Four wheels good, three wheels bad.

Yesterday whilst I had my car on the jack to change a tyre, the jack broke. Badly. Very badly. It is held up by a metal screw that goes through a plastic threaded block, and it was this block which sheared off. Ever seen a car drop suddenly to the tarmac? You find out what the air freshener hanging on the rear view mirror is all about when you think “my hand was around that hub seconds ago”.

When a spare jack was eventually found, I found that the backing plate behind the brake disk was bent. I’ve levered it back with the tyre iron, and the wheel went back on okay. I drove around a couple of miles to check nothing was damaged, and there are no strange noises and the brakes work okay. Still, that was not an experience I feel like repeating. Now I need to get a replacement jack. There are quite a few on Ebay that I have my eye on. Still, it goes to show why you never go underneath a vehicle supported only by a jack.