Hi all;
Got some WeatherReady all-weather tires installed today at Discount. Are folks here familiar with the little lifts they use - see photo I found on internet which is similar to what they used. After the car was over the lift with those lifters that basically recess into the floor, they raised up the car and I noted each long rectangular and padded side of the lift contacted the underbody of the car rather than contacting the length of each pinch weld. The length of the non-contacted pinch weld was actually about 2" above the length of the top of the rubber padded lift surfaces. I looked under the car from the parking lot and noted there was perhaps 1/2" to no gap between things like exhaust pipes and the like. I asked the manager, who was actually the one that started work on the car, about it and he said they do this all the time and no worries it was not contacting the pinch weld. I asked my Toyota service manager about this and he said Toyota only approves lifting via those pinch weld areas and their four pole lifts contact only the pinch welds. The dealership agreed that although probably not the best, likely no harm was done due to the huge contact area and distribution of weight but yet I'm still surprised DT would do this especially since they had giant metal blocks with black rubber cushions all over the place and I noted they used them on other cars on the lifts basically suspending the car with four blocks contacting the pinch weld areas (two blocks per side obviously I did look under the car at home afterwards and it seems there are some support members running front to back on the car but who knows what else the lift was contacting under the car. This sure doesn't seem like an ideal way to lift a car.
Also, they tightened the lug nuts by hand and then used the torque wrench rather than impact driver/torque stick per my request but is it acceptable to run each lug nut to torque spec one by one in the star pattern and then once again checking torque around in a circle? I would think you would want to cinch them up past finger tight below torque setting and then again to spec rather than one by one to spec. which is supposedly what doing it with an air gun/torque stick would do, right?
Thoughts?
Got some WeatherReady all-weather tires installed today at Discount. Are folks here familiar with the little lifts they use - see photo I found on internet which is similar to what they used. After the car was over the lift with those lifters that basically recess into the floor, they raised up the car and I noted each long rectangular and padded side of the lift contacted the underbody of the car rather than contacting the length of each pinch weld. The length of the non-contacted pinch weld was actually about 2" above the length of the top of the rubber padded lift surfaces. I looked under the car from the parking lot and noted there was perhaps 1/2" to no gap between things like exhaust pipes and the like. I asked the manager, who was actually the one that started work on the car, about it and he said they do this all the time and no worries it was not contacting the pinch weld. I asked my Toyota service manager about this and he said Toyota only approves lifting via those pinch weld areas and their four pole lifts contact only the pinch welds. The dealership agreed that although probably not the best, likely no harm was done due to the huge contact area and distribution of weight but yet I'm still surprised DT would do this especially since they had giant metal blocks with black rubber cushions all over the place and I noted they used them on other cars on the lifts basically suspending the car with four blocks contacting the pinch weld areas (two blocks per side obviously I did look under the car at home afterwards and it seems there are some support members running front to back on the car but who knows what else the lift was contacting under the car. This sure doesn't seem like an ideal way to lift a car.
Also, they tightened the lug nuts by hand and then used the torque wrench rather than impact driver/torque stick per my request but is it acceptable to run each lug nut to torque spec one by one in the star pattern and then once again checking torque around in a circle? I would think you would want to cinch them up past finger tight below torque setting and then again to spec rather than one by one to spec. which is supposedly what doing it with an air gun/torque stick would do, right?
Thoughts?