The bitch tried to kill me (1 Viewer)

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Sep 26, 2004
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It really wasn't her fault though.:p

Since buying the new LX a month ago, I've gone nuts gathering parts. To date I've have or have in transit:

OME lift
ARB front bumper
Snorkel
295/85 16 Hankooks
OEM Aux tank and filler neck, switch, ect...
lots of other interior knick knacks.

To make a short story longer... two and a half weeks ago, I was under the front of the truck. I had done the lift on three corners with just the driver's front to go. I still had the passenger front tire off and the frame supported on a jackstand (mistake :frown:)

I was on my left side removing the steering damper when the jackstand failed. That's right, it didn't slip off, it failed. The truck came down on the brake disk and the ARB hit me on the right collar bone compressing my chest into the driveway. I was yelling loud enough that the nieghbors and my wife came running.

Continuing the stupidity, I wouldn't let my wife call for an ambulance. After 15 minutes of laying in the driveway trying to breathe, I put my tools away and jacked the truck up and put the tire back on. That's when I realized I was running on shock and adrenaline so my wife drove me to the ER.

Sorry for the long post, but it's only been a couple of weeks and I've only been able to get up without help and dress myself for a few days. The final outcome is no broken bones (I don't know how I managed that). Lots of torn cartilage on the left side of my chest so everything pops out of place if I sneeze :D, a very screwed up shoulder, and unbelievable soreness and pain. I also had to be monitored for several days becuase of a suspected tear in my left lung.

The moral of the story is:

DON'T TRUST YOUR LIFE TO CHEAP CHINESE STEEL!!! :mad:

I do take responsibility for the stands being too small. I figured a 3ton stand would be plenty for one corner. I've used then on numerous cruisers for years. In my defense. I've had these stands so long that I didn't know they were HF specials. I should be dead. The really scary part to me is my three year old was helping me. Fortunately, I make her sit on the porch when the truck is up on stands. I can't imagine what she'd have had to deal with if she had watched me kick off. I'm hoping to finish the lift in a couple of weeks (it may be longer :rolleyes:) and get some progress pics.

Anyway, here's the pics. Sorry for the quality of the first one. My wife was trying to be sneaky. The second and third show what happened to the stand.
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Glad you're ok! Wow that must have been pretty scary. :eek: Never seen or read about a jack stand failing like that.
 
Dude - Glad to hear you survived! I have similar stands from HF and now i am getting a little bit worried. Mine are 6 ton but i am still worried although i typically try to remember to place the tire i pull off under the frame just in case the stand fails.

My advice is to get well soon and to give me the snorkel so it doesn't try attacking you!
 
Wow, I am glad you're OK. Thanks for the warning. :frown:
 
Holy crap! Glad you're okay!

I would have used those stands. They look 'sturdy'. I would never have suspected they would/could have failed.

:censor:
 
Holy Schnikies, that made me sick to my stomach just reading it.:eek:

Really, really glad you are ok!
 
WOW! Glad you are ok first and foremost and had your 3 yr old safely away from the truck to start. He/she (? sorry I don't know) is luck to have a Dad around.

Good saftey warning to all of us that work on our trucks!!!
 
Glad you are ok, must be in good health to survive such an impact. Those jack stands look like the HF ones I have, but mine are the 6 ton ones....get the bigger ones for your truck.
 
I always wondered if the tire under the frame would hold up in a situation like this. Glad you are OK and this is a good reminder to all of us, safety first...
And now I am questioning if I bought the 3 ton stands or the 6 ton stands. Going to have to check tomorrow.
 
sooo glad you're OK considering what could have been.


That's why I got 12 tons jacks. Still no certainty they'll hold but likely.

(and as my oft-stated pet peeve, note that most are rated for the pair AFAIK. So 3 ton stands are really 1.5 each, not 3.)

be careful out there, folks.

I always try to have something else under there besides the stands just in case.


so, what exactly failed on that thing? the latch or a tooth or ?
 
Thanks everyone. The recovery is going extremely well (I want to send a thank you card to whoever invented Vicodin :D). I was very lucky. This could have gone worse a hundred different ways.

