Is it necessary to drain the water from the block or will draining the radiator be good enough? The reason I ask is because the nut that is around the knock sensor is stripped. Also, liquid wrench is awesome. My car has 160,000 miles on it and with the help of liquid wrench the collector bolts came right off...I figured I was gonna break them...Oh I am also doing lt's too..

 

You'll find out if it needs to be drained from the block if coolant comes rushing out at you.

 

may not be necessary but when i pulled my heads and didnt drain the block, #8 and #7 cylinders, water passages and head bolt holes were filled with coolant
and then after assembly for about 5 min on the 1st start up i had white smoke coming out the exhaust that scared the **** out of me, then i realized it was just excess coolant around the rings being burned off (stuff that didnt get soaked up out of the cylinders) shes fine now tho

my $0.02 is to drain the block
one thing i think you can do is start the car with a coolant hose unplugged and it will run itself dry, just dont let the car run for a very long time like that........bad things could occur (overheating)
if you do it that way, keep a close eye on your temp guage

 

Yep, drain the block. I just went through this yesterday (pulled the heads).

 

Will draining one side be good enough? I can't seem to get the drain plug out of the driver's side.