Swapping engines

[tcoradeschi]

Originally Posted by LoneWolfGal

I'm still alive, still getting things set up at my new place. In the meantime, since putting the car on jack stands will be my first order of business, I've been thinking about how to make the process less frustrating.

Consider the following:
With the floor jack under the rear crossmember, jack up the entire back of the car and place jackstands under the left and right side jacking points (just ahead of the wheel wells) and lower the car onto them.
At the front, jack from just behind the front wheel wells, placing the jack well inboard (you will see a good structural location about 18” in). That will lift the front of the car, at which point you can place jackstands at both of the front jacking points, lower the front of the car and pull the jack out.

In summary, lift the car twice and place four jackstands. Easy easy.

[LoneWolfGal]

Originally Posted by piper6909

That should work, but you don't need to do all that. The suspension and body are stiff enough that even if the lift points are off-center, the lean won't be all that much.

Here's a video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fDA-qI5HsIU

Thanks, Al. That was one of the first videos I watched when I first got the car. I like John Salt's videos.

I've had the car on jack stands four times now, using Salt's (and tcoradeschi's) method. Which works fine IF you don't need to elevate the car higher than 14" or so. As Salt observed, when raised at the recommended jacking points, front and rear, the car is higher on one side. There's no way around it.

My jack stands have a maximum height of almost 20", and I want every inch of that, to have enough room to drop the engine and transmission. A 14" jack stand height won't cut it. I can't conceive of any way I can achieve maximum height — on BOTH sides — without using something like my floor jack cross member to lift the car evenly and level, both sides at once. I've been thinking about this problem for a long time and I'm fairly certain my design will do the job.

So I'm going to proceed with fabrication (i.e., cutting the channel to length with a hacksaw) of the floor jack cross member, which I have dubbed "The Lift Master" (patent pending). Any bets on whether it will work?