More and more people do their own car maintenance. Self-maintenance is a lot cheaper than having it done by a garage or workshop. However, it is very important that you take your safety into account when doing work underneath the car. Are you planning on changing the car tyres or replacing brake discs and brake pads? In that case, good jack stands are essential for your safety.
You will have to raise the car for these jobs. After jacking up the car you will have to place axle stands under the car. It is strongly advised against only leaving a trolley jack or bottle jack under the car. They can be unstable, and of course, you want to prevent the car from falling down if you accidentally touch it. If you use jack stands, they take over the load-bearing capacity of the jack. Jack stands are a lot more stable than trolley jacks. However, before you purchase axle stands, you must pay attention to a number of things. You can read more about this below.
What to look for when buying axle stands?
The first thing you should pay attention to is the capacity, also called load capacity of axle stands. The capacity is the maximum weight the jack stand can support. It is therefore important that the axle stands can handle the weight of your car. For this, it is necessary to know how heavy your vehicle is. The weight of your vehicle can be found in the instruction manual of your car. Once you know the weight, you can opt for axle stands that surpass this weight. In our shop, you will find axle supports that can lift 2 or 3 tons per piece. This will be enough capacity for most cars. This is because passenger cars usually weigh in between 1,000 and 1,300 kilos or 2200 to 2900 lbs. Do you want to place a heavier vehicle such as a caravan or passenger bus on the axle stands? Then you will probably need support with more capacity.
After you have matched the weights, take a look at the height and the adjustment system. For all axle stands on our site you can find the minimum and maximum lifting height. It is important that the minimum height of the supports is lower than the maximum height of the vehicle jack you use. Otherwise, you won’t be able to drop the car on the stands after lifting it. In addition, you must look carefully at the height of your car. Some cars are standing higher on their suspension than others. Is your car high on its wheels? Then you need an axle support with a higher maximum height to be able to keep the car up with the wheels off the ground.
There are two types of adjustment systems that you can choose from; the ratchet or the pin. The advantage of the ratchet system is that it generally has more height settings than those with a skewer. Furthermore, both systems are equipped with safety functions so that the support cannot simply fall down. It will lock the axle stand securely to ensure a safe working space.
Buy car axle stand
You can easily buy axle stands at Winparts. You can choose from different sets in various weight ratings, but we also supply individual stands. In addition to axle stands, you can also find trolley jacks, bottle jacks, car ramps and other automotive tools in our shop.