Outdoors
Sponsored by

lug wrenches are outdoors..

7,225 Views | 85 Replies | Last: 5 yr ago by flashplayer
OhAggie98
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
Pooh Ah said:

I also wonder how many folks regularly check the pressure in the spare tire?
This is why I always carry a portable 12v air pump in all my vehicles. The spare tire always loses air slowly over time. I realized this when I worked at firestone while at A&M.
swampdog01
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
My fil made my wife learn firsthand how to change tires as a prerequisite to driving solo. Fast forward to a couple years ago me and some buddies were headed out of town and she texts me she got a flat as she was dropping the kids off at school. When i read her text aloud my buddies asked if we needed to turn around...the next text was 'time me'.
Point is if you don't teach the next generation they ain't gonna learn it. Our oldest daughter is almost 13 and she'll know how to do handle minor breakdowns.
insulator_king
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
Sears Craftsman 19.2V cordless impact and hydraulic jack.

I can change a tire in 3 minutes.
Takes more time to get the tools out.
Emotional Support Cobra
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
Burdizzo said:

javajaws said:

Jersey Girl said:

My dad taught me how to change a tire, check the oil, use jumper cables, and other basic functions before leaving home. The first time I got stuck with a flat, I couldn't turn the lug nuts they were on so tight from the hydraulic wrench so I had to call my husband for help anyway.
I give you an A-, only because:

hydraulic: uses oil
pneumatic: uses air

And pretty much every autoshop uses (misuses!) a pneumatic impact wrench to put on tires, often way over the suggested torque specs (a big cause of lug stud/bolt failure).


So now you can go home to your husband tonight with confidence and ask if his hydraulic system needs some pneumatic assistance.



Give her a break. She married her husband because she watched him start his truck with a pocketknife
Aw darn it! I meant pneumatic. I'll remember that next time I run out of blinker fluid.

Guys, don't forget, there's nothing sexier than a man who knows how to fix stuff. Sometimes we just want to watch you do it! :-)
eric76
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
Back in the early 70s, someone who grew up with my older brothers and sister stopped to help someone change a tire. It turned out that he was the president of a new company that is now considered one of the very top companies in its field. He decided that the helpfulness of the guy who stopped to help was just what he wanted at his company and so he hired him on the spot. It led to a full career from which he never had to worry about layoffs and is now retired.
eric76
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
Burdizzo said:

I have done countless oil changes from lawn mowers all the way up to Cummins and Detroit Diesel semi trucks and John Deere 4640 tractors. I can still do it these days, but I will be honest that I'd rather pay some flunky $50 to do it while I read my smartphone than roll around on a creeper for 15 minutes then worry about taking the old oil an filter down to Walmart.
I still prefer to do my own oil changes simply because I am far more careful about checking for leaks when I'm done than the people working at most shops. One simple oil leak that they don't catch can ruin an engine.

I'm of the opinion that if you ever run the oil so low that the oil light comes on, the best thing to do is to add oil and start looking for your next car.

By the way, when I lived and worked in the Houston area, there was some talk about one of the oil change places there that had a contract to do all the oil changes for a nearby plant. After a while they started losing engines. They sent an employee out to watch the oil change place and another employee to drop off a truck. The oil change place never even opened the hood. An employee of the oil change place came out after a while and moved the truck to another parking spot so that it looked like they had driven it in and changed the oil.

In another case in the same area, a local girl's boyfriend took his car into a shop to change his oil. He happened to look through the window into the work area and saw that whoever was changing his oil had taken his wheels off the car. He went in and asked what he was doing and the employee said that he was inspecting his brakes and that he needed new brakes. There wasn't anything wrong with his brakes going in, but they failed in the parking lot when he was leaving.

That's why when I do have someone change my oil, I take it into the local car dealer that I trust (I've known the owner since the first grade).
eric76
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
Jersey Girl said:

My dad taught me how to change a tire, check the oil, use jumper cables, and other basic functions before leaving home. The first time I got stuck with a flat, I couldn't turn the lug nuts they were on so tight from the hydraulic wrench so I had to call my husband for help anyway.
Too many twits using an air wrench think that they have to tighten them just as tight as they possibly can.
eric76
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
schmellba99 said:

Not a farm boy, so somehow I managed to be the exception to the OB rule, but I still do all of my vehicle, tractor, lawnmower, buggy, etc. maintenance, including changing parts that are worth my time to change instead of having somebody else do it. Things like AC components, water pumps, etc. - yeah, I'm paying somebody with the right tools and procedures to do that. But oil, alternator, changing a tire, etc. - basic things that everybody should know how to do and anybody with even elementary mechanical skills should be able to figure out in relative short order.

