It's a Two-for-Tuesday here at NICO (cheesy radio voice), I'm combining two guides into one. So it's time to change your spark plugs, and while you are at it, why not paint your spark plug covers! You'll be surprised how big of a difference and how many compliments you will get on this. Following this guide, I will show you and explain step by step how to change your plugs and spray your plug covers. This guide is mainly geared toward helping a first timer and newcomers in changing the G50 plugs, so if you've done this a few times then it may just be a breezy review. The painting portion can be an easy and fun project for both the casual and professional! There’s a lot of pics in here, and I've reduced them to the minimum I can for bandwidth.
Why bother with this? The spark plugs are self-evident, they need to be changed at regular intervals or more often if you've experienced MAF or injector troubles. Ask any different mechanic and they'll swear a different mileage you need to change them at. I change mine about every 20,000 miles or less, but some will suggest 60,000 miles. If you know that you're having issues with your MAF and/or injectors, you could easily have totally fouled plugs at 15,000 miles.
So why bother painting the plug covers? You'll notice the engine is a sparse and bland expanse of black, grey, and metal. I decided it needed a splash of red, and I would never have used a different color personally. I only use red and silver as accent colors, in keeping with the Nissan / Nismo performance colors.
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Tools:
You’ll need some common and a couple not so common tools for this. Following the picture from left to right, here is the bare minimum you will need:
• One 12-inch extension, not totally mandatory but it can make some plugs easier.
• One breaker bar, to break the initial torque when removing the plugs. I used a 1/2 drive bar with a 3/8 adapter.
• One 3/8 drive universal joint, for the rearmost passenger side plug.
• One 7mm socket for the igniter bracket bolts. I used a 1/4 drive wrench, a 3-inch extension, and a 1/4 drive 7mm socket, this setup is nice and maneuverable.
• One 3/8 drive wrench.
• One spark plug gaper, to double check the uniformity of the replacement spark plug gaps.
• One 5/32 Allen wrench,
• One 5/32 Allen bit and bit driver, both for the spark plug covers.
• One 6-inch extension, mandatory, for inserting and removing spark plugs
• And a 5/8 spark plug socket, mandatory, a plain 5/8 deep-well socket won’t do, you must use a spark plug socket. You’ll know why very soon.
• One packet of anti-seize lube to put on the new spark plugs. Mandatory, please, it’s less than two bucks.
• Eight spark plugs. Most here will say that NGK platinum is the only way to go. These do seem to feel very good. I’m trying out the Bosch Copper Plus right now, which are cheaper than the NGK, just don’t get the junkie Autolites.
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Paint:
You have some choices here. Acceptable candidates will: be safe for high temperatures, resist oils / cleaners / fluids / harsh chemicals, have good adhesion properties, and resist chipping. Standard paints here will be unacceptable and will be dangerous. Common names of acceptable paints: brake caliper paint, high-temp engine enamel, engine block paint, high performance wheel coating. Unacceptable paints include: any other kind of paint such as latex, krylon (don’t be tempted to use the krylon fusion plastic paint), any of those $1.98 cans, ect. I chose the red brake caliper paint because I do indeed plan on refinishing my brake calipers, and this color is as close to the “Brembo” red as I could find. Also, the red looks amazing next to the light bronze valve covers. I went with the high performance wheel coating for the hardware because it came in the gunmetal grey color I really like.
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Get Started:
1. Remove the main intake tube. Attached to it are four hoses: two small ones up front, one underneath, and one up by the plenum. You can lay the upper airbox back on once you get the tube off, so you don’t have to mess with the connector.
2. Disconnect the two wiring connectors from the throttle body area. This is to give you room to wiggle the spark plug covers out and back in easily. Actually I was able to get by just fine with only disconnecting the big grey connector… I didn’t mess with the black one because that’s how I destroyed my original MAF connector. You’ll notice the connectors are alike.
3. Using your 7mm socket, loosen the Igniter and brackets, disconnect the connections to the Igniter and to the things on the brackets. Using your 5/32 Allen key and bit driver, remove the Allen screws holding the cover on.
4. Remove the driver’s side spark plug cover. Oops, don’t forget to remove the Igniter or you may not be able to fish it out. Simply get it lifted up a bit and fish it out going forwards. Notice my disintegrated wire loom! It completely crumbled as I touched it during this project. I’ll show you how to fix this here in a moment.
5. That is all for the driver’s side for now. I suggest placing the Igniter on the roof on the driver’s side so that you don’t mix them up. Move on over to the passenger side. Here is the exposed driver’s side coils.
6. Unscrew the Allen screws on the passenger side. Tip: If you find a stuck Allen screw, use an extension onto the Allen key to get some better leverage for it.
7. Again, unbolt the brackets, Igniter, and disconnect all these connections.
8. Remove the cover by fishing it out going forwards again. Please excuse the dirt and mud, it’s been flooded here lately, all our roads are flooded, and there has been some mandatory off-roading. Also visible here: subwoofer power wire, fuse, and upgraded terminals
9. Get the covers and all those brackets into the sink and prepare your cleaners. Degreaser is an absolute must, these must be fully degreased or the paint will not stick to them. I used a lot of degreaser and dish soap, with a scrubbing sponge. Spray, scrub, dump dish soap on them, scrub more, spray, scrub, rinse, repeat.
