On Tue, 16 Oct 2012 22:13:56 -0400, Retired wrote:

On 10/16/12 9:36 PM, Jim Elbrecht wrote:
There are a few clever folks on this list- Wondering how many knew
about this trick, or think it is just 'Hollywood.

On this weeks Homeland, the guy got a flat on the front of a newish
SUV. no jack. So he found 2 handy pieces of firewood in the woods
[OK- *that* part is Hollywoodg] He laid one against what looked
like the transaxle, then made a T with the other one to use a brace.

Then he held the bracing block in place with a tire iron while someone
else drove the car forward, the first log bit into the dirt, and stood
up, raising the car enough to change the tire.

I don't know if I'd ever be desperate enough to try that but it might
give me something to ponder in an emergency.

Jim


Did you see the episode of One Car/Too Far where they used a log to
overcome a broken rear axle ?? Can be seen at:
http://dsc.discovery.com/tv-shows/on.../log-wheel.htm


I wish I had pictures.While I was working in Livingstone Zambia back
in the seventies I was driving a 1949 VW Beetle. I broke the shift
lever inside the "nose" of the transmission and needed to get under
the car and pull the engine/transmission back and remove the shift
housing, or "nose" of the transmission. I took the wheels off one
side, then jacked up the other side with levers (a couple of fence
posts and blocks of wood) and tipped the old beetle over on it's side
so I could work on it standing up. Took it apart, walked about 6km to
the school where I was able to reweld the part - then back to the car
to reassemble it and drop it back on it's wheels.


A few years earlier I was doing body work on my '63 Valiant and had
the bumpers off. I had a flat on a sunday afternoon, miles from home
and only had a bumper jack. I jacked it up by the lip of the trunk
lid (thankfully it was a rear tire) and jammed rocks and blocks of
wood under the axle in case the trunk lid bent.

About the same timeframe, I backed a 5 ton stake truck back the
shoulder of a road in the dark, across a side-road, and into a
drainage ditch which I did not know existed (off the end of a concrete
culvert) Using some old fence posts and planks I was able to liberate
from a nearby wood pile I fashioned a ramp and got it jammed under the
dual rear wheels dangling in mid air over the ditch and was able to
drive it out