I can understand why people now often choose to take their vehicles to others though. Simply put, vehicles today are not designed with the end user in mind at all. I'd go so far as to state that they are intentionally designed to frustrate the end user on basic PM requirements so that the user takes it to the dealer to spend a lot more money than they should on simple services.

Take Dodge for example - my 2500 Cummins is an absolute ***** to change the oil filter on. Your choices are to buy a $40 oil filter adapter, use some hillbilly plastic bag and hope method, or take the fuggin air filter and turbo tube off just to change the oil filter. The fact that no vehicle has an actual valve on the oil drain pan and instead they still use 150 year old technology with a bolt that you have to pull as fast as possible to keep from spilling oil everywhere is annoying too. Something that should be done every 5k miles and something that should be one of the easiest things to do on a vehicle. And it is not unique - most designs require special tools, taking parts off that shouldn't need to be taken off, etc. just to perform simple tasks. That and the fact that vehicles now days are more suited to computer programmers than actual mechanics for diagnosis and it really is easy to see why fewer and fewer people invest the time in basic maintenance.
What I always hated was fixing flats on a tractor or on a combine. If it was on an inside dual wheel you always had to take the wheels off. If not a dual wheel or if on the outside wheel, it was usually easier to jack it up, work the tire wall outside of the rim, pull out the tube, reach in and feel for nails to remove, patch the tube, put it back in, work that side of the tire back on the rim, and air it up.

In comparison, changing tires on a fully loaded wheat truck is simple. Just make sure you are never even close to being in front of the split rim when airing up the tire.

Regarding air filters, I always loved the oil bath air cleaners. I don't guess you see those any more on anything but old engines from the 60s or before.

On tractors and combines, we could go a year between changing them in extremely dusty conditions. One time on my '64 International C-600 pickup I figured I'd change the oil in the air cleaner because I hadn't done it in at least 15 years. It was a waste of time -- the oil was perfect.
eric76
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
schmellba99 said:

MouthBQ98 said:

They make hydraulic wrenches. They used them on the oil rigs I worked on to torque huge nuts or bolts to thousands of ft/pounds.
We use them to take off or tighten up heads on tube and bundle heat exchangers as well (along with other large equipment that takes insane torque specs).

I myself use a battery powered impact wrench with lug nuts at the house. Those things are worth their weight in gold.
This is all you need:

eric76
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
chris1515 said:

An underrated aspect of changing a flat tire, especially in urban areas, is how to get the heck off the freeway. Someone referenced this earlier, but if anyone on here is teaching someone about changing a flat, teach them how to drive on the flat if needed to get to a safe location. I always figured I'd rather ruin a tire and wheel if needed to get someplace safe...won't see me hunkered down 18 inches off I-35 changing a tire.
I had a flat tire on the West Loop in Houston once just north of Post Oak. I was in the outside lane so getting out onto the grass wasn't a problem. Once I changed it and tried to get back on the freeway, I waited a while for a break in traffic and then nearly got rear ended by some twit who suddenly pulled over into the outside lane well above the speed limit to pass the cars in front of him.
Burdizzo
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
eric76 said:

Burdizzo said:

I have done countless oil changes from lawn mowers all the way up to Cummins and Detroit Diesel semi trucks and John Deere 4640 tractors. I can still do it these days, but I will be honest that I'd rather pay some flunky $50 to do it while I read my smartphone than roll around on a creeper for 15 minutes then worry about taking the old oil an filter down to Walmart.
I still prefer to do my own oil changes simply because I am far more careful about checking for leaks when I'm done than the people working at most shops. One simple oil leak that they don't catch can ruin an engine.

I'm of the opinion that if you ever run the oil so low that the oil light comes on, the best thing to do is to add oil and start looking for your next car.

By the way, when I lived and worked in the Houston area, there was some talk about one of the oil change places there that had a contract to do all the oil changes for a nearby plant. After a while they started losing engines. They sent an employee out to watch the oil change place and another employee to drop off a truck. The oil change place never even opened the hood. An employee of the oil change place came out after a while and moved the truck to another parking spot so that it looked like they had driven it in and changed the oil.