I usually do use the tire under the frame trick, but on our trucks, I'm not sure it would help. I've always thought either the frame would go right through the aluminum wheel or the axle would hit the ground first (so I make sure I'm never under the axle).

It was the tooth part of the stand that failed. It's hard to see, but the whole area that the tooth attaches to bent down. The stands were just too small. I'm very safety concious, but I've had these stands in the garage for so long I took them for granted. They've done that same job in the same spot on at least three other cruisers.

This was a real wake up call. Check your equipment. These failed without warning, but that's not always the case. E9999 is right, they are rated per pair. I learned that the hard way.

I just replaced the stands with Beck Werner 6 ton stands. The size and quality difference is huge. I'll post pics side by side later.

My helper was a little freaked out, but she is doing good. She is now my nurse. This is Millie, my cruiser chick. I have to sneak out to the driveway to work on it unless I want a shadow. She loves wrenching on it and wheeling it. :D

Thanks again everyone and stay safe ;)
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wow.

Hope the recovery is fast - and yes, praise to the Vicodin gods...

If you're in the LA area and need a hand putting anything back together, hit me up.
 
Great pic of you and Millie! Glad you'll be back out there with her!
 
if you haven't already, you might want to put up a (scary) blurb in the main tech section, might save somebody's life, never know...
 
Wow, that is amazing. And scary. I have a pair of those stands, and I've been under my cruiser with them many times.

When I crawl under my cruiser, I always leave the jack in place as well. I let the weight down on the stands, but keep the cup of the jack snug under the diff and then cinch down the handle to lock it there. Just in case. No guarantee this would work 100%, as the jack could leak down, but it's another "leg" just in case.

I think I'll go and find some HD american made stands now.....

From your description, I"m not sure what exactly failed. Was it the white part with the teeth, or the orange part where the white teeth engage?

And where on the frame was the stand? Was this one stand holding up half of the truck, or just one corner?

I'm amazed that failed. each stand is rated at 1.5 tons, 3000 lbs. These cruisers weigh around 5500lbs or so stock, and of course can reach up to 7500 modded and loaded, maybe even a tad more. So even with the ARB, it's hard to see that stand being loaded more than it's rated. It looks like it failed even though it had not been over-loaded.

And most equipment like this is actually built to be over-stressed and not fail, like a built in safety margin. For example, winch cable is rated at so many pounds, but they will actually take quite a bit more before failing. Not so on these stands I guess. Or maybe this particular one had a bad weld or maybe it's just crappy steel. (probably)

Not good.

Glad you're OK!
 
Wow,

This thread just gave me goosebumps. Glad your ok man. I have cheapo 6 ton stands, but looks like im going to upgrade to 12 ton.

I also always leave the jack under the diff just in case.

I know it will be tough, but keep ON wrenching.
 
this story yet again points to the bigger issue of ratings for hardware.

Leaving alone the fact that it's highly likely that much chinese-built hardware probably is not subjected to exacting standards, one needs to keep in mind the huge difference between working load and breaking load.

Normally, with serious recovery devices, they'll state both in the specs. Typically, the breaking load will be many times the working load.

So, with stands like these, even US made ones, what does the rating mean? working or breaking? if the latter, than 3 tons for the pair is seriously insufficient for a heavy cruiser if you use one and anything goes wrong (shifting, poor location, uneven weight distribution etc). If it's working load, then in principle should be OK even for half the truck weight.

the thing though is that things can go wrong fast with a domino effect. You use several devices but then one fails, the others get more load, they start to fail too etc etc. Or you use 2 but one slips, bam the other one is overloaded.


also, as we've discussed before on the site, besides the higher load rating, one serious advantage of the "heavier" stands is that they are also physically bigger, which means more stable.
 
Now those are jackstands :D. I actually looked at those as replacements, but they were too tall.


To answer questions, the tooth assembly failed. I'm not sure how other than it's bent downward. There's no way to get to it to look so when I'm up to it, I'm going to cut them apart and look.

The stand was placed under the frame right behind the mount for the control arms. It was only supporting one corner. I totally agree that there needs to be a more straight forward way to rate the stands. :mad:
 
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