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ScottnSherrie's avatar
Oct 03, 2013

Jack stand substitute

Going to be working on rear brakes so will be jacking the beast up. I don't want to drop $200 or more for heavy duty jack stands I'll hardly ever use.

My plan is to use cinder blocks and wood to act as jack stands. I figure if I go two wide on the blocks it will be stable. That how they do it to hold up mobile homes.

Anyone ever done it this way?

27 Replies

  • I 2nd the 6 ton jack stands from Harbor Freight. I bought 2 pairs a few years ago for just that purpose. Love them. :)
  • Old-Biscuit wrote:
    A set of 6 ton jacck stands are only $40......Harbor Freight...LINK


    Ditto. See below, HF 6 ton stands under the rear axle, HF 3 ton stands under the front frame. Sat like this for about 5 weeks while I did the brake and fuel line replacement.



    Life is too short to risk it on cinder blocks...bite the bullet and get the right tool, in this case, jack stands.
  • Do NOT USE cinder blocks. They have superb compressive load when used as designed with the load spread over their entire top and bottom surface. They are not designed where there will be a potential for lateral loading or uneven loads from a surface that doesn't directly mate with them.

    Either use jack stands or wooden stands. I prefer to use both jack stands and used railroad ties that are cut into 24 inch sections and stacked. If one fails, the other will provide back up.
  • When I did the rear brakes on our Class C with the E450 chassis a few months back, I used the wood ramps that the front wheels normally sit on when in the driveway. The ramps are three 2X10's nailed together and inverting one on top of the other was just about enough so that the axle flange could sit on top. A piece of 1 inch scrap filled the gap. Turned out that I didn't have to crawl under the rig to do the brakes.

  • Cinder blocks will crumble. They will not allow for odd surfaces to curve to match them. Trailers have flat smooth frames where the cinder blocks do not have to conform to odd shapes.
    I use 8X8 timber blocks about 16 inches long.
  • A set of 6 ton jacck stands are only $40......Harbor Freight...LINK

    I worry too much about cinder blocks collapsing to use them as supports.....great for cinder block wall

    Short of jack stands I would use wood cribbing
    But $40 for a set ($90 for 12 ton) I would splurge on them......they can be used for other projects.

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