Where to jack my car up on a trolley jack?

[cs02rm0]

I struggle with this on every car.

Here's a picture of roughly where I'd expect to be able to jack it up, I don't have a piece of wood or a saw to put a groove in one so I can't use the sill where you'd use a scissor jack and there's nothing in the manual for trolley jacks.



And the view back the other way down the car.



X, or similar, marks the spot would be appreciated, I know nothing of suspension arms, flanges, etc. I've bent the sill of a car getting this wrong before so I'd like to avoid a repeat performance!

Happens to be a Focus btw. Thanks.

[Jazoli]

Put the trolley jack where the red arrow is pointing, excuse my very crap paint skills

[The Black Flash]

I've seen garages do it on the sump

Personally, I always look for a suspension mounting point (as per picture above) and use that. If it's got the suspension attached to it, it's already taking the weight of the car.

[GKP]

Yep as above as that mount will be more than strong enough, but I'd caveat that with an additional area for the axle stand once you've finished lifting:

[cs02rm0]

Great, paint skills more than up to the job, thanks!

[miniman]

The Black Flash said:

I've seen garages do it on the sump

The correct (i.e. as per the owner's manual) jacking point for the rear of an MX-5 is the diff casing.

Anyway, just to trump your sump, the local tyre shed jacked up the front of my A4 by raising the whole car on 4-post ramps, putting a gearbox stand (i.e. scaffolding pole) under the gearbox and then lowering the ramps leaving the front of the car held up by the pole. Odd.