We have a 1998 Accord EX 4 cylinder. Tools are a Harbor Freight 3 ton rapid pump low profile floor jack (max height around 19.5") and two sets of jack stands, 2 ton and 3 ton.

Finally got around to changing the brake fluid today. AFAIK it has never been done on this car.

Lifted the car from the front jack point, set the jack stands on the front pinch weld points, lowered car onto jack stands. Tires were off the ground. Pulled the wheels, pushed new brake fluid through on both of those. (Advantage of a California car - no problem with the bleeder screws at all.) Put the wheels back on. Moved the jack to the tow hook on the back and cranked it all the way up. Placed the jack stands on the rear pinch welds - but neither set of jack stands could go more than one click above their lowest setting. Lowered the car onto the jack stands and both rear wheels were firmly on the ground. The problem is that the floor jack is lifting from a point too far away from the pinch weld points. The wheels were off the ground when the floor jack was all the way up, but I have a hard and fast rule that I don't take the wheels off when the only thing holding the car up is a little piece of rubber under high pressure.

Is there something else on the car that one can use to lift the back, much closer to the wheels than the tow hook? There is a fairly substantial looking chunk of metal in front of the gas tank that runs from side to side on the car (almost) and has what looks like two drain holes in it. Almost like a piece of unistrut, but bigger and with many fewer holes. Can that support the weight of the rear of the car? If need be the rear wheels can be driven up on some 2x10's to provide a little more clearance for the floor jack handle to pump. (Have to do the same thing when working on the front of our Prius.)

Some other part of the rear suspension maybe? There is a fairly thick piece of metal oriented vertically that runs side to side near the front of the rear wheels. Part of the suspension is anchored to the outer ends of it. It looked like it might bend though.

I already searched for solutions to this problem and the most common solution seems to be to put a piece of 2x4 on the floor jack between it and the tow hook to get a little more lift. As a rule I avoid using wood in this sort of application because wood is prone to splitting when abused like that.

Thanks.

 

Well, since I couldn't find any other solutions and needed to get this done, I went with a pair of 2x4s stacked on the lift platform. It worked to get enough clearance for the jack stands, but the top piece rotated about 10 degrees with respect to the bottom one as the jack went up. The tow hook dug a groove into the top piece maybe 1/4" deep.

Oddly the height wasn't exactly the same on both sides. Perhaps the driveway is a little bit lower in the middle than the sides,. The car was parked on one half of the driveway. It wouldn't make much difference except that the "teeth" on the jack stands are pretty coarse, so it was a little tricky finding a height that worked well on both sides.

 

There should be a reinforced point on the rear subframe than you can jack the car up from. I'm mostly familiar with 5G Accord rear setups, but it should be similar enough. It is much farther forward than the tow hook, so with the front stands as the pivot point, you can get the car MUCH higher than you would be able when jacking the car from the tow hook.

 

"Should be" being the problem. I have searched extensively and not found anything that documents such a "forward" rear support structure. The Honda repair manual that I have access to has only the most cursory description of the front and rear subframes. As I said in the first post, there is a lateral bar just behind the rear wheels which looks something like unistrut and which appears to be pretty sturdy. Unfortunately on unibody cars appearances aren't worth much, so I wouldn't dare to use it as a jack point without confirmation.

Not sure what Honda was thinking with "use the tow hook", and then placing it so far back that most floor jacks can only just get the rear wheels off the ground. Maybe they assumed nobody would ever work on these at home? There is no problem in a shop, since they all have serious lifts that attach at the pinch weld support points.

 

i got round this problem by bolting something onto the tow hook

 

Jack on the rearmost portion of the rear subframe