that lip ever crushed, those jacks would shoot forward so fast... I use jackstands now.

 

[dalepmay]

Wow, I can honestly say that in the last 3 or so months, I have been under my car at least 10 or 15 times, with only a 2 ton hydraulic jack holding the front end up. This thread has now converted me, and I will never again get under any car without using the jack stands. Thanks for the enlightenment guys!

 

[hefftdsm]

This just proves that you need a good jack and jackstands to work under a car. Now, can someone please tell me why, when you're going junkin', junk yards won't let you take them in?

 

[Omega]

Now, can someone please tell me why, when you're going junkin', junk yards won't let you take them in?

One word liability. This post should be a good indicator of that.


dalepmay: Uh, once the car is on the flat section of the ramp, lip or not it isn't going anywhere. I hope you don't park the car half way up it!

 

[JiveMasterT]

im changing oil in 2 of my 4 cars tomorrow... you can bet my jackstands will be there the whole time.

ive seen a jack fall down... last winter trying to fix the seized caliper on my van with a few people, someone let off the ebrake because they thought it would be a good idea to see if the wheel would move. jack started rocking and i was like "ohhh shit" and i got behind that truck and pushed with all my might and got it straight up again. never again will i work on something without jack stands though... never.