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Lifting engine by jacking up by the oil pan--what am I missing?
I have the 3 bolts from k-member to block on pass. side out, bolt on transmission cross brace out and am fighting the long horizontal bolt that goes in the clam shells of the engine mount on the drivers side. As well as a few other cables and wires cleared out so they don't break off.
I am lifting with a 2x6 piece of wood to get a little wiggle room to get the drivers side engine mount bolt out and I seem to be lifting the whole car.
What am I missing??
PS Should I be worried about busting a weld on my Canton pan?
I put a board on the the sump diagonally so no pressure will be on the kickouts. Are you trying to lift both sides of the engine? You say you're fighting the engine mount bolt on the drivers side, did it ever come out?
Just got the large bolt out of the driver's side engine mount. What a ****. Nice to have one of the three smaller bolts from the block to k member plate blocking it from coming out. I'm not sure how I'm going to get it back in. Had to kind of chisel the large bolt out with a mega sized flat head screw driver and hammer. The engine is being supported by the jack now.
SS RRR: Ultimately I'd like only the pass. side but I didn't think is was possible without tearing something up (engine mount, a bracket..) on the driver's side.
I'm going to wait until I get another set of hands to work the jack while I'm under the car keeping an eye on things. What I thought was the car being lifted by the jack might just be the weight of the engine being relived from the suspension.
When i changed my oil pan gasket i had a real tough time getting the engine mount bolts out of their clam shells. You have to keep playing with the jack until you relieve all the weight from the bolts. If you go too far, that will have the same effect as not jacking it up enough. Once this is done though they will go in and out pretty easily.
Just trying to get the motor a 1/2 inch up off the pass. side plate where it meets the block so I can slide in a spacer in there to prevent the smashing of my header flange on the K member.
Clearancing the collector flange won't leave much meat on to seal properly and grinding on the K member (aftermarket) is at a welded boxed section and would compromise strength. The flange is hitting the K member in just a bad spot. Options were a home made 1/2" spacer or new headers...not that new headers would be a guaranteed fix.
I don't mean to sound like a Kooks advertisement(they are that good....), but you will have zero fitment issues with them....but as with any header, motor mounts must not be sagging.
Look into Prothane motor mounts. They will keep the motor from twisting AS much and possibly "rise" the motor for you.
On a more safer side. Invest in a Harbor Freight motor hoist. This thing was AMAZING when I did my motor mounts. Wrapped the chain around the header primaries and could fine tune the height of driver/passenger side independently to an extent.
Another option will be to change your header to midpipe connection to a slip fit design and use 1" wide band clamps.
I don't mean to sound like a Kooks advertisement(they are that good....), but you will have zero fitment issues with them....but as with any header, motor mounts must not be sagging.
Same with Hooker SuperComps. That's unfortunate that a tubular k-member even has issues with fitment. As suggested, I think I'd look into changing out the motor mounts before using spacers. I mean you're half way there on replacing them.
I would say the mounts are fine. I just need some room between the collector flange and K member. There is probably a dimes worth of space but with motor movement there is a leak in the gasket from being ball-peened by the end of the summer.
I guess the question I have to ask myself is "What negative could happen by having one side of the engine 1/2 inch higher then the other?
SS RRR said driveshaft/pinion angle could change but I have an ajustable torque are to address that and would rather play with the TA then redo collector gaskets every year or do motor mounts, which may or may not be the problem.
So I've thought about it and ordered the Prothane 7-508 motor mount kit. I could pop the spacer in and be done with it in an afternoon. No doubt this will be more hassle and hope it gives me the room I need.
If you go back with the spacer idea it'd probably be a good idea to put one on the trans mount as well. That way the driveline should still stay true and not kinked to one side. You'd most likely still have to adjust the pinion angle.
So to close this chapter and for anyone doing a search in the future, the poly mounts are in and it was a bitch of a job to do. I only have a one car garage, hand tools and myself. I'm no mechanic but I've swapped rear ends, blowers, brakes, brake lines, all kinds of **** and this was the cuntiest of them all.
I did get about a 1/4 inch of room for my header-y pipe flange so I think the gasket should live for more then a few months.
All the bolts fought me as only my car can and things didn't line up worth a damn putting it back together. Things that made it more difficult are the blower and all that goes with it and the Canton pan with kick-outs but the UMI k-member made for some room. I can't imagine how it would have been with a stock k-member. I had nightmares of possibly having to take off the headers and steering column.
The Harbour-Freight engine hoist really does a great job (good call Smitty2919) and would have been a real bitch if I had to use a jack as room was at a premium to work with. I reversed the drivers side mount bolt so the head is to the rear and clears the mount-bracket to block bolt so they don't jam into each other in the future, not that I'm ever going to do this again. LOL
05-25-2016, 10:42 AM
Lifting engine by jacking up by the oil pan--what am I missing? 
