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So Tuesday and Wednesday of this last week I clearly found out why the dealership wants $700 for this job lol...
Next time I may gladly pay it...
Just so I'm not always taking from The forum but giving the experience that I got working on the car...
First off I had the luxury of a medium lift I guess I could call it that it lifted the car about 4 ft off the ground so we could be on little roller stools underneath the car..
I went right at the famed hard to get to number 8 spark plug first. My arms are long and skinny so I was able to get my arm up between the starter and the exhaust pipe and feel for it. Pulled the plug wire off.. then I just went out pulling the spark plug wires.
If I had to do it again I would go right at pulling the battery the alternator I would just again flop it over to the side and just disconnect the one little small wire that comes off of it. Underneath I pulled the belt tensioner which was just too little bolts right in front of me and pulled the belt out of the way...
Order of operation I pulled the boots all off the plugs and pulled all the wires out pulled one plug at a time and put them back in. Worked on the passenger side first as this was supposed to be the worst. And it was!..
I got the eight six and four from underneath and had to get the number two spark plug from up top. Then I was able to fish the spark plug wires out by taking them off the holder that wraps around the front of the engine one at a the time the bottom one first and taking it down another two three inches to an open area where I can pull the boot through and then the next one up and the next one up and then the last one at the top. I noted which one went first but the optispark is numbered so you start with the top one putting it back so you can slip it up to the top plug wire holder into the optic spark keep tension around the corner into the place where it goes. Just doing one at a time and I had to put the boot for the spark plug through first I tucked it under like the picture shows and then grabbed it with some needle nose pliers and slowly worked it through without really trying to yank on it.. the one YouTube guy I've seen doing this pulled the power steering pump or something but that's not necessary.. and for the life of me he didn't change the plugs while he was at it..
On the passenger side I did end up putting a little bit of heat shield around the four six and eight wires as they went past the exhaust emissions pipe that I know gets very hot...
Needless to say the lift got serious exercise going up and down...
So on to the passenger side everything was done from down below. At least the way I did it. The guy on the YouTube video said 10 mm but I thought there was two 3/8 bolts holding the bracket that holds the number seven and number five spark plug mostly the number seven. The one little bolt up front that's easy to get to you can take out and the one in the back you just need to loosen up as the bracket has a bit of a fork and you can just push it up and out and not having to take the bolt out. I just unloosened all the wires from both ends. I loosen that rear bolt took the front bolt out and fish it all through... I went up to the bench and closely matched those spark plugs wires and we put them into the bracket and slid it back in there and slid the bracket down onto the rear bolt and put the front one in and tightened it and tighten the rear one oh yeah sorry I changed all the spark plugs after I took the plug wires out. These were all relatively easy compared to the other side at least from the bottom I would say the number five is reaching back there was probably the hardest.. I unplugged what I believe is the block water temperature sensor just to get out of the way so I wasn't yanking on it when I was doing stuff and just plug that back in.,..
Again I would tackle the passenger side first as it's by far the hardest and sure makes the driver side look easy...
I voice command all this stuff so I may have to come back through and edit a little bit..