Thursday, January 25, 2007

Removing and Cleaning the Valve Cover

mileage = 72392mi

In order to see what kind of work was needed to change the spark plugs, I removed the valve cover for the first time. There are four 5mm allen or hex key bolts that hold the valve cover on. The bolt in the lower right-hand corner is a pain because it is deep in a well. I only used a 5mm hex key, but a socket hex bit with a 3" extension is probably the proper tool to use. After removing the three easy bolts, I twisted the cover counter-clockwise to get a good angle to get my hex key to fit into the bolt. Little by little, I was able to unscrew the fourth bolt.Underneath the cover, the engine was pretty dirty considering it is covered. There was some spilled oil around the ignition coils and bits of sand everywhere. As far as the spark plugs go, the three in the front are easy to access, but the back three are really hidden. It looks like the intake manifold needs to be removed to get to the back three spark plugs. Its going to be a really big job for spark plugs.The valve cover was pretty dirty and the bolts were pretty corroded. I used some Fantastik to clean the plastic valve cover and some engine degreaser to clean up the bolts. I wish I had done this earlier before things get rusty and dirty.

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