Was almost the weekend when I had a little "fun".
Thursday evening I went to pick up this toolbox I was given and started feeling a bit of vibration. I was towing my little trailer with old KM tires, so thought it must be coming from there.
Only was able to fit the top half of the box in for this trip.
Friday morning I'm heading to the shop, got an early start because I'm taking it easy while towing the trailer, and I'm still feeling this vibration. At this point, I'm sure it's coming from a tire, so I'm half-expecting something to happen. About 5 minutes from work, it happened...I hear a loud flapping and look in the side view mirror to see the left rear tire in shreds.
It actually threw the chunk of tread off first, then started losing air, so there was no loss of control or damage to the rim. There was a little damage to the fender, though.
As with most mishaps, I learned a few things. First, if you have a vibration that feels like a tire, get out and check them. Chances are you will be able to see it and get it taken care of before things fly apart. I could have easily changed this in front of my house with my floor jack and an impact wrench. Instead I was doing it on the side of the road with my HiLift, which leads to the second set of lessons--Using a HiLift is not as easy as it seems, especially if it has just been hanging out on the back of your rig, not receiving regular cleaning & lubrication.
HiLift lessons:
#1: If you are not using the off road base that is available and don't set the parking brake on the vehicle, it could start to tilt and possibly fall. I watched mine angling toward me as I was trying to get the lug nuts back on the spare, and didn't want to spend much time in the path of that destructive bar. I ended up hopping in through the passenger side and inching back in reverse until the jack was upright again.
#2: When pins are sticking, the lift will not want to lower the vehicle properly. My lower pin wasn't releasing when the handle was brought down, so I ended up having to pull it out each time by hand. The last time I did this, that pin didn't slide back in to its lock position, so when I raised the handle the upper pin released and the final 10 inches of lowering happened quite quickly. That's how I ended up flaying open the knuckle of my right hand.
All in all it was a learning experience, I was only 10 minutes late to work, and now I need to buy some new tires. These KM2s were used when I bought them about 4 years ago, and have been showing their age. The 60" HiLift proved its worth as it was reaching its upper limits while using the lift point on the 4X4Labs bumper to get the rear tire off the ground.
