I finally broke down (figuratively) and bought one last summer. I've known for a long time I wanted one, but since I live in my camper in the summer, it seemed like too much weight/bulk for how often I'd use it. Already too much crap in the back of my truck. Anyway, I decided to go ahead and buy one. Got one from Napa. My second time using it, it stopped working. Aside from not being able to find my receipt, I'm really not interested in replacing it with another just like it.

Trying to find something affordable, with a high enough capacity and high enough lift is challenging. Mine was 2 ton, and it couldn't lift the entire back end of my truck. Plus it didn't actually lift one side high enough to get a back tire off. What I'd end up doing to rotate tires, my most common need for a floor jack, was lift one side of the front with the floor jack, and use the bottle jack with wood stacked under it to raise a back wheel enough to get it off. Annoying. So I need at least a 3-ton, and something that'll actually lift at least one side of the back end high enough to get a tire off.

I see one at Harbor Freight but I generally don't trust their stuff. With my current salary, I'm not going more expensive than this.

Advice?

 

Just curious if you have these Tanganyika/Farm/Hi-Lift jacks in the US? They're useful in the workshop or in the bush. Tricky to use safely, but there's no more efficient way to raise half a car off the ground in a fix...

 

That napa jack may be rebuildable.

Those Harbor freight Daytona jacks are pretty good these days. I love my badlands jack...







The middle jack here is a no name low profile 8+years old, still works great. Then the black one is a craftsman that ive hade since high school, slow but still works great. Maybe that napa jack just needs to be bled or something simple. It shouldn't have died so quickly.

 

I bought one of those el-cheapo Harbor Freight blue/silver aluminum jacks something like 10 - 15 years ago (replacing a Craftsman that was only 4 or 5 years old and got used a lot less, but was already leaking). I've used it a LOT since then, and it's still working great. More recently, we got a heavier duty, higher lifting steel one (can't recall the 'brand name', but similar to that Daytona. And got a crossbeam for it as well: https://www.harborfreight.com/automo...eam-64051.html

We've been using that for about 2 or 3 years now, it does great. It it will easily lift 2 wheels on our lifted 4Runners (front, side, or rear).

Obviously, I wouldn't get under a car held up only by a jack, but I wouldn't trust a better brand name jack any more than I would a HF cheap thing.

 

Alright thanks. The Napa one is likely rebuildable but it seems clear that 2-ton isn't enough to lift the back end, and something as gigantic and heavy as a floor jack doesn't seem worth it if it can't do that. And I just looked at it online and see that it maxes out below 14". Wish I had looked closer before buying it. Not strong enough to lift the back of my truck + not lifting high enough to get a rear tire off = no thanks.

I was looking at Costco online and they have a CAT brand that seems ok...but $240. I guess if the HF ones are ok, I could go with that. Curious if the extra $50 for the CAT is worth it. They both lift the same height, same capacity.

Hi Lifts are great but I'm not comfortable using one in a garage. I see them as great emergency backcountry lifts.

 

This may sound obvious...but a 3 ton floor jack is way bigger than a 2 ton! Wow. I could have the 2 ton in the back of my truck, along for the ride, and not be too annoyed by it. It really was kind of "portable". The 3 ton is huge! But I'll bet it can get the job done. I decided to run to Harbor Freight yesterday and pick up the low profile Daytona. We'll see how it does.