My 30 year old Sears 2.5 ton floor jack finally stopped working last week due to a torn u-cup seal on its ram. The failure didn't occur suddenly, the jack could lift but wouldn't stay up. It was like this for about a year before it failed completely and wouldn't lift at all while I was almost done installing winter wheels on my car on New Year's Eve. I had to get the scissors jack out of the trunk to complete the job.
I shopped around for a new floor jack and determined that one of equal quality to mine would be about $200. There are less expensive jacks but their quality is questionable based on the reviews I read. There weren't any used jacks available near me either. Anyway, I'm turning 64 two weeks from today so my years of DIY repair are nearly over. So buying new didn't make sense.
With a little bit of research and some YouTube video viewing, I bought the appropriate seal kit on eBay ($40) before I attempted disassembly of the jack's power unit. Had I disassembled it first I could've saved $20 since I really only needed the u-cup seal. Lesson learned.
This repair is far from easy because loosening the cap on the power unit is very difficult and is best done with a 40 volt impact or pneumatic impact driver. I barely managed to loosen the cap by hammering the handle end of 3 foot long pipe wrench with a large rubber mallet which luckily were available at my workplace. Otherwise I would've needed to rent a tool to get that cap off.
Upon replacement of the u-cup seal and two large o-rings inside the power unit, my old floor jack works like it did when it was new. My floor jack had been very reliable for 30 years so this repair should last at least half as long; long enough for this old mechanic.
January 09, 2022 at 10:01AM
