Purpose of this jack

[zendriver]

It's a ratchet jack with the fixed handle. About 17 inches tall down.

It lifts from the top or two points on the side.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Rookie2]

I believe it was sometimes called a railroad jack to lift rails . maybe not ?

 

[jmill97]

Looks similar to a house jack

 

[gte718p]

I believe it was sometimes called a railroad jack to lift rails . maybe not ?

The style is indeed often called a railroad jack. All real railroad jacks I've seen are significantly bigger though. They were made to lift rail cars and locomotives. It is not uncommon to see them in 40 and 60 ton capacities.

It is also called toe jack or house jack. Basically it is for moving something heavy vertically. Generally to give you room to get some other piece of weight handling equipment under it.

 

[Farmall 1066]

Here in SE Nebraska, that is called an Avery Jack, tractor jack or threshing machine Jack.
Avery made most of them, but no idea if they had ties to farm implement mfg of same name.
I've got several, and they come in handy, especially the low lift part. Bad part is you need a piece of 2x to set them on, as the handle generally won't catch unless pressed below the base of the Jack.

 

[RedF]

Hey, that looks familiar!

To the best of my knowledge, they are (were) most commonly used for farm implements.

 

[Dozerhand]

We had two of those finger pinching SOB's around the farm when I was a kid. Used them for everything

 

[Larryjones]

Always called them railroad jacks, I've actually seen a track crew lift track with them. I've also seen riggers use a smaller version, maybe a foot tall, to lift heavy equipment. They would use a pair, one on each side and let each know how many clicks they went up. Dad had one, he used it as a bumper jack on his old Ford pick up. I was a little **** and was playing with it, and had the tires of that old Ford maybe 8 inches off the ground and then flipped the release over which would give it an instant down by pulling the pawl out of the shaft. Well that old Ford hit the ground with a "whumpf" and the old man came tearing out of the house to see what I was into. No, the truck was fine.