I am planning to remove my 2.0 and I am leaning towards the Pelican article on engine removal. Here are my questions:

1] Safest way to keep the front of the car stable when I am jacking up the back. I assume it's safest to leave the wheels on the front.

2] Any other options besides the furniture cart?

3] Most of the floor jacks I have seen only go up to about 20" or so...is this enough? This is also the safe limit of my jack stands [3 ton SUV].

4]Is there an easier way to get to remove the CV's other than on the ground prior to lifting the car?

5]Will it be better to remove the HC's and exhaust prior to avoid damage?

Any pointers will be appreciated.

Block them and Yes

Any low height rolling dolly

Place bolcks of wood on the pad to get a higher lift. You need working room.

Nope!

Muffler for added rear clearance. HEs make good handles to guide and pull engine from under car - just not to much force on them

Yeah, what he said.

Also, when finally dropping the engine, the engine tin might get caught on a part of the suspension console, bending up the tin if you're not careful. At Seanery's, we found that if we raised one side of the car high enough to completely clear that little suspension ear, then we could shift the engine to the side (underneathe that ear) a little to clear the ear on the other side. Had we tried dropping the engine straight down, we would have mangled the tin.

We removed the HE's to avoid smashing or otherwise damaging them during removal.

1. I just put chocks in front and behind the front wheels.

2. I used a furniture cart. You might want to put a piece of wood, on the cart, under the front of the engine to match the angle the car will be when you go to unbolt the engine/tranny.

3. One of mine says something like 15.25". I had no real problem. I even left the rear valance on. But did take off the air filter housing.

4. I raise the car up and use e-brake to hold everything. That way I can spin the wheels to give as much access to the CV bolts as possible.

5. I left the HE's and muffler attached. No problems. Just make sure the engine is not resting on an exchanger tube while it is on the cart.

I also had the engine tin catch on the suspension ear bolt.

you can leave the front wheels on, but I usally have the front wheels off and on jackstands(low setting) when I'm doing this anyway, and that works great for me...

furniture cart works great... and cheap



the HEs and muffler get in the way to me... I take mine off...

Really....no problem with the tipping or shifting as you are working the rear?

Dan, we left the HE's on. We did remove the carbs and manifolds as an assembly.
I tried a beefier cart, bad idea, we had to go buy a furniture dolly.

Make sure you have someone with you, it makes life much easier.

none... I think stand placement had something to do with that though... my stands are on the long circular brace in the front... no undercarriage cover in my way <_<

I wouldn't put stands in the stock jack point in the front and raise the back that much...

as for the CV's, I disconnected mine with the rear raised to the heigth for engine removal. Came apart quite easy and I had glorius working room!

.....b

The Pelican instructions work good. Use what's recommended. However, I found that in using the furniture dolly, it helped to have about a 12" long hunk of 2x4 on part of the dolly pointing to the front of the car to kind of prop the engine up on the dolly a couple of inches. It's not so much for the removal as the installation. It helped to have the front of the engine higher than the back as you're lowering the car onto the engine.

Peter,

If you need a hand, I've pulled mine and other engines countless times and can help. I'm just over around USF.

PM me with a phone # and we can talk if you want.

Paul