Finally got the exhaust manifolds and Y pipe off today.

The good news is that my guides and seals appear to be just fine; There isn't a speck of buildup on the exhaust valves that would indicate that oil was getting in. In fact, there's only a light coating of carbon on the back of the valves and inside the ports, including the one that was getting oil fouled.

The bad news is that the intake manifold will have to wait for Monday; I'm beat from spending a couple of hours under the car twisted into odd positions getting the manifolds off. Man, what a pain! The drivers side was a piece of cake, but the passenger side... Well, I have a full compliment of busted knuckles but it's off.

Tomorrow I'm in the firehouse for a full 24 hours. Looks like I'm driving the wife's Achieva to work. I have a 54 mile commute (one way) and while I really like my '06 Dodge Power Wagon, the 14 miles per gallon is a bit rough on the pocket for commuting.

Monday I'll tackle the intake manifold with a clear head. I'm holding off on installing the headers until after I get the intake manifold off and inspect the intake gaskets and the intake valves to be completely sure I'm not pulling the heads off.

 

On one other note, I pulled all the plugs out of the motor in the process of removing the manifolds. Driver's side had Bosch Platinum +4 plugs (Gimmick junk; shrouds the spark too much) and the other side had AC Delco used-to-be platinums that were all missing the platinum buttons.

Nothing more amusing than Previous Owner repairs, sometimes.

 

Maybe their budget fell short, they couldn't afford the other four.

 

Or they looked at the passenger side and said, "Wow, that looks hard, screw that!"

 

I bet it was option B...

 

I think this is the only car I ever had that installing headers made it *easier* to change plugs. Go figure.

 

Installing plugs with headers is a breeze. Worst part is removing the starter. Overall, its a very quick procedure though.

 

Getting cracked in the face with the y-pipe was the fun part for me once I got it undone. It doesn't look like it weighs that much... I had no problems with the starter, just busted the two bolts loose with a breaker bar.

 

The cast iron manifold on the passenger side fell on my hand when I pulled the last bolt out from under the car. Felt like getting my knuckles rapped with a hammer. I said a few choice words, none of which I could repeat in front of my daughter.

 

This is what the inside of a 14 year old, 75000 mile Optispark looks like.
Scary thing is, it worked just fine... considering that the rest of the ignition system was beat to hell. Plugs were worn out and mismatched. Plug wires were so old they were actually cracking a bit.






Yes, that is a bunch of rust particles you see there on the white cardboard. Fell out when I opened it up.









The bearings feel nice and gritty, too.

My new AC Delco replacement is on the way from thepartsladi on Ebay, should be here Friday.

Let's see... New AC Compressor, new (electric) water pump, new Optispark... Only old accesory is the alternator. But that works fine and doesn't make any noise. (For now...)

At least that's easy to access and change.

 

Did you need any special tools to get your optispark apart? I would like to disassemble my original opti. I bought an E4 torx socket and got the cap off, but never got the rest of it apart. I didn't mess with it too much, but it looked like there were some hard to get to screws or bolts remaining once I got the cap off.

 

i would have went with the LT headers i have seen those pacesetters crack left and right and leak bad!!

 

wow im surprised that was running at all! i have seen cleaner optis run horrible or not at all but that one is nasty!
time for the 95 opti conversion while you are there!

 

I just did a quick search for 'pacesetter crack' and got nothing, so point me at a few of these problems?

 

i see them crack at the welds on the flanges. this was a few years back i have read that they have improved the quality though...
i would recomend the long tubes over the mids...and coated