Safety Concern: How to properly lift my car?
 

Hello all, quick question. I am very concerned on how to properly lift my car in order to install my aftermarket exhaust (Perrin). Whoever has already installed an aftermarket exhaust themselves, i would very much appreciate information on how you lifted your car. Am i supposed to use two car jacks on the rear end? Did you use a professional car lift? Please help as the thought of using a car jack and sliding my head under my car frightens me.

Thank you!

Oh boy, never and I repeat never trust a jack to hold up your car if you are going under it. Jack stand is what you need and I would not recommend that you put your car on four jack stands either as it could easily fall off. I'd pay a shop to do it if you don't have the right tools, it quite cheap to have it done.

Good job on asking first though, many people fuck this up.

if this is a concern, you're best off seeking a buddy to help you who has more experience than you, have fun learning!
with experience,correct supports and ratings, 4 jack stands are fine btw..but yeah, NEVER get under there with just a jack, please.

If a lift is not available, follow this diy on how to safely lift the car:

http://www.ft86club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10111

Personally I own my own professional lift in my garage so I had it easy. However I have done stuff on jack stands before and it's not fun. It's not difficult ether, basically you have to lift the car, slide the jack stands under the jacking points and slowly lower the car onto the jack stands. Once the car is on the stands it is safe to work under, if you are truly worried then take a spare tire or some other large sturdy object and place it under the rear tires so if the car slips off the stands (which it shouldn't if you've done your homework) it wont crush you.

Look at the owner's manual, it tells you where to use the floor jack to lift it. Also, you can read where to place the jackstands. But as others have said, if you aren't confident in what you are doing find someone who knows their S**T and have them help you, or take it to a shop.

2700+ pounds falling on you is not going to turn out good, PLEASE be careful!

Does anyone have any advice on for putting it on a lift? It took me like 20 minutes to get my car in the air because it was so low I had to use jacks to fit the arms under the car. -.-

Nope....if your car is that low, then that's what you gotta do, if you want you could try rolling the car up on some 2x4's if you only need a couple more inches of clearance it may get you what you need to slide the arms under. Otherwise you just gotta jack it up and place the arms.

take the wheels off and place them half way under the car!

Due to how low my car is I had to use two jacks to get my car on 4 stands safely, but it can be done. The safest way is what was shown in that DIY guide Gmooker linked, and if your car is low use 2x8's to raise the car off the ground a bit to make room for the jack to get under the car. 2x4 just feel too narrow for my taste, of course you can lay them side by side so there is always that!

+1 on using wood to get the car in the air. Make sure to chuck the front wheels that are still on the ground, use a floor jack to raise it from the center lift point (the differential), then lower the rear onto jack stands on both sides. Finally, go around the car and really bump into it to make sure it's secure. Better to fall then than when you're under it. The setup I used when I did my suspension is further down in this group of photos I posted on reddit: http://imgur.com/a/vVkqQ

The most important thing is to be safe! As a rule, I have a friend help me out so I also help me out so there's somebody to help/ call for help should something go wrong. An experienced guy on s2ki died a couple of years ago when he got too comfortable and ignored some of those steps, so every time I do it I keep him in mind to keep myself honest and for his death to have not been in vein.

If you haven't used a jack and jackstands before, you may want to start with ramps. I find ramps easier to use in many instances. For something like a catback exhaust, it should be enough to put the rear wheels on ramps for the install (I'm still waiting for delivery of my Perrin CBE, so I can't confirm first-hand yet).

I've lowered my car a bit on KWs, and short of high dollar pieces of equipment, there aren't ramps that accommodate a lowered setup. Stock suspension *might* get away with it, but I didn't try ramps in that configuration.

Rhinoramps are perfect for this. You could even Rhinoramp one end of the car and then jackstand the other for an even safer method than jackstands on both ends, but for a catback on this car, the ramps on the rear should suffice.

I've also heard of people using jackstands on just the driverside of the car and working on the catback that way.

All four corners lifted would give you some nice working room, but you really only need to lift two.

I'm swapping my Evo 3 out for a Perrin today if the weather cooperates, I'll confirm how I ended up doing it once I'm done.