How to Repair A Floor Jack That Won’t Hold Pressure?

To lift your car for tire replacement or other maintenance work, a floor jack is a must. Although the floor jack is a solid tool, yet it is not safe from harm or damage. Sometimes the floor jack fails to hold pressure for a couple of reasons when we don’t use the floor jack for a long time.

And then you face trouble with lifting as the jack keeps lowering itself even before you put any pressure on it. Here we are going to show you the reasons why your jacks can not hold pressure and how to repair a floor jack that won’t hold pressure?

Why won’t floor jacks hold pressure at times?

In most of the cases, we have found trapped air in the jack stops the floor jack to hold pressure and lift your object. Besides the oil used in the jacks pull down the performance level if the manufacturer recommended ones aren’t used.

Sometimes there is not enough fluid in the fluid reservoir of the floor jack as it moves from the lower pressure reservoir to a higher pressure reservoir. All you have to do is to check if there’s any possibility of an oil leak or something like that. But if not, then the fluid level must have been decreased too low.

How to Repair a Floor Jack That Won’t Hold Pressure?

Reasons might not be many but each should be followed with a systematic repair. We prescribed each with detailed steps.

Trapped Air

To save you from this issue, you need to follow the process named “Bleeding” which is described in detail down below.

Step 1: Replace the release valve of the floor jack in a position where it is anti-clockwise of the handle.

Step 2: Remove the oil filler screw from where the trapped air will be removed.

Step 3: Continuously screw and pump the handle for at least half a dozen times even after it has reached its limit. After that, the trapped air must be removed.

Step 4: Don’t forget to replace the oil filler screw before take it back to the work.

Fluid Level Mismatch

If the bleeding process does not solve your problem, you need to check if the fluid level in the floor jack is up to where it is supposed to be. To solve that you need to refill the fluid tank. The procedure of this operation is explained down below.

Step 1: Look for an oil filler screw in the top of the cylinder of the floor jack. Sometimes it’s a screw and sometimes you may find a rubber plug. Remove that screw from the cylinder.

Step 2: Keep the top surface of the cylinder/reservoir cleaned so that some unwanted particle doesn’t get into the reservoir.

Step 3: Now get a floor jack oil to refill the reservoir. Prefer the ones that have got leak stopper features in it.

Step 4: As there’s hardly any fill level marked on the cylinder, you have to fill the tank up to the top.

Step 5: After filling the reservoir, clean it up, and put the screw back on its place. And your floor jack is ready for action.

Change Your Oil Preference

Try not to use common oils like motor oil or brake oil for this purpose. This kind of oil may cause damages to the interior components of your floor jack. All of the oils in the market have different viscosity and other specifications as well as their own applications.

The high acidity level or the chemical may react with the components of your floor jack. So brake oil or motor oil is not the perfect replacement for your floor jack oil.

Conclusion

Before going for any solutions, you must know the actual issue with your tool. Troubleshooting for the issue will be simply done if you own enough knowledge and proper guidance. After finding the underlying issue for what the floor jack stopped working, it will be much easier to get to the solution.

The solutions on how to repair a floor jack that won’t hold pressure that we have suggested worked for a lot of people. But if the issue is more serious than this, contacting the manufacturer or the professional will be the best choice for you.