[FWDLK] speaking of supporting ones car...

[David Charles Gedraitis <dcg@xxxxxxx>]

I have a set of jack stands that are the proper set for a car that weighs
as much as mine does, however, I wasn't too pleased with them. I didn't
like the amount of surface area that was on the actual part that touches
the frame, the shape, how they are adjusted, and of course, my fear that
if the car falls off the jack stands, aside from crushing me, the car will
come to rest on the jack stands in a bad place. Such as punching a nice
hole through the floor or my oil pan-none of this would make me happy. A
while back, I bought a bunch on 6" x 6" beams and cut them to 2' lengths,
and stack them on top of each other in a pyramid fashion to hold up the
car. I think they're more solid, damned near impossible for the car to
fall off of, and cheaper. I don't know about the rest of the list, but I
subscribe to the "push test"-when I have the car on the wood, with the
jack slightly under the frame to catch it just in case, I give the car a
bit of a shove to make sure it's not balanced and likely to fall of on me,
or anyone else. Also I've found if you use jack stands on straight old
pavement, a heavy car will make them sink down nicely into the
asphalt-wood doesn't do that either. I also have a few smaller chunks of
wood, as we can't always raise it up another 6" if it's no high enough.
What are the lists thoughts on this? Does anyone else do this?

~dave

'61 Newport (needs brakes)
'67 Kaiser M-715 (needs a head gasket)
'91 Toyota Pickup (almost on the road!-so much better than my bicycle)