A short but important PSA on jack safety

[amgarrety]

Lets straight to the point here guys. That scissor jack in your trunk is meant for changing spare tires, and changing spare tires only. Never use it for doing work under the car.

This:
https://sl-i.net/FORUM/images/imported/2012/04/6909543504_6481a7b2af_z-1.jpg

https://sl-i.net/FORUM/images/imported/2012/04/6909544040_5b8a5c8032_z-1.jpg

Can and will turn into this:
https://sl-i.net/FORUM/images/imported/2012/04/7055634491_28002be56a_z-2.jpg

https://sl-i.net/FORUM/images/imported/2012/04/7055675743_f41469577c_z-2.jpg

The two guys in these picture were swapping exhausts at our meet today when one of their jacks slipped while he was under the car and he was pinned. It didn't help at all that is car was slammed already. Luckily everyone was near and able to lift the car by hand and pull him out, but you might not get that lucky if you're at home by yourself. So let me warn you guys after experiencing this first hand today.

Never use scissor jacks to do work under your car. It's not safe. Ever. When you do jack up your car, make sure you are on even and solid ground, and use jack stands. Jack stands can and will save your life if your jack slips. Refer to the photo below, the hydraulic jack holding some of the weight and jack stands supporting most of the car's weight evenly in the front:

https://sl-i.net/FORUM/images/imported/2012/04/6909568650_00d640331b_z-2.jpg

Despite our group acting quickly, the person who got pinned under his car experienced some pretty serious injuries, including a fractured skull. He is okay tonight, but this could have been a lot worse. I want our group's ignorance to see what we were doing was unsafe to be a lesson for all of you. Please be safe. I don't want to be mourning the loss of any of our members here because your lowered Legacy pinned you due to some safety precaution you didn't think of beforehand.

[xoSubieLegacyxo]

Thank you Mike! That needed to be said.

[MRLancaster]

Yeah, thats why I kept a full size jack in my car at all times. Glad he's okay, just wish he knew not to get under a car (On gravel) with that kind of jack.

[kimokalihi]

The hydraulic jack shouldn't be holding any weight. It should be fully supported with jack stands. Have the jack under there if you want but not to support the weight, just as an extra precation. Sometimes I get lazy and don't want to put the stands underneath and then I think twice and I do it anyway. Not worth risking your life to save a little bit of time and effort.

[Dead91silvia]

Ok, I know I'm gonna sound heartless and like a dick for saying this... Buy WTF?! Did this really happen??? If I saw someone doing that in person I would straight up tell the guy hes gonna be a Darwin Award winner!

If I ever hear of or see any of you on this forum doing something like this, I will be asking for you to be band for being a moron...

I truly hope the guy is ok, but that is just about the most stupid thing I have ever seen!

[geckoboy86]

The hydraulic jack shouldn't be holding any weight. It should be fully supported with jack stands. Have the jack under there if you want but not to support the weight, just as an extra precation. Sometimes I get lazy and don't want to put the stands underneath and then I think twice and I do it anyway. Not worth risking your life to save a little bit of time and effort.
The person in the last picture had 2 jack stands under the car as well as his jack on the side of entry.

[xoSubieLegacyxo]

The hydraulic jack shouldn't be holding any weight. It should be fully supported with jack stands. Have the jack under there if you want but not to support the weight, just as an extra precation. Sometimes I get lazy and don't want to put the stands underneath and then I think twice and I do it anyway. Not worth risking your life to save a little bit of time and effort.

The jack was just a secondary. Dennis (the person under the car) came with his equipment and he even had on rubber gloves. I thank him and his wife for taking care of our friend when he got injured, and following the ambulance over to the hospital. I completely agree that is was very foolish, but we can only change the future. Our friend Eric is at the hospital with skull fractures and most likely some pain in his chest.

[MRLancaster]

Ok, I know I'm gonna sound heartless and like a dick for saying this... Buy WTF?! Did this really happen??? If I saw someone doing that in person I would straight up tell the guy hes gonna be a Darwin Award winner!

If I ever hear of or see any of you on this forum doing something like this, I will be asking for you to be band for being a moron...

I truly hope the guy is ok, but that is just about the most stupid thing I have ever seen!


Yeah, especially on gravel.

[amgarrety]

Ok, I know I'm gonna sound heartless and like a dick for saying this... Buy WTF?! Did this really happen??? If I saw someone doing that in person I would straight up tell the guy hes gonna be a Darwin Award winner!

If I ever hear of or see any of you on this forum doing something like this, I will be asking for you to be band for being a moron...

I truly hope the guy is ok, but that is just about the most stupid thing I have ever seen!

Yeah, unfortunately its just one of those things none of us ever thought about because none of us ever experienced it. We've all heard to use jack stands, but none of us have ever seen the consequences of not using them until yesterday. I can tell you now that I will never cut corners when working under my car again. I even had trouble sleeping last night after replaying the situation in my mind.

