Valve cover gasket replacement 3.4 V6 tips

It’s not a head gasket. Just snug them down - 0.0% of mechanics will be setting their inch pound (nonexistent) torque wrenches on these. With the rubber you’ll have to go around a few times maybe since they loosen the other ones as the rubber gets compressed.

 

yea, don't get hung up on torque. It's rubber.

Start in the middle and work out like a head about 3x around. Just barely touching first pass.

 

Did this job over the weekend and it took both days but I was going slow to try and make sure no mistakes were made. It runs great afterwards! Also did plugs while I was in there, cleaned the throttle body, cleaned the MAF, resealed the aluminum half-moons and replaced cam dummy plugs, new spark plug tube seals, extra FIPG where indicated, new air surge gaskets for the lower and upper plenums, cleaned my air filter. PCV valve and grommet were replaced less than a year ago I protected and reused those. I think I nailed it, folks. Feels good!! And the engine looked nice and clean inside.

 

Also Did this job over over a couple of days, so here's my take on things. A lot of this info is already in the thread but I find it helps to reiterate things or have the info all in one spot.

I'm a shade-tree mechanic and I didn't have any reason to rush so probably took longer than most people. I also spent a few hours scrubbing and cleaning the valve covers due to caked on oil and general grease/grime. I would estimate I spent 4-6 hours of actual removal and re-install not counting the cleaning.

I did this mostly without any document or guide, though I did watch a short video and caught a couple extra steps from that. I also had a former Toyota mechanic to help me out, which was great for a lot of the head-scratching moments. But in general, this is not rocket science so if you are mechanically inclined you can probably just figure out most of it. I like to take pictures and label anything I disconnect with a piece of tape, but there was a lot of stuff that was too dirty for the tape to stick, so clean what you can first. Having a wobbly extension for a lot of the fastener removal is really really useful, especially on the 10mm valve cover bolts.

Absolutely plug up or cover the intake manifold ports running down the middle of the block once you have the plenum removed, as that drops straight into the cylinder.

Replaced with all Toyota factory parts. My local dealership quotes a 16% discount from MSRP so prices may vary. I have seen the air surge gasket as high as $27 list so shop around.

- $71.10 [11213-62020] (2) Valve Cover gaskets @$35.55
- $28.02 [17176-62040] (2) Intake plenum / air surge gaskets @$14.01
- $30.00 [11193-70010] (6) Spark plug tube gaskets @$5.00
- $27.20 [90210-05000] (16) Valve cover bolt crush washers @$1.70 (shown as 11101-B in some diagrams)
- $11.61 [

$19 12204-62010 PCV Valve Sub-Assembly

12204-62010] (1) PCV valve @$11.61

$167.93 total parts plus tax. I also spent another $85 at autozone to get tubes of anti-sieze, dialectric grease, and black RTV, plus 6 quarts of oil and filter.


It's tempting to re-use the old washers/grommets for the valve cover bolts, but they are a crush part and they are pretty cheap. spin those on and off lightly with a screw gun and you will probably save 10 minutes.

Spark plug tube gaskets are difficult to remove, and you must be very careful not to scratch up the mating surface on the valve covers at all. Be gentle. They are rubber with an interior metal ring. We lightly tapped them out towards the inside until the metal ring was bent enough that you could just lever the seal out with a small pry tool. It may help to use a vice or clamp the covers down if you are working by yourself.

Re-installing the new spark tube gaskets, I put a very thin layer of RTV around the outside and a smidge of fresh oil on the inside. Make sure you install these oriented the right way, it's easy to get them upside-down. If you don't have a guide, do one cover at a time so you can reference which way the old ones are put in.

Retightening the valve cover bolts I used this pattern, going about 3 times before torquing them to spec. This was advice from videos and my mechanic buddy.

7 1 3 5
6 4 2 8

These are 10mm bolts and torque to 53 inch pounds / 4.4 ft lbs. Thats pretty low, but actually felt much tighter than I expected, so test your torque wrench on something else or in a vice to get a feel for how tight it is, if you don't do this sort of thing often. Added a little dab of RTV to the corners of the gasket around the cam bearings. That was recommended as the one place the gasket might not fully seal because of the sharp corner.

Putting the plenum gaskets back on I similarly tightened starting in the center and working my way out probably 3 times before torquing. This was advice from the parts guy at the dealership. These are 12mm nuts/bolts and torque to 13 ft lbs.

Other Notes.
Any steel bolts going into aluminum I applied anti-seize to the bolt threads. Also applied dialectric grease to the spark plug boots. (A little on the inside where the connection is, and a light coating around the outside of the same end of the boot helps it plug back in easily)

I did not do the half moons because I am lazy and it was pretty obvious the leak was from the gaskets. The old ones had a couple of cracks and over half of the bolts were not even finger tight. Chances are I could have gotten away with just tightening them, but you need to pull the plenum to get at all the valve cover bolts anyway, and at that point you might as well just replace the gaskets too.

