How to choose the best jack for your car

Trucks and SUVs don’t have the same height restrictions as sportier sedans or coupes, so floor jacks don’t have to be quite so low profile to slide underneath them. This means home mechanics have more flexibility when choosing the type of jack they’d like to use. Floor jacks, bottle jacks, electric jacks, and scissor jacks all fit well under a truck or an SUV.

Lifting Mechanism

When it comes to choosing the best floor jack for cars, you’ll have a choice between a few different jack types. They differ in the way they lift the vehicle.

• Floor jacks, or trolley jacks, have long arms that slide underneath a vehicle and rise when the user pumps the handle.
• Bottle jacks are compact and fairly light (between 10 and 20 pounds, typically), and users position them directly underneath the jacking point. As the user pumps the handle, a hydraulic fluid pushes a series of pistons upward to lift the vehicle.
• Scissor jacks have a large screw in the middle that pulls the two ends of the jack closer, forcing the lifting pad upward, which lifts the vehicle.

Floor jacks are the fastest, but they aren’t very portable. Scissor jacks are highly portable, but they take a while to lift a vehicle. Bottle jacks are more portable than a floor jack and faster than a scissor jack, offering a nice blend.

Height Range

Consider the standing height of any bottle jack and make sure it will fit under your car.A typical vehicle jack might lift only 12 to 14 inches. This is rarely high enough for an SUV or a truck since these vehicles often require to be lifted to heights over 16 inches. Bottle jacks tend to have a bit more height than a floor jack or a scissor jack.

Load capacity

The general car weight is 1.5 tons to 2 tons. And trucks are heavier. To choose the right jack, use the jack safely. Every car jack is designed to lift a certain amount of weight. This will be made clear on the packaging (we note load capacity in our product descriptions). Make sure that the bottle jack you purchase has enough  to lift your car. A jack doesn’t need to be rated for the full weight of your car, however. When you change a tire, you’ll only need to lift half the weight of the vehicle.