In another case in the same area, a local girl's boyfriend took his car into a shop to change his oil. He happened to look through the window into the work area and saw that whoever was changing his oil had taken his wheels off the car. He went in and asked what he was doing and the employee said that he was inspecting his brakes and that he needed new brakes. There wasn't anything wrong with his brakes going in, but they failed in the parking lot when he was leaving.

That's why when I do have someone change my oil, I take it into the local car dealer that I trust (I've known the owner since the first grade).



Meh. My take is that bad oil changes are like school shootings. They are catastrophic and tragic, but statistically they are like proverbial lightning strikes, pretty rare. Moreover, for people like us that frequent the Outdoors Board, it isn't hard to check the reputation of a place and then actually use the two eyes God gave us to observe the flunky under the car.

The place I take my vehicles is in an established location in a respectable part of town. There is enough affluenza in this part of town they are not going to risk screwing up an oil change on some cougar's BMW and drawing the ire of her husband over an oil leak. They have a good reputation. They do it right, and I watch them to make sure they do it right. I just don't have to worry about getting dirty and figuring out where to dump the oil and filter when I'm done.

Some days it is ok not to be a control freak. It is kind of funny we freak that some flunky might screw up our cars to the point we change our own oil ourselves, but no one bats an eye about the minimum wage flunky touching our food at Whataburger (plus all the other minimum wage flunkies working in the food processing industry)
eric76
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
Burdizzo said:

eric76 said:

Burdizzo said:

I have done countless oil changes from lawn mowers all the way up to Cummins and Detroit Diesel semi trucks and John Deere 4640 tractors. I can still do it these days, but I will be honest that I'd rather pay some flunky $50 to do it while I read my smartphone than roll around on a creeper for 15 minutes then worry about taking the old oil an filter down to Walmart.
I still prefer to do my own oil changes simply because I am far more careful about checking for leaks when I'm done than the people working at most shops. One simple oil leak that they don't catch can ruin an engine.

I'm of the opinion that if you ever run the oil so low that the oil light comes on, the best thing to do is to add oil and start looking for your next car.

By the way, when I lived and worked in the Houston area, there was some talk about one of the oil change places there that had a contract to do all the oil changes for a nearby plant. After a while they started losing engines. They sent an employee out to watch the oil change place and another employee to drop off a truck. The oil change place never even opened the hood. An employee of the oil change place came out after a while and moved the truck to another parking spot so that it looked like they had driven it in and changed the oil.

In another case in the same area, a local girl's boyfriend took his car into a shop to change his oil. He happened to look through the window into the work area and saw that whoever was changing his oil had taken his wheels off the car. He went in and asked what he was doing and the employee said that he was inspecting his brakes and that he needed new brakes. There wasn't anything wrong with his brakes going in, but they failed in the parking lot when he was leaving.

That's why when I do have someone change my oil, I take it into the local car dealer that I trust (I've known the owner since the first grade).



Meh. My take is that bad oil changes are like school shootings. They are catastrophic and tragic, but statistically they are like proverbial lightning strikes, pretty rare. Moreover, for people like us that frequent the Outdoors Board, it isn't hard to check the reputation of a place and then actually use the two eyes God gave us to observe the flunky under the car.

The place I take my vehicles is in an established location in a respectable part of town. There is enough affluenza in this part of town they are not going to risk screwing up an oil change on some cougar's BMW and drawing the ire of her husband over an oil leak. They have a good reputation. They do it right, and I watch them to make sure they do it right. I just don't have to worry about getting dirty and figuring out where to dump the oil and filter when I'm done.

Some days it is ok not to be a control freak. It is kind of funny we freak that some flunky might screw up our cars to the point we change our own oil ourselves, but no one bats an eye about the minimum wage flunky touching our food at Whataburger (plus all the other minimum wage flunkies working in the food processing industry)
I've seen one really serious leak after an oil change. The plug got crossthreaded and was dumping oil surprisingly fast. That engine could have easily run out of oil in under a mile.

