Is this "Jack" Corvair related?

[Elwoodandnadine]

Can anyone tell me what this is or what it may go to?
It is a jack of some sort.
It is screw driven and the handle on the right, once the jack is raised a bit, will fold out.
Sort of reminds me of a trailer jack.

Thanks for any help in identifying it.

[kevinpreston]

It's a Fiat jack. It may be used on other euro cars, but I have several Fiat jacks and this is the same model.

KP

[Elwoodandnadine]

Thanx!!

[bbodie52]

I have a little scary and bad experience with using a manual scissors jack. Here is my tale that I posted some years ago...

...My car came with its original scissor jack but it was a solid immobile chunk. it works great now. I shot a coat of paint on it last night, just because I was so happy that it works now.

Your mention of an ancient scissors jack brought forth a shudder, as I remembered the last time I used an original Corvair scissors jack in the early 1980's. A failed rear axle bearing in my 1965 Corsa coupe during a cross-country journey in 1981 brought about a potentially fatal experience while passing through Cheyenne, Wyoming. Although I've told this story on the Corvair Forum before, I thought that you might enjoy hearing it. If you will bear with me for a few paragraphs...

A failed rear axle bearing was the only breakdown event where I've ever been stranded with one of my Corvairs while on a long journey. My family was with me as we were traveling from Thousand Oaks, California to Incline Village, Nevada — Lake Tahoe (573 miles), and then on to a shipping port in New Jersey, near McGuire AFB. We were shipping our 1965 Corsa coupe to Germany, to drive there during our three-year tour of duty with the Air Force near Ramstein Air Base.

My wife and two young sons (ages 5 and almost 3) were with me in September 1981. The journey was uneventful as we drove across a lot of barren and desolate country from Lake Tahoe, across Nevada, past the Bonneville Salt Flats, and spent the night in Salt Lake City, Utah (551 miles). The next day we traveled on to F.E. Warren Air Force Base, at Cheyenne, Wyoming (436 miles). Upon our arrival, we found overnight family quarters available on base. We were leaving the base to get a meal when I heard it: a squeaking, grinding sound from the right rear wheel! The wheel bearing was failing!! In something of a growing state of panic, I grabbed a phone book and began calling local auto junk yards in the late afternoon. Believe it or not I found a junk yard where the person on the phone thought he had a late model Corvair back in the yard somewhere. Leaving my family in the transient family quarters, I grabbed a taxi to the junk yard, and anxiously followed the manager out to the Corvair. It was a stripped vehicle with no powertrain and no wheels, sitting with the body on the ground. The right side was up against an adjacent junked car. The left rear wheel bearing assembly had already been removed, but I could see that the right-side bearing assembly was still in there! I couldn't reach it, but I could see it!

The manager loaned me some tools and a flashlight (it was getting dark, and the salvage yard was closing). I jacked the body up off of the ground using a bumper jack jammed into the body opening — where the engine normally exhausted heat. With the rear up in the air, I pushed the car to the left so that it fell back on the ground — but this time a foot or so from the adjacent wrecked car. Another turn with the bumper jack produced another foot of clearance for me to work in. The bearing hub seemed to turn smoothly, so I assumed that I had a good one!! I grabbed a socket wrench and an extension and removed three of the four nuts that secured the bearing assembly to the rear suspension. But then... DISASTER! The fourth nut was not coming off! It just kept turning while the blind stud that was not supposed to move was turning! I ended up working into the evening darkness with a flashlight, chisel and hammer, desperately trying to chisel the nut to release the bearing assembly from the stud that did not want to let go. The manager of the junk yard was waiting long past closing on a Saturday night as I labored to get the bearing assembly from the junked Corvair. Finally the nut split and I was able to remove it and the bearing assembly. I paid the manager and he agreed to drive me back to the Air Force base, where I went to sleep — cold, tired and dirty. I don't believe anyone in the family ever had any dinner that evening — we just went to bed tired and hungry.

