Jackstand placement?

[obaa996]

Haven't even driven it much yet, and already I'm itching to wrench on it....
For my own peace-of-mind, I'd feel much more comfortable driving the car once
I've had a chance to change out all the fluids and give it a tune-up/general
once-over. I bought one of those aluminum jacks to lift the front end up and
change the oil, but could not figure out where to put the stands once the car
was lifted up. I used jack on the steel loop pads to raise the car, but didn't
see an appropriate place to place the stands. The floorpan looks like thin
sheetmetal, and the frame rails seem very far inboard; the service manual doesn't indicate anything other than a hoist can be used at the points I used
my jack. What is the correct stand placement?

Thanks!

[MHQC]

996, I had the same question. Like you say, the manual does not give many places for jackstands. I am changing the fluids the weekend. I have already had it up on stands. click on the link to see. It appears to be plenty solid. I hope this is right. Haven't jacked the back yet though... Jackpoint

[ViperJoe]

From a previous thread:

Jacking Points

The middle of the front cross member (the meeting point in the "K" of the frame) will allow you to pick up the front of the car.

Placing a floor jack under the "S" part of the rear side frame rail (closest to the center of the car as you can get) will pick up the back of the car - although one side will come up first, the chassis is stiff enough to pick up the back end.
We pick up the back end first to give enough clearance to get to the front. This is the only way we ever jack the car to get it up on jackstands.

Jack the back end of car at the start / curvy part of the frame's "S" curve FORWARD of the rear axle. This will pick up your jacking side of the rear first, but keep going and it will pick up entire back end.
Place jack stands under FRAME RAILS behind S curve - not too far out. We only lift the car about 16 inches or so - just enough to be comfortable to work under there. We have never had an issue about the car moving in this tilted position, but again, we don't lift it to a 45-degree angle.

Jack up front of car - either by placing jack between front and rear wheels and going in that way, or, with a low enough profile jack, going in from the front. Place jack saddle at the intersection of the "K" crossmember. This will pick up the front of the car very evenly.

Place level jackstands under FRAME RAILS slightly behind where the tie down holes are but not directly underneath the "A" arm reinforcement. Again - big thing here is to make sure you are under the thick / wide section of the frame and not the front 1/2 height section of frame horn.
Both our cars have spent MANY HOURS up in the air like this - we work under them, over them, sit in them, etc. and have never felt the car was the least bit unstable. We have no marks on our sills, either.


HTH

[obaa996]

Hey guys,
Thanks for the tips, and even pics!
I'm going to need to crawl around under the car this
weekend to see if I can identify the points you mention.
About jacking up one end, and then the other... is the
car pretty stable when doing this? So I'd have to chock
the front wheels to keep the car from rolling when lifting
up the rear, okay. When the rear is on stands and I start
lifting the front, will I need to worry about the rear
stands rocking over? I wouldn't think so, but I'm a worrywart...
When I changed the oil after first buying it, I was going
to use a set of rhino ramps (the low profile ones; hey, worked well with a lowered Porsche), but no dice with the
front fascia. My lincoln service jack was too tall to
fit under the sills, so I bought that aluminum jack. I
jacked up a front corner and put the ramp under the tire,
and repeated for the other side. I didn't notice until
I was under the car, that the drain bolt was in the middle
of the pan (what genius thought of that location?), so
I had to cut up some boards to put under the rear of the
car to level it out and drain the oil. BTW, the al jack
is very nice and light, but it looked like the lever was
going to bend/break trying to get the last corner off the
ground... Took me an entire day to get the oil changed.... Grr... Now I want to go through and get the
tranny, diff, clutch, brake, and coolant fluids changed out, and I may as well lube the chassis while I'm down
there....