Had anyone had the s hooks connection on chain super stake break? I bought 7 dozen a few weeks ago I pulled 24 traps yesterday and 3 of them broke with next to no pulling pressure.

Nope, never had one break and that includes the first half dozen I bought 6 years ago that came with the traps.

Either a bad batch or faults developed when they were weleded, assuming they were weleded closed.

What exactly broke? The s-hook or the tab the s-hook goes through?

Have them open up once in awhile if tack weld isn't the best. Never broke. Someone on here posted using like 5/16 or 3/8 lock washers to connect and tack welding them. Think I'll try that next time. I wonder if the broke driving them in rocky ground and the force of driving can be hard on them.

5/8 lock washer

Thanks

I’ve broken them but only trying to pull from frozen ground with a heavy duly puller, dang near gave myself a hernia I had to pull so hard. I did try putting some in the ground without welding the s hook, and that did not go well. They opened up and came off every time.

Yes, but that was always either using a cheater pipe on the puller or pulling with a winch or highlift jack. Went to using cold shots and welding them. There are downsides to them, had one drove through about a six in tree root last year (don't know how I managed that without realizing it, even driving it in hard frozen ground). Couldn't get it up and was pulling my line so I wouldn't be back. Was on a snowmachine and didn't have anything to cut the chain with. Cut about a twenty foot pole six inches in diameter for leverage and tried to break the cold shot, swivel, whatever I could break to get my trap. No go, ended up digging and chopping down through frozen ground to the root (how I figured out what was holding it and how big it was) and chopping through the root to get my trap.

I usually carry bolt cutters if I am pulling a line that has many traps earth anchored, but I only had a couple staked on this line, everything else was on drags or chained off to trees. If I have bolt cutters I can just snip the chain and off I go.

If you bought them already assembled and welded, it was probably a weak weld. Those S hooks are not easy to weld anyways, I’ve welded a lot of them. The steel is so mild. You have to ‘watch your puddle’ and make sure you fuse them together and get a good weld.

That’s not anything against the guys that make em, it’s just not easy to do consistently on every S hook. I use flux core wire and put my Lincoln welder on 3E setting. I make my own, and know how good all the welds are. My chain will break before my S hook will if it’s a strong weld, my S hook will fail before the chain if didn’t get a good puddle to make a strong weld. If I don’t get a good weld, I’ll just throw it away and weld another one to be confident with it.

Tac the closures, then weld a puddle straight across the top of the S hook to get a good puddle going and watch it all fuse together.

I guess what I’m saying is if I were you, I’d make your own. You’ll be more confident with your stakes and they will last a lot longer. I’ve had mine for 5+ years and still going strong and making more.

Oh and last thing, if it’s frozen or really hard compacted ground (cows stomping on it for years), something’s gotta give, but it’s normally your chain from my experience if the S hook has a strong weld on it.

They were welded but they must have not been welded good. I guess I'll cut them all off and try the lock washers.

Haven't had a s-hooks fail, but then I use heavy duty hooks and weld them solid.
Why not just reweld the s-hooks? You'll have to weld the lock washers shut too.