But there is more to this story! On a cold Wyoming Sunday morning I went out to the parking lot and jacked the right rear of the Corvair into the air using the old scissors jack that came with the car. I had no jack stands to hold the car in the air, so I just decided to risk working on the car with only a 16 year old factory scissors jack holding the car up. The scissors jack worm screw squeaked as I raised the car, but I ignored it. I removed the wheel, half shaft, and worked to remove the bad wheel bearing assembly and brake backing plate. It was cold and the work went slowly because my fingers didn't work well in the cold. I was laying at times under the engine with nothing holding the car up except that jack. The right wheel and brake assembly was sitting on the pavement. Finally, after some hours in the cold I finished re-installing the "new" bearing assembly.

With the rear wheel and tire back on, I began to lower the jack. I gave it about ¼ turn counter-clockwise, heard another squeak, AND THE JACK COLLAPSED!! The threads in the fixed nut that held the worm screw mechanism pulled right out of the nut!

My life had quite literally been hanging by a thread! If that jack had collapsed with me under the car, I would probably have been crushed by the heavy engine and powertrain. For much of the time when I was under the car, removing and re-attaching the half shaft between the differential and the bearing assembly, I was laying under the car with only a brake drum and my body there to support the car when it would have hit the ground.

After I quit shaking, I examined the broken jack. The worm screw moved freely back and forth through the now-stripped fixed nut, with no threads in the nut to prevent its movement. The scissors mechanism moved freely up and down.

There was an opened dumpster some distance away, and I hurled the broken jack into that dumpster — never to be seen again. I cleaned up, packed up, and we began travelling the remaining 1,743 miles to McGuire AFB, New Jersey. (I did stop at a Sears to pick up a replacement jack for the car, and I also managed to get two speeding tickets in Iowa on the next day! But otherwise there were no more significant events during our journey).

Now you can see why I stress safety when working on a car, and I ALWAYS secure the car with jack stands before I work under it! I was foolish that day, working unsafely out of necessity. Obviously, the risk was not worth it.

I had another bearing fail on my 1965 Convertible in the middle of winter when I was stationed near Ramstein Air Base, near Kaiserslautern, Germany (1980-1983). My father shipped a replacement bearing assembly from California to West Germany. I replaced it (using jack stands, this time) while sitting on a pile of snow in a Kapaun Air Station parking lot near the military post office mail room.

Since Corvairs are aging vehicles and may occasionally break down or need a roadside repair from time to time, here are some recommendations for your trunk...

A copy of the appropriate shop manual in the trunk should also be there as your guide (or as a guide for any automotive mechanic who may assist you).

I now carry a set of these in the trunk as a part of my roadside emergency repair kit...

Torin Big Red Hydraulic Stubby Bottle Jack, 12 Ton Capacity $25.74
3.9 out of 5 stars 110 customer reviews | 24 answered questions
Item Weight: 15.95 pounds


https://www.amazon.com/Torin-Hydraulic- ... ive&sr=1-4

A quick survey of the numerous electric scissors jacks and hydraulic bottle jacks available on Amazon.com https://www.amazon.com/s?k=car+jacks+an ... b_ss_i_4_5 seems to reveal that electric scissors jacks generally have a lower lift capacity at a much higher selling price! The reliability factor also seems to be variable and questionable, and a much higher price does not necessarily equal a safer or more-reliable tool.

I would suggest spending less money on a high capacity hydraulic bottle jack that should lift the lightweight Corvair safely and reliably, without requiring external battery power. The high lift capacity should provide a hydraulic advantage making for less strain and work when manually pumping the jack handle. Spend some of the saved cash on compact jack stands, wheel chocks, and roadside warning lights instead.


Never trust a scissors or hydraulic jack if you intend to crawl under the car. Also, unlike modern cars most Corvairs lack emergency flashers. Wheel chocks are a useful safety item that I first discovered bundled with my jack and lug wrench when I owned a Datsun 240Z. I always felt that was a thoughtful idea. Here are some examples...

Compact Jack Stands:
Torin T43004 3 Ton Aluminum Jack Stands (Sold in Pairs)
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0007X ... PDKIKX0DER


Valterra A10-0908 Red Wheel Chock
http://www.amazon.com/Valterra-A10-0908 ... 654&sr=1-1


3 FlareAlert 9.1.1 LED Emergency Beacon Flares with Storage Bag
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000LQ ... UTF8&psc=1



An emergency lantern similar to this is also a good idea. You cannot assume that your car will only break down during daylight hours!


https://www.amazon.com/Rayovac-Sportsma ... NrPXRydWU=