where to place floor jack?

[ChargerST]

Maybe it sounds stupid but where should I place the floor jack if I want to lift the car? on my other cars I usually lift the car on the frame close to the wheels but according to the FSM a floor jack should only be used under the rear axle and the lower control arms - it further says that floor jacks must never be used on any parts of the underbody. what's the deal?

[bill440rt]

I usually jack up the car from the center of the rear axle, or directly under the center of the K-frame.

[b5blue]

I had to jack up the Goodyear tire mechanic for lifting my Charger by the rockers! We got that crap sorted out with the super, I do like Bill at home.

[tan top]

I usually jack up the car from the center of the rear axle, or directly under the center of the K-frame.

  yep

[Hemidog]

I usually jack up the car from the center of the rear axle, or directly under the center of the K-frame.

  yep

I second that!

[FLG]

Yep agree with the above.

A very strong point is also where the front frame and cross member meet.

[Nacho-RT74]

Maybe it sounds stupid but where should I place the floor jack if I want to lift the car? on my other cars I usually lift the car on the frame close to the wheels but according to the FSM a floor jack should only be used under the rear axle and the lower control arms - it further says that floor jacks must never be used on any parts of the underbody. what's the deal?

thats not what says on Haynes manual as far I recall... they boxed the underbody area at the end of frame rails ( closer to center of car ). I can be wrong though, but I remember read that

[bull]

Like these guys said, under the middle of the K-frame or the diff. But I've also jacked under parts of the subframe without any problems. If people just use their heads and don't jack on the bottom of the floor or something it'll be fine.

[Mike DC]

            
The factory forbade a lot of seemingly decent jacking points . . . and then they delivered the cars with nothing but bumper jacks for changing flat tires at both ends of the car.  

IMHO jacking at the extreme ends of the car (with the bumper jacks) would probably stress the unibody more than any of the "wrong" jacking points that hobbyists usually do.  I think the factory's instructions had a lot more to do with keeping non-car-enthusiast drivers from killing themselves while changing tires than they did preserving the unibodies.  


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The K-frame can take the weight just fine in theory, but there are caveats.  

For one thing it's not a very stable arrangement once you've got the car up in the air.  The pad of a floor jack or a jackstand is not a very large area to hold up the entire front half of the car.  The car can very easily tip to one side or the other, and it probablty wouldn't be too hard to tip it over far enough to threaten a fall.  (Even if the car doesn't tip over off the jack, the jack itself could go sideways.)

For another thing, if you're jacking the car in the middle of the front end like that, then you're not just lifting 1/4th of the car with one jack or stand, you're trying to lift HALF of the car that way.  That's a lot more stress on a small area of metal than just lifting a corner.  The K-frame won't bend and hurt the unibody or anything, but it might dent the underside of the K-frame itself a bit where the jack or stand is pushing on it.  

[Silver R/T]

on unibody cars I jack up on pinchweld closer to wheel. On Charger I go by the pumpkin in the rear or frame rail works too

[flyinlow]

K frame or diff. with a floor jack

stub frames with a lift