Advice on placing your E30 on jackstands...

[JRKOUPE]

What is the best/safest way to get the car on 4 jack stands?..........one side first.........one end first?.......tia!

[DoriftuEvo]

I've always gone back to front. Can't think of a reason that one method would be significantly safer than another.

EDIT: ^ Not one of my better thought out posts. Guess I'm used to only having to change the rear wheels. I always use a wheel chock up front as well.

[Low Level E30]

I jack the front, THEN the back.

I figure it's safer to lift the front first, because you can stop the rear wheels from rolling w/ the parking brake (I prefer it over using the transmission to lock the wheels...). One less thing to worry about.

[HST]

Yeah.... front to back, then when you take it down take down the back first. Make sure you pull that e-brake!

[Charlie]

I like to roll it up on ramps under the front wheel, and then jack it up under the front subframe. From there I pull the ramps out and put it on jack stands.

After that, I put the jack under the rear diff, lift it and put stands under the rear subframe.

Pretty quick and painless.

-Charlie

[fretburnr]

on a known flat surface i don't like to chock the wheels/use the p-brake as my jack tends to pull the car forward as it raises, and it either makes the chock useless or the rear wheels drag some. if i'm only lifting one end, i'll chock the wheel after its lifted.

plus my car's so low i can't get a jack under the front any way at all, so i have to raise the back and get the jack under the front crossmember from the sides.

Charlie, do you lift on the diff itself? i tend to use the center of the rear subframe most often

[JRKOUPE]

I cant imagine getting to lift the rear after the frt is already up. W/ my HR race I'm thinking the rear will be drooping to low to get to if frt is already up..........Ill check it out again over weekend .........good points here...Thnx!

[JRKOUPE]

Im wondering....


once you have frt up, how do you access rear jacking point....from side of car? or rear?

I guess I was assuming from rear, which would be diffcult on a lowered car.

[browntown]

Im wondering....


once you have frt up, how do you access rear jacking point....from side of car? or rear?

I guess I was assuming from rear, which would be diffcult on a lowered car.

From the rear, under the diff. For the best little picture this site has, see this:

I have it push-pinned in my garage for reference.

[Low Level E30]

I personally like factory jack points only.

[rwh11385]

Joel,

i like to jack the front by the rails just inside the rockers with my craftsman (QUICK and easy to do), then jack the rear at once with the same and throw some jackstands under the back.

it's very quick, safe, and easy to do.


i only wish my car would fit onto a ramp.

[amdspitfire]

so many more jack points than an e36, looks very convenient

[bmwsmurf]

I have a very hard time jacking the rear of the E30.

If you jack it up on the rear subframe on the sides, there's no room to get a jack stand onto the subframe bushing bolt on the edge. If you try to jack it up on the subframe bushing bolt, the bolt can slide around on the jack and is pretty unsafe unless your jack mounting plate can accomodate for this. Not to mention you may end up warping out the bottom edge corner of the body panel that surrounds the subframe bushing/bolt area if your jack stand doesn't move, and that part gets caught on the edge of your jack.

I've ended up jacking up on the metal plate that is part of the rear subframe bracket that bolts onto the body. This is highly not recommended if you have rust in that area.. which my other E30 does. My jack has a rubber pad on it so that it doesn't mar the underbody.

Best thing probably to do is to get one of those super long and low profile jacks that are $200-$400 and jack it up under the center of the rear subframe.

Some have warned against jacking on the differential and that it could be bad. No idea if that's true or not.

E36s and E46s are so much easier.

[Jand3rson]

With the iS airdam on my car, it's too low to get a jack under there from the front. Does anyone know if low-profile jacks (like the Craftsman one) will fit under the front end of a lowered car? Because right now, jacking my car up is a huge pain in the ass. I have to do one side, get a jackstand under it, take the jack to the front, jack it up, then get jackstands under the front once it's up high enough, then do the rear.

[bmwsmurf]

What you want is one of these:

http://www.ultimategarage.com/acjacks.html

If I ever get a garage... that's one of the first things to buy.