Quote:
Originally Posted by David.m
We'll just have to agree that our opinion/experiences differ regarding the jack stands/jack pads and I wouldn't concede mine are less valid/reliable.
In the 6.5yrs I've had this car it's been up on these stands using the same set of rubber jack pads probably 90-100 times, never any damage to the car mount points & pads are as good as when I first got them.
No I haven't 'lunged' at the car (doesn't sound good for the body panels  but have pushed against the top of the roof rail as hard as my 180cm 83kg body can and car was rock solid, likewise firmly shutting door even starting engine.
Maybe the most challenging work I've so far done for the stands was the rear springs/coilovers. Torque for the rear eccentric bolt/nut is 165Nm and to get leverage with my big torque wrench I had the stands in the highest position (had to put jack on a platform to get the height) and car was still rock solid.
Your reviews are great but I think it's fair to say not necessarily the last word. eg the oil filter cap tool, I have one which looks identical to your 'Amazon' one though I bought from ebay over 6yrs ago. Mine is a perfect fit on the cap, I've done I think 17 oil changes and not a mark on the cap. I did buy the spark plug gap tool you reviewed, it's fantastic compared to the old way of tapping plug on the bench. I only posted in the thread as I didn't see the point of Terry wasting (my opinion) money when other tools much cheaper are available, down here at the bottom of the world availability is often an issue not to mention crazy pricing. cheers |
Personally I think there's no way around it rubber jack pads degrade and deform, whereas aluminium ones do not. So this always will pose more of a chance that they fail when on claw style jack stands.
I don't intend for my reviews to be the last word, I just give my take and you the buyer make the decision if you want it or not. I don't control how you spend your money, I can just offer my opinion.
Yeah my amazon oil filter tool is a tiny bit too large, and every time I put torque on it, it rotates on the cap and the cap gets stuck inside, and this "mars" the corners of the oil filter cap. Then the ebay stamped steel one just doesn't fit at all. The reason why yours likely doesn't have an issue is production tolerances of the tool and the cap, then the issue is compounded because the tool is designed to be a tiny bit larger for additional wiggle room on all sorts of filter caps - not just bmw. Then that causes issues for caps that might be a bit too small like mine. So I find the BMS tool to be better because they removed some of the extra tolerance that wasn't needed, because it only has to fit BMW's so the fitment is alot more snug and doesn't spin.
I opted out of the spark plug tool because I don't like magnets picking up weakly ferrometallic debris that could end up falling off and into the cylinder. So I use a friction retention style spark plug gap tool instead. The BMS spark plug gapping tool is indeed excellent.
But my opinion on the jack pad adapters remain the same, it is really nice to have aluminium ones that don't fall apart. I've had many sets of rubber ones and all of them failed - as you can see from my pictures. So after spending a bunch of money buying the same part multiple times, I deciced it is probably best to buy metal ones that wont have to be replaced.