The plastic cover holding the wiring harnesses by the driver's side fuel rail is indeed brittle and I broke mine completely, so be aware of that.

 

Been neglecting this for awhile and our newest driver has taken an interest in the taco, saying she'd help turn wrenches. And let me tell you, for the first time ever she stepped up and did just that! What an intro to mechanic work this little project was. We live in a rural area where every kid who manages to scrape 2 dollars together has an old full-size truck, and diesel 4wd if they have more than $2. She prefers our "dinky truck."

She's the kind of kid that you have to get her buy-in to do something but when you do she's all-in 100%. We completed it in 2 afternoons. She played three 9-game tennis matches the first morning and we didn't get started until after a long drive back home at about 3pm, stopping at about 8pm when I thought the store hadn't placed the spark plug tube grommets in the bag earlier ... I'd forgotten that they came with my Fel-Pro vcg set.

Meanwhile, the whole time she was like, "We're finishing this tonight." Ah ... sorry no. Dad's annoyed already and tired and wants to search FB Marketplace for old Honda CBs or CTs he can't buy just yet.

It had been a long day. I placed an online order the night before for what I needed and supposedly it would be ready by 10:30am. I show up to the store at 2:30 and the guy's like, "Did you know this isn't all here?"

And I'm like, "Why would I 'know' that, when your SITE said last night everything would be here 4 hrs ago?"

"Oh, that must have come on on the morning truck ..." <sigh>

****

Figured we'd want to move the wire harness secured to the air box tube out of the way. Maybe that's not necessary? It's already a blur. The snap lock for the ignition module harness broke. There's a zip tie there, now ... and 5 of the 6 injector weatherpak connectors broke at their respective snap locks when disconnecting them.

Those 5 connectors are now cinched down with double or triple zip ties (purple color was chosen, for extra horsepower, duh) loop tied against the fuel rails. I fully expect heat and vibration to snap the zip ties and leave the truck stranded upside-down in some random ditch with zero cell service access unless I can find replacements and tear off the plenums again. I like thumper bikes but a Tacoma will need more than one cylinder to move.

2 yrs ago I'd previously replaced the spark plug wires and coil packs due to an emergency ... I'd driven 500mi to my dad's house and a few days later as I was leaving the truck would barely move. It would idle fine but not accelerate well and bucked like a bronco on the highway. The only reason I diagnosed it was because I'd already been through something very similar with another vehicle a few years earlier. I did not have access to a reader or anything that would have conclusively shown me misfires. But I mean c'mon, it was like flipping a switch on and off erratically.

I crawled back to his place, borrowed a nasty, basic set of tools from his neighbor and put new Denso coil packs on and "Import Direct" plug wires. It was one of those weird situations where the OEM coils (Denso) didn't cost more locally than the no-name ones but the OEM-quality spark plug wires cost way more than the discount brand ... and I wanted it fixed in an hour to make the 6hr drive back home ... so ya gotta do what ya gotta do.

It all worked perfectly, but this weekend when removing the spark plug wires they did not want to come off either the coil pack nor the driver's side. Those mother-effing discount plug wires were now extracting their payment: Hard to unclip from the coils, and pinching the driver's side would not pull the plastic shafts off the spark plugs! So I had to sort of piece them back together afterwards.

It was at that point I remembered I'd never changed the spark plugs myself -- I don't think I could have reached the driver's side with the plenum on ? (never tried it) -- and didn't know if the first owner had ever done it ... I'd bought the taco at 138,xxx and now we're at 183,xxx ... sent #1 kid to the store for fancy iridium plugs, because let's face it I'm a baller and that's how we roll, yo. The old NGK double-ground plugs looked great but the electrodes were a bit worn.

"Shouldn't you write that down for him, or text it ... he'll forget!"

"Your brother won't forget ... iridium is a word he'll know from some long-ago obscure YT video that talked about rare earth metals yada yada ... wait for it ..."

Son: "Oh cool, iridium? Isn't that used for ... ?"

"Just go get Bosch or NGK or Autolite iridium. Doesn't matter which brand. They have them all in stock. Go. And please get 6 of them!"

***

Being a moron I installed all 6 spark plug grommets backwards and we could not get the valve covers to seat flush; they just would not slip over the spark plug tubes ... I reviewed Timmy's video again ... damn. Took them out and reinstalled correctly. That's the benefit of the Fel-Pro grommets; no steel to deform and ruin like the OEM. Mistake #2 was only buying 1 plenum gasket eons ago, and local stores don't stock them. I cleaned up the best one of the old pair and reused it for the top, installing the new one at the bottom.

My girl had been talking for 2 days of driving the taco to Taco Bell, and late this afternoon we did just that as part of the extended shakedown run. Everything is A-OK so far, although I did caution her to watch the road bumps because the rig is literally tied together with zip ties.

She's already looking forward to driving it to school next year. And after the 'Bell was consumed she's back at the tennis court tonight.

 

Nice!
The 1st time I did my valve cover gaskets I installed the the plug grommets backwards too, that wouldn’t happen again