OK, got a '93 Z28 with the infamous 3rd/4th gear problem. I plan to drop the tranny in my drive way, then swap or rebuild and reinstall. I have been pondering what the best method for getting this thing safely in the air to do the nessicary work with a trans jack that i have been eyeing from harbor freight.

What i have come up with so far includes:

Rhino Ramps, but they only will provide an overall lift of 8.5"

Jack stands, but they too are limited in height, and make me a little nervous at the height that i think i need.

Build a car stand, I can buy some 2X12X16's and stack them in order to get the car up in the air around the 24" that i think i need, but it offers some other issues such as mobility under the car with the sides being solid, and storage.

Another option would be to build tire stands only for each tire, jack up the front place the stands, jack up back and place stands. ( I really prefer this)

car sits low enough that the trans pan sits about 5.5inches off the ground. So in order to get the 20" high tranny to clear the bottom of the car i would need somewhere in the order of 28" from the ground to where the tranny pan currently resides using the trans jack that i am looking at.


what have you done in the past, does any of this sound sane? I could really use your input. BTW take it to a shop is not really what i am looking for here.

 

If you have a rental place nearby, you can rent a cherry picker to lift the front up high enough to get the tranny out. You would more than likely still need to sit the rear tires up on something in order to have some "moving around" room under there. Once the tranny is out, then lower the car down on some stands until your ready to replace the tranny.

 

 

Another option would be to use one of the $15 furniture dollies that HF sales and a small hydralic floor jack and lower the tranny down on the dollie and roll it out but you will need a helper to keep the tranny balanced on the jack. Definitely a helper getting it back in. But I like ATM's idea better! Just an FYi, some of the castings on the tranny housing are sharp as a knife so be careful where you handle it.

 

ATM, thats pretty much what i was thinking. I like it. seems simple and safe. Plan to put my blazer right behind in the driveway to ensure it cant roll backwards (driveway is at a slight down hill)

I like how modular those are, might cop the design.

had any issues with them?

 

I saw a post about this at NastyZ28. They made them out of 2x4's, I could not find the post, so I went to Google and found this. These would work great, I like the modularness to these too. When the time comes, I'll be making some.

BTW, I have dropped a few transmissions in my time. I always just balanced it on a regular jack, undid everything, dropped it onto my chest, and slid it to the ground, then just drag it out. The last one I did I used my motorcycle jack with a steel plate mounted to it.

Here is the jack:

 

man i almost got me a lift for the 4 wheeler thinking i could use it to do the tranny. just used the shop jack though like u mentioned. i like the block thing and read it somewhere but never seen pictures. need to set them up to interlock somehow, looks like they kind of do. i been using the extra wheels and tires for the wheeler. move the wide set to the end i want up higher. had to put jack stands on the front to get that little extra to get the trany out and had to tilt the tranny to boot. i figured if it came of the stands it would only drop 5 inches or less.

 

I would like very much to use the jack that I have to lower the tranny, but I know how my luck goes, so with that in mind i still plan to use the tranny jack. I also am sure that this will be a solo mission (wife and kids will be around but not able to help).

I plan to build the stands, so that they are modular and possibly interlocking. So far I still really prefer this method, unless i can make friends with someone who has a lift. (highly unlikely). I will post my plans and results once completed.

 

Good luck with it. Post up a few pics as you progress with your work.