Safe floor jack points for the CMax

[hunt3rj2]

I noticed in the factory service manual that there is no proper/safe central floor jack point listed for these cars. I find this very strange considering every car I've ever worked on has listed some kind of specially designed floor jack point in the front and rear so you can safely jack up the front of the car, put the jack stands on the pinch welds in the designated area (with appropriate pinch weld adapters), then lower the jack so the car sits on the jack stands. This also makes it possible to safely raise all 4 corners of the car, usually by raising the front half to the lowest jack stand position, then the rear, then repeating the process until the car is high enough to work under comfortably. It's clear to me that Ford did not really care about whether someone using a floor jack is able to lift the car safely, which is why it makes no mention of anything other than the scissor jack/two-post lift points.

 

After a lot of research I noticed that some Ford Focus cars with the Duratec (often older) have a "dogbone" that connects the transmission to the subframe as the central floor jack point for the front half of the car. This is often listed as the factory approved floor jack point in those cars. Looking under the CMax it does in fact have this same exact point. I believe if you use a thick rubber puck to properly engage the divot and avoid marring the bolt that connects this transmission mount to the subframe you will be able to safely use this as a front jack point. It pretty much connects directly from the subframe to the chassis with solid metal at every point between the subframe and chassis, so I'm confident that it won't bend the subframe if you use this point:

 

 

The center of this picture with a large bolt appears to be the transmission mount I'm speaking of. It may be hard to get to it without some ramps to get the car higher to clear a floor jack. I am doing more research into what could be a safe jack point for the rear at this time, I'm not sure yet but it appears to me that the rear subframe may be the only way as well. The problem is that I have found some people mentioning that jacking on this crossmember can dent or bend it, so it may be necessary to use some kind of load spreader like a wooden plank or block to avoid damaging it. I would appreciate if someone could chime in with their experiences here.