DIY Spark Plugs & Ignition Coils

This is a very easy job. I guess good write up but yeah I mean this is like basic things you need to know how to do for this car or you need to have your wallet ready to pay me or somebody else to do it whatever it takes changing spark plugs and doing the necessary things while the spark plugs are out is kind of a no-brainer chainsaw weed eater motorcycle all have these things that get done if you're going to own these things generally one would think when people would get a clue but oh well I had to learn to do everything I'm not a very trusting sort. I haven't had a contractor in my house and well 35 years or better I don't have time to stand over and babysit people so I do it myself.

 

Especially if you come to wrenching new and with no experience, it can be a good idea to use a torque wrench and pay attention to torque on things like spark plugs, at least until you have a feel for about what the right torque "feels like".

With years of experience comes a pretty good sense of how tight "tight enough" ought to feel, and you might go without the torque wrench more often then. But when you're starting, you develop that feel through practice, and practice helps the most when it's accurate.

You do have to remember, too, that if you've practiced with a torque wrench and its handle is longer than your usual socket wrench, it'll feel quite a bit harder with the shorter socket wrench to apply the same torque.

Another thing worth mentioning for DIYers: old spark plugs being removed can be pretty stubborn sometimes. Once it first comes loose and starts moving, I pay close attention to how easily it turns. If it isn't coming out quite smoothly, I'll pause and just go back-and-forth with it ¼ turn or so till that feels loose, then it'll probably come smoothly out at least another turn or so, and if it starts to bind again I'll do it again. That eventually gets it out without much risk of damaging the threads.

The same approach also helps with other threaded fasteners that have rusted and grown stubborn, and sometimes saves you from breaking them right off.

 

The 15 lb/ft Toyota specs for the plugs is presumably with clean/dry threads, since they make no mention of lube, say anti-seize. Probably best to stick with clean/dry, but if you do use anti-seize, best to reduce torque some, say to around 12 lb/ft.

In the good old days, step one of removing the plugs was…: removing the plugs. But we progress. The Gen 3 (and v) plug access is a bonehead engineering fail.

I use sockets with the rubber insert to grip the plug, and after leaving them stuck down the well, pulled off the extension, enough times, I’ve gotten cagey; wrap some masking tape ‘round the socket/extension junction.

 

We use the magnetic sockets mostly now for the plugs all the different size ones doesn't matter there's a magnet up in there that grabs whatever instead of the rubber that swells and let's go of the plug or shrinks and get so tight you're pulling your extension off and things like that and then I try to use spark plug sockets with the extension that's built on them so it's like a spark plug socket with a magnet in it and a built-in extension on it so I can pull on it with my hand or a pry bar or whatever I want to do But generally in all my cars as I buy them the plugs are like finger tight It is unnerving every generation two that I buy one NZ engine I can almost unscrew the plugs with just the extension not even attach the ratchet with my bare hand It's kind of weird.