Yes. On the driver side, take the battery and washer reservoir out. This makes room to remove the coils.
On the pass side, its just a tight fit. Really nothing you can move out of the way. You could remove the one engine mount nut on that side and jack the motor up as his will help clear the body rail.
with the valve cover gaskets off it's much easier. i did mine when the valve cover gaskets were off and it was actually easy from underneath.
will do my other one soon too and will replace the valve cover gaskets as well.
it's not a design flaw either - cars are not designed with your comfort level or ease of maintenance in mind....no one purchases that way so dealers would be silly to design as such.
note - there are quite a few vehicles (no subarus) that require the engine to be lifted to replace the spark plugs (all the ones I know of are American vehicles). now that is a bit much for me....but only because i'm used to Subaru's.
Or Ford F series where the rear of the engine sits under the cowl and you can barely fit a hand in to clean an IAC, or having to replace a forward O2 sensor and the harness plug is midway between the top of the head and exhaust with 1.5 inches between the engine and firewall. Still can't figure that one out except it saved a few bucks a truck in harness cost. So some manufacturers don't even consider replacement of maintenance items in their design.
Subaru is an easier vehicle to work on compared to others. You just don't have other vehicles to compare it with.
Oh yeah i did it from the bottom, On the pass side i did put a small port-a-power between the engine and frame and moved it over about 1 inch, that help alot, as well as all the corect tools, i just didn't want to unhook the motor mounts to raise it up, although i probly will the next time.
i think maybe raise it up and scoot it over mite be the way to go.
Oh yeah i did it from the bottom, On the pass side i did put a small port-a-power between the engine and frame and moved it over about 1 inch, that help alot, as well as all the corect tools, i just didn't want to unhook the motor mounts to raise it up, although i probly will the next time.
i think maybe raise it up and scoot it over mite be the way to go.
On Ford stupidity. Have one in the shop now for ignition plugs replacement. 5.4 3 valve POS. The coils were removed and plug ports flooded with PB Blaster and sat for 5 hours. 7 of 8 plugs broke off. This morning, I'm going in to remove the lower portion of the broken plugs. The rear of the engine will be the most difficult because of the placement of the engine. I will probably spend about 3 hours getting them removed and replaced.
Ford is the worst for building a vehicle for maintenance. It's like they are put together as if nothing will ever go wrong and reg scheduled maintenance is labor intensive.
I just did the valve cover gaskets on my H6. I figured that since I had the covers off, I would go ahead and change the plugs. It was definitely easier.
On Ford stupidity. Have one in the shop now for ignition plugs replacement. 5.4 3 valve POS. The coils were removed and plug ports flooded with PB Blaster and sat for 5 hours. 7 of 8 plugs broke off. This morning, I'm going in to remove the lower portion of the broken plugs. The rear of the engine will be the most difficult because of the placement of the engine. I will probably spend about 3 hours getting them removed and replaced.
Ford is the worst for building a vehicle for maintenance. It's like they are put together as if nothing will ever go wrong and reg scheduled maintenance is labor intensive.
+1 on this!! I have a '98 Lincoln Navigator; last two spark plugs/coils on each side are so far back under the cowl you can't even see them. When I needed plugs, I waited until a local dealer had a "loss leader" special and let them do it. Coils are starting to die (not unexpected at 270K) so my ground rule is that I will replace 1,2,5 and 6; my mechanic will do 3&4 or 7&8 as one on each side fails. End of rant!!!
on the other side of the coin, i think the easiest stock vehicle i ever changed plugs on was my 94 corvette. With the hood tilted forward, the entire engine is available to work on.
the old 84 F250 with straight six was pretty easy too, you just climbed up and sat in the engine bay next to the engine.
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