XimbueX

Over my winter break from college, my brother and I stripped an RX7. After we got all the extras off the block, we were able to lift it out of the engine bay with our hands. It's only about 250lbs I think.

Silkworm

- Start at the rear, drop the exhaust
- Pull the exhaust shields
- Disconnect the drive shaft from the rear pinion.
- Move to the engine bay
- Remove battery
- Carefully disconnect the fuel lines. (under high pressure)
- Disconnect the throttle cable.
- Cut radiator and heater hoses off
- Disconnect AC lines
- Remove fan shround and fan
- yank radiator and AC condensor
- Disocnnect all electrical connections on passenger side of the engine bay (ABS, Boost sensor, etc. Anything tied to the electrical bundle leading into the passenger side firewall)
- Disconnect the steering shaft
- Remove spark plug wires
- Disconnect electrical connections from transmission.
- Disconnect electrical connections along the lower drivers side of the car. There's a bunch of connectors near the drivers side firewall that have to be disconnected.
- Go inside the car and disconnect the wiring from the ECU and assorted other connectors, and pull it back out into the engine bay.
- Disconnect brake lines at the fender well.
- Final check for anything that will get hung up.
- Support tranny with a jack, disconnect trans mounts
- lower tranny onto a 1000lb dolly (home depot), still connected to the engine.
- Jack car up slightly, remove jackstands, and lower entire car down on the front onto two more dollys. At this point, you have three dollies under the car, and the car is resting on them. The rear is not supported by jackstands, just the tires.
- Disconnect the front suspension from the shock towers so they are free to drop out. Don't remove the center nut!
- Pull the bolts holding the front subframe to the car. (when lowering the car, be careful not to obstruct these holes)
- Now the fun part, using jacks on both sides, lift the body up off the engine. Get it high enough to support on jackstands. We used a long 4x4 to help get it high enough for our jacks on a Camaro.
- The dollies will easily support the weight of car, so the subframe isnt' a problem. Two people should be able to push the engine/trans assembly to the side
- Lower the car back down, support it with jackstands. raise the rear, support it on jackstands
- Remove everything else you want to remove.

How in the hell you're going to get the shell out of your garage, I don't know I suppose if you really strip it, 4 guys could pick it up and carry it

Disclaimer: I've done this exact procedure on a Camaro Z28 and two Fieros during engine changes. But I've got a hoist, and the RX-7 isn't that hard to drop using a hoist. The hard part is getting the body up over the engine using the above method. But that's how I'd do it if it were me and I couldn't get my hands on a hoist. there may be other parts that need to be removed to get at things in my list. I did this by memory, there may be other things you need to remove as well. Take it slow, and really think hard before taking that final step and lifting the car.

PaulC