How To: Spark Plug Change (1 GR-FE)

See above post. Here is another shot of my engine compartment. Anyone one know what that component is, the one with the hose going over my air intake hose??

 

Thanks Chris, I will try to slide the intake hose out of the way. But do you know what that is and why my truck has it and yours didn't?

 

All I did in mine was to unclip the filter housing and get it out of the way. I did not remove the intake tube. Is it easier removing it? Maybe, I had no problems moving the tube out of the way and accessing the coils. Gerry good write up by Chris.
FYI, it only took me 1hr to change mine on my first attemp. Gotta love this easy to work engine!!

 

I didn't remove the intake tube when I did mine. I just detached the box portion of the intake from the tube.

 

Successfully changed my plugs. I think i did everything correctly, took the truck for a quick spin, idled smooth, sounded good. Just curious, since i am a nervous nelly, how soon would you know is something wasn't right, such as cross threading the plug or plug too tight or not tight enough besides for the obvious stuff like truck not starting, misfiring, rough idle??

 

Did you use anti-seize? If not, they'll be tough to remove a few years from now. You'd know if you cross-threaded. The plug would be hard to tighten, but never actually finish tightening. It would potentially pop out after a while, if not right away.

 

Yup, i used anti-sieze on the threads and just a touch of di-electric grease on the terminal end. I hand tightened all my plugs, then finished them off with my torque wrench. I had my torque wrench set to 14ft-lbs as i wasn't sure how accurate it is and def. didn't want to over tighten.

 

I did mine this weekend and had the same issue-That component (Emissions Pump?) Was secured with 3x10mm screws so I just moved it out of the way enough to get to the Intake bracket screw and then carried on as normal. First time changing the Plugs for me (30k service), but thanks to Chris's write up it only took 2.5 hours start to finish and that included Cleaning the MAF and Throttle Body while I was in there.

Thanks Chris!

 

I did this today. got the denso plugs for $23 on ebay. It was pre-gapped to exactly 0.04. For the most part, it was straightforward, except for the driver side leftmost one, the connector was a royal PITA to remove. I'm just changing the plugs the first time at 57k (only been doing oil change and rotate tires every 5k). I am not looking forward to change it after 30k. perhaps after another 60k. The old plugs gap, I can pass the 0.45 easily. other than that, the old plugs were clean. I got to say I did not really notice anything different after changing the plugs.

I also did the u-joint grease. The front were PITA to do. It seems there is always something in these maintenance jobs that make it not easy.

next, gear oil change.

 

I changed mine yesterday and was a snap thanks to the write up Chris made. The only two things I did different was, I just loosened the air filter hose clamp and took one end of the tube off. On the drivers side I only removed the vent hose and not the bracket or anything else.

 

Which plug did you replace them with, the original or something different..?

 

All Denso plugs, it was Denso on passenger side and NGK on drivers side straight from the factory. Pic shows two NGK's on the end and a Denso in the middle for comparison. Notice the ceramic on the NGK is burned of hence the reason I went with Denso. Thats with only 7,000 miles.

 

Finished changing them using this just a couple hours ago
Only thing different was I didn't remove the intake pipe because the second bolt was blocked by the smog thing (forgot what it's actually called lol) and I didn't feel like taking that off too

Thanks Chris for the DIY!

 

Does anyone know why the truck would come with 2 different types of plugs from the factory..?? Is there supposed to be an advantage somewhere..??

 

Well its a good thing you took them out after just 7,000 mi. usually people don't take them out until at least 30,000 right.?? Are the the iridium plugs or the regular ones.??

 

Current FJ Cruiser, 4Runner and Tundra with dual-VVTi 1GR-FE specify the use of SK16HR11 plugs in lieu of SK20HR11 that was specified up to 2013.

2013 FJ (go to page 515): http://www.toyota.com/t3Portal/document/om/OM35A71U/xhtml/OM35A71U_0027.html?locale=en

2014 FJ (go to page 517): http://www.toyota.com/t3Portal/document/om/OM35A88U/xhtml/OM35A88U_0028.html?locale=en

Anyone knows why?

 

At 63k miles I finally changed my spark plugs. They didn't look too bad. Some of the plugs had a little oil on the threads, looking at some photos in here it seems normal. Took about 45 minutes and that included a quick run to walmart for a magnet on a stick for the driver side.

 

Howdy,
great write up!!!! I just did mine for the first time and it took me 1hour and 45 minutes. My Taco is a 12 and has 60750 miles. The original plugs were still in it. Densos on the passenger side and NGK on the drivers side. I went back with stock Densos. I got them from a Toyota dealer and was told that they were pre-gapped. They were from .040 to .043. I set them to .040 and installed them. Chris is correct the drivers side is a pain in the butt. I would like to thank Chris for the great step by step installation write up. Have a goodun!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!