OT Watching a Patty Duke epiode from 1966, another teenager keeps
working under his car with nothing holding it up afaict but bumper
jack. There scenes like that.

I know I didn't have safety stands until 1970 or maybe much later, but
I also didn't lie under the car when it was jacked up.

Was this sort of standard in 1956, for teenagers, amateurs, even pros?


I've had my car fall off the bumper jack twice, once when it was on a
hill, I was only changing a tire and I didn't put anything under the
car, only my arms in the wheel well for a few seconds. Once I had to
borrow a jack from another guy on the street, to get my jack out, and
then I used both jacks.

Yes, Bumper jacks were the most common way to lift a car and probably
the only way for most shade tree mechanics. A lot of brake shoes were
changed using nothing but bumper jacks to get the wheel off the ground.
Most people were a lot skinnier back in those days, I could usually take a
drive shaft out with having to raise the vehicle. Oh the good old days,
a piece of cardboard to lay on and a hand full of tools and you could fix
a lot of things on the old cars....

Before the scissor jacks, about the only advancement was a slit in the
bumper where the jack inserted, making it only a LITTLE safer. I always
carried a bottle jack and a small floor jack, as many times you needed a
combo of jacks. And now, if you have a flat, and the ground is uneven, you
can't even get one of those scissor jacks under the car. And it takes a
gorilla to turn some of those.

I have stopped to help a few motorists, and when I pull out that floor jack
and zip zip zip, I believe I have sold a few floor jacks for companies. As
on trailers, sometimes they're so low that a little floor jack is all you
can get under there.

Steve