One of the funniest screwups I've seen was when riding my Triumph Bonneville one day in the mid 1980s. I was on my way to Houston and stopped at a gas station in Hempstead to fill up. There was a high school kid working there who had never even seen a Triumph before and he asked if he could fill it up and so I said to go ahead. I went inside and a minute later he came in and said that it was already full! I had lost the rubber piece that covered the hole through the top of the tank where you bolt the tank to the frame and he thought that was where you filled it with gas.
Burdizzo
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
Dumb and ignorant people abound. I went to my local O'Reilly a couple of years ago for a carburetor kit for my '70 Chevy. That model had the option for a Rochester Quadrajet (spread bore) or a Holley (square bore). The kid kept trying to sell me he Holley kit which was not what my car had. I started explaining the difference between a spread bore and a square bore configuration. He just stopped me in mid sentence, shrugged at me the old fart, and said, "I've never seen a carburetor."

Haven't been back there since then.
Long Live Sully
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
Hilarious.. and sad.
CE Lounge Lizzard
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
My brother took his pickup to the dealership for service one time and they did everything except put fresh oil back in it. Dealership and Dodge bought him a new Cummins engine.
CanyonAg77
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
A few comments:

Eric, you're out of your mind on the oil bath air cleaners. Dirty, inefficient, a PITA to clean. We used to have them on irrigation engines, and we would change the engine oil once a week during the season, and clean the oil bath air cleaners. They are made out of stamped steel, and invariably have razor sharp edges. You haven't lived until you're cleaning one of those SOBs with gasoline, and then cut your finger wide open.

On tires in general, it's rare when I have a flat these days, and I drive on dirt roads. At most, I get a slow leak, air it up, and drive it in to be fixed. When I was a kid, it was a weekly, if not daily occurrence, when you factored in all the farm equipment. Tires are exponentially better these days, as are roads.

I was maintaining and even overhauling our irrigation engines back in high school. It was a necessity back then. Things last so much longer now, it's not as needed. But I still tried to teach my kids how to take care of themselves and the equipment. We didn't live on the farm as they were growing up, but I still took them out as much as possible. A couple of stories...

My son (Bender) was at a Marine Corps equipment demonstration of their maintenance equipment, and was asking the Gunny questions about it. Gunny wanted to know how he knew so much. Son shrugs and says "farm kid". Gunny just nods.

I know of times in high school when he helped girls with flats and such. Didn't hurt his popularity. And I know of times when he fixed/repaired/patched his car to get far more miles out of it than most would.

I tried to treat our daughter the same as our son, when it came to farm work She got drug around by me a lot when she was 4-5. Mom started a full time job, she wasn't in school yet, brother was in school, I was farming. So she was always around me and equipment. Once in an auto parts store, she spotted a little 8mm wrench. She wanted me to buy it for her. You bet I did.

Our son and daughter both drove a manual trans '74 Nova in high school. Also drove the tractor, which was a power shift, but still had sort of a clutch (inching pedal) When she got to college, freshmen and sophomores couldn't have cars. When the upperclassmen needed a designated driver, it was tradition for them to ask a fish or soph to drive for them. In return, the fish or soph got use of the car when needed. Since very few male or female students could drive a manual, she was in high demand among those upperclassmen with manual transmissions. Which were usually Very Cool Cars. And she always had a surplus of cars she could borrow.

Later, when she was serving a tour as a FAIP, she got into Flight Check, which was a job rarely entrusted to a FAIP. She was one of the few instructors who was trusted to get into a T-6 after it had been through maintenance. She would thoroughly preflight it, then take it up and wring it out. She would then approve/disapprove returning it to the flight line. I credit that job to her being exposed to mechanical things growing up.

A friend has a 2018 high school grad son. He worked on the farm his whole life, and is smart as everything. I think he aced the ACT. He has been accepted into a mechanical/electrical engineering program at A&M, one with very few slots. The prof in charge was downright giddy to have him. The prof told his parents that he was always thrilled to get farm kids into his program. They weren't afraid to work and get dirty, and they often already knew how to use hand tools, welders, etc.
flashplayer
How long do you want to ignore this user?
AG
My wife is quicker at changing tires than I am. Byproduct of the odd luck she's had with usually being the one who gets the flats, like 80% of the time.

Living outside town around lots of new construction for several years now wins us about a flat every 4-6 months on average.

We both meet plenty of people our age and older who don't even have a clue what the first step is. Or what a jack looks like. Her coworkers think it's amazing she can change a tire- to them it's like something akin to speaking multiple languages. Unbelievable.

Pretty sure my siblings have no clue how to do it either, aside from knowing how to activate roadside assistance.
 
×
subscribe Verify your student status
See Subscription Benefits
Trial only available to users who have never subscribed or participated in a previous trial.