The 65E is up on the lift ready to get the broken steering racked fixed tomorrow. I prepped the space tonight, with some help from Christopher to get the bonnet tilted up and hung off the block & tackle in the barn. Funny, when I installed it almost 10 years ago to lift hay bales, I never would have thought that I’d be putting it to this use!
Bob Rankin will be here in the morning to help me out, as I’ve never done work on the steering before (beyond some very minor stuff) so it will be nice to have somebody with some knowledge. I’ll be sure to take pictures and share the story. Right now I’m off to bed!
Update: Noon Saturday. Bob arrived right at 9am, and we removed the rack from the car. It came off quite easily. The tie rod end on the passenger side required a puller (which Bob brought) to separate, and we had to remove the fan from the radiator, but otherwise it was a shockingly smooth operation. Bob was very helpful to have around and enjoyable company. The new rack mounts went in with no problems but Bob noted a bit of wobble in the rack… on the passenger side, opposite from where the broken mount was located. Go figure.
The broken mount, when removed from the car looks fine, and in fact can’t be made to deform like it was on the car. I guess I’m just not strong enough! 😉 The new mounts went in with no problems. But we wanted to ponder the condition of the rack prior to re-installing it.
We took a break, washed our hands and went inside to sit in the living room and have some iced tea. We took this opportunity to call Paul Wigton, who provided some further troubleshooting steps. Tea finished, we headed back out to the barn and discovered the play was in the “wrong” part of the rack. So we’re done for now. I’m ordering a rebuilt rack from Terry’s Jaguar. Maybe I’ll have the car road worthy again next weekend! Big thanks to Bob (& Paul) for the assistance!
I’ve updated my pictures too.
Chuck, I like the looks of that lift. Where did you get it?
Hi Carl,
Somebody asked me the very same question on the E-type mailing list. This is how I answered (pasting to save my fingers from typing it again!):
I bought it about four years ago, and found it through this group. I used to work on all my cars with ramps and jackstands. Drive up the ramps, then jack up the other end. I was underneath my wife’s VW when we had a small (~4 on the Richter scale) earthquake. It scared the bejeezus out of me! The tremor itself was very small, and relatively short… but the noise that car made whilst hovering over my head and chest had me wiggling like a caterpillar with it’s ass on fire to get out from under the car! I honestly thought I was going to be crushed to death right then and there.
I resolved to get a lift.
Ironically the group here was having a discussion about lifts about a month before that so looking at the archives I noted somebody had talked about a (relatively) very inexpensive one. I had some off-list conversation with the guy, whose son had bought one. It is from Harbor Freight and at the time had a sale going in, so if I recall correctly I paid something insane for it like $899. I had to pay Freight to a depot in Seattle, and then drive it home in the bed of a pickup truck. A friend with a tractor lifted it out for me after my first attempt using a block & tackle had my barn making noises much like the groaning VW above me in the earthquake! It is heavy (maybe 450 kilos?) but can be moved around after folded flat, using the lift mechanism as a cart/lever. I have replaced the wheels on that, as they disintegrated from load not long after I bought it.
http://etc.goolsbee.org/jag/lift/
I have to lay wood beams under the tires of the jag to provide enough clearance to drive on & off.
http://etc.goolsbee.org/jag/lift.jpg
I also have to put wood blocks under the car to clear the body of the lift too. The arms are kind of fussy to fit under the jag “properly” due to the need to get under the picture frame in the front.
It is a breeze for my other cars though, just drive up, rotate the arms out, lift. Makes oil changes and tire rotations a very quick job. I just did an oil change on my wife’s Jeep Liberty CRD between arriving home from work and dinner time one day last week. That is amazing, as I am the world’s slowest mechanic. =)
I just looked on the HF website and it has gone up in price quite a bit:
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=91315
Looks like they have the same one a few hundred bucks less, but without the lifting mechanism also being able to maneuver the whole lift around:
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=46604
If you had a spot to put it and never move it, that would be fine.
Still, this is a steal compared to the other lift options, which all seem to start at 2X this price. In my dream “garage mahal” I’d have one of those two-post, four arm jobbies that provide full access to the entire car. Until then my reality “Barn du Chuck” has this one. 😉
looks so much easier to get under the car Chuck … had fun morning in the weekend with the old HQ Holden trying to get axles stands under it to adjust the handbrake – gravel driveway not quite level and jacks that would not go high enough … what a saga!!!
I’d be happy if my dream garage was big enough to work on a just one car – can’t even open ‘a’ door properly its so narrow…
Jerome
It is very easy Jerome, and quite safe too.
I can’t imagine jacking a car on gravel… except for maybe a quick tire change or something.
–chuck