10. Now use your girlfriend’s toothbrush (jk jk) and clean inside those Allen screw recessions. They’re guaranteed to be caked with gunk.
11. Dry everything with paper towels and then set them outside in the sun to dry for a few minutes. It’s a very hot 92 degree summer day here, so the sun works fast. If it’s cold or rainy when you read this, you may let things dry indoors for awhile but expect it to take much longer. Notice there’s already paint on the newspaper, because I was also painting my old and corroded Jeff Williams strut tower brace
see that in the last pic.
12. Lay the brackets out, prepare to start spraying!
13. ProTip! For refinishing your old hardware, take a box and cut tiny X’s to stick the bolts into. This allows full coverage without having to manually touch them!
14. Here’s the paints, red caliper paint and high performance wheel coating. Getting one of those $4 spray can attachments will make all painting infinitely easier and turn out much better. Bonus: a curious cat inspects my work.
15. Spray the brackets with 2 light coats and 1 medium coat, 10 minutes between each.
16. Spray the hardware with 2 light coats and 1 medium coat, 10 minutes between each.
17. Begin lightly misting the covers with several very light coats. I mean very light, as in just a slight misting with each pass. Don’t worry about missed spots such as in the screw holes. Here you can see the very handy “can gun” attachment.
18. Coats three and four, getting a little more coverage on these passes, but still using light coats. Allow 5 to 10 mins between passes.
19. Coat four, even medium coats now, starting to look good!
20. Coat five… a strong coat.
21. Coat six! This is it here, lay it on really strong, make sure the screw holes and shadows are covered. Then, and this is the most important part, you must let it bake in the hot sun for at least two hours. After they bake, only hold them by the ends which will be hidden, and put them inside or in the shade for another two hours to cool and cure. Fingerprints will ruin all your work if you fondle and molest them before they are fully cured. If they are tacky to the touch, let them sit longer. If you don’t have hot sun to bake them in, you can take them indoors to a dry and safe place to sit, it may take as much as 8 hours to dry and cure indoors. These things are beautiful at this point! Time to get ready for spark plugs
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22. Back to the spark plugs. Unbox all 8 plugs and use the gap tool to check the gap. All mine were exactly matched at .40 - .41, this is fine.
23. Starting on the passenger side, unplug all 4 coils and move the harness out of the way.
24. Unscrew the hex head cap screws, not the Phillips screws. Use the 7mm socket on these. The back one is very tricky so be careful so you don’t drop a screw!
25. If you’re of skinny build, you can squeeze your hand behind the brake distributor and the ac lines, and access the last screw from behind:
26. Here’s the setup to break the initial torque on the spark plugs, a ½ drive breaker bar, adapter if needed, a 6 inch extension, and the 5/8 spark plug socket:
27. As soon as you break the initial torque, remove the breaker bar and unscrew the rest of the way by hand. This will be more gentle on the delicate threads.
28. Prepare the new plug by sticking it into the socket, it will hold in place with the grommet inside the socket. Apply a liberal amount of anti-seize lube to the new threads, and stick it down in there with the socket-extension setup, and begin hand tightening it. DO NOT just drop the socket down there and then stick the socket down and start wrenching on it, that is how you destroy the threads.
29. Once hand tight, attach the ratchet, NOT the breaker bar, and get it just a bit beyond hand tight. Over-tightening here can also destroy the threads when the engine heat cycles.
30. Continue back, one at a time so you don’t mix up the coil packs (doesn’t matter but I like to keep things matched up the way they were). When you get to the rear-most passenger side, Cylinder 8, this is the hardest one. This is the minimal setup you’ll need: a 3-inch extension to a universal joint, to the 6-inch extension, to the 5/8 spark plug socket. Prepare to fish it down by the brake line block.
31. Fish it down in there like this between the ac lines and the brake line block:
32. Once done with the plugs, begin reassembly of the passenger side. In case you forgot how the brackets go, these pics will save you!
33. And that funky bracket goes like this, complete reassembly by reattaching and reconnecting the electrical connections:
34. Driver’s side! Lots more room on this side than the passenger side. These are the 7mm bolts to remove, again, don’t mess with the Phillips screws, just the 8 hex head cap screws.
35. This is Cylinder 1 actually, and it’s the very easiest one. Follow the same important directions as I mentioned before.
36. Continue working backward to Cylinder 7, it’s a little tricky, but you can move the black plastic wiring cover out of the way by hand to get the tools down there.
37. Plugs done! Remember that busted up wire loom from earlier, yours is probably crumbled by now too. It’s 20 years old. So remove all the old loom (the black plastic covering that’s crumbling), and clean up the existing electrical tape.
38. Wrap fresh electrical tape over the whole collection of wires.
39. Before putting new wire loom on, finish reassembling the driver’s side plug cover. The brackets go on like this:
40. Put on some fresh wire loom by measuring it up and cutting it to the correct length. Finish the reassembly by attaching the Igniter and reconnecting the connections, slip them into their homes in the brackets.
41. Complete the reassembly by replacing the intake tube, reattaching the 4 hoses to the tube, reconnect the wires up by the throttle position sensor, and make sure the upper airbox is secured.
Here’s what I was also painting: the strut tower brace! It was looking really nasty and the hats were rusted up after many years of abuse.
Now stand back and admire the great addition of some color! Good luck!
added this to my bookmarks