It's the same with anything dangerous though. You can tell a teenager not to text and drive, or anyone not to drink and drive, but until they experience what really happens when things go wrong, they won't think much about it. That's what happened with us yesterday. We all knew it was unsafe in the back of our minds, but it was much more obvious looking back after the situation and seeing where we went wrong.

The only good thing that came from this situation is we can all see that this is a real danger. I'm extremely grateful that you can all see this for yourselves so this hopefully doesn't happen again, and we're all very lucky that Eric is making an improvement today.

[rougeben83]

if you know you're going to go to a meet to swap exhausts, bring the right stuff with you...seriously. I've had a scissor jack fail when changing a flat tire...that was enough reason for me to put at one of those $20 2 tons in both family cars.

[Dead91silvia]

Ok, I know I'm gonna sound heartless and like a dick for saying this... Buy WTF?! Did this really happen??? If I saw someone doing that in person I would straight up tell the guy hes gonna be a Darwin Award winner!

If I ever hear of or see any of you on this forum doing something like this, I will be asking for you to be band for being a moron...

I truly hope the guy is ok, but that is just about the most stupid thing I have ever seen!

Yeah, unfortunately its just one of those things none of us ever thought about because none of us ever experienced it. We've all heard to use jack stands, but none of us have ever seen the consequences of not using them until yesterday. I can tell you now that I will never cut corners when working under my car again. I even had trouble sleeping last night after replaying the situation in my mind.

It's the same with anything dangerous though. You can tell a teenager not to text and drive, or anyone not to drink and drive, but until they experience what really happens when things go wrong, they won't think much about it. That's what happened with us yesterday. We all knew it was unsafe in the back of our minds, but it was much more obvious looking back after the situation and seeing where we went wrong.

The only good thing that came from this situation is we can all see that this is a real danger. I'm extremely grateful that you can all see this for yourselves so this hopefully doesn't happen again, and we're all very lucky that Eric is making an improvement today.

When I was about 8 years old, my grandpa told me a story about his cousin. He was working on the family car with just a jack, some how the car shifted and the car fell on him, killing him. Sadly no one knew it had happened and no one found him till they went looking for him in the garage.

NEVER have I EVER got under a car, or even stuck a leg or arm under a car without making sure it cant hurt or kill me. I have done even some crazy stuff when wheeling, but never anything to that level.

If you dont have a jack stand, get that doughnut out of the back of the car and slid it under, thats what I do when changing a flat tire. I never trust the jack!!!

I have had a car fall and crush my hand, once and it was trying to keep the car from falling. By the Grace of God, it was just painful, but no real injury, an inch ether way I would have lost 4 fingers...

Like I said, I hope he recovers well and comes back to messing around with his Subie, with the lessons learned...

[xoSubieLegacyxo]

if you know you're going to go to a meet to swap exhausts, bring the right stuff with you...seriously. I've had a scissor jack fail when changing a flat tire...that was enough reason for me to put at one of those $20 2 tons in both family cars.

Rougeben83 they didnt know they were swapping exhausts until they were at the meet. The guy that got injured wanted to do it, while the other guy wanted to wait another day. We finished the other guys car by using a spare tire out of a forester, and then used a donut as a block to hold the wheels.

[Huffer]

Thanks for the post... so cheap and easy to use jackstands. Even just putting ONE in your trunk to use with a scissorjack will help prevent injuries. Hope your friend has a quick recovery and learns an important lesson.

[redlegacygt]

glad to hear the guy is ok. that could have been a hell of a lot worse...

[geckoboy86]

Update from Facebook

I would like to thank everyone for there support and also pulling the car off of me. Heres an update. Multiple skull fractures with a blood clot in my left hear. A cracked vertebrae. Also broken bone that stabalizes my neck to my skull. Im doing good now just in some pain. Once again thank you everyone for there support. Im not sure when ill be able to have visitor either.

EDIT: just added

so i have a fracture from my one temple to the other. they think i might be going home at the earliest tomorrow but im not sure. ill let everyone one as soon as i no when you can visit me and when im leaving

[Bhatman]

Wow. Glad hes ok, that could have been much much worse. I would not even trust those things even when changing tires.

#1 rule taught in all beginner auto shop classes...ALWAYS USE a Jack/Jack Stand combo. In order for us to even get shop access we had to show the shop teacher that we knew how to use them correctly. Glad I learned.

[kimokalihi]

Same here. Auto Tech 101. Made sure we knew where the lift points were too so we set them up properly.

[Perdue]

I'm not sure that he realizes how lucky he is. Without the quick action of his fellow enthusiasts, he likely would have died. With fractures in the skull, as well as what sounds to be c1 and/or c2 vertebrae (stabilize the neck to the head?), he is very lucky that even being moved from under the car did not kill him as well. Good work to those who acted and likely saved his life. I hope that everyone there learned a very, very valuable lesson...I have had two patients do this in the past week, and one of those got trapped under a big box truck when his undersized hydraulic jack blew with him under the truck.

[jjay03]

Wow thats messed up ide even be a bit nervous with jacks stands on gravel.