Spark Plug Change info...

My 4.0 L has 38,000 miles so I decided to change the spark plugs. It was not necessary to remove anything except the air filter box on the passenger side. The drivers side looked harder than the passenger side so I started there. All plugs looked good and probably had many more miles left on them. The drivers side had 3 NGK and the passenger side had Denso. All the NGK had a little more ware(more gap) than the Denso's.

Installed 6 Denso's I bought from the dealer ($3.50 each). Took my time and installed anti-size and boot lube on all plugs. Took about an hour.

Great way to get to know your truck a little better!

 

Good to hear it's not too hard.

I plan on putting a set of iridium's in my truck at around 30k.

 

Did you buy the truck used? It sounds like some lazy kid only replaced the"easy" plugs at a past tune-up.

 

Yep Jim,

I had the same experience when I changed them back when I had my 2011. The NGK were worn more than the Denso's which leads me to believe the Denso plug is a better plug for our truck. Pretty easy to do with the right tools and like the post above, Chris4x4 did a excellent write up and I just followed his advice with no issues at all. My wife helped me and would hand me the tools which saves a huge amount of time.

 

Mine doesn't know the difference between a wrench and a table saw.

 

Haha.. Mine didn't either until I laid everything out and explained what each one does and their name. She actually was a huge help and probably knocked off 30 mins of time. It's nice having someone there with a tool at the ready.

 

Every vehicle I've ever owned has had aluminum heads. Have always used 3-in-1 oil on spark plug threads, most have had over 100k miles and no problems.

Question - how much anti-seize to use rather than oil ? Cover first 3-4 threads at electrode end or ???

Just don't know how much (and I did search both here and other sites but no recommendations).

Thanks

 

I put anti-seize on the threads with the exception of the bottom 2 threads. I didn't want to take a chance of anti-seize getting into the combustion chamber (not that I think it would hurt anything).


*EDIT* Since our trucks use copper plugs you need to change them at 30k. Some people use Iridium but I personally wouldn't as our trucks weren't designed for them.

 

So the anti-seize gets pushed down as the plus is threaded in? I also thought about just doing 3-4 "stripes" of anti-seize vertically from electrode end toward the porcelain so it would spread horizontally to uncoated portion of threads when plus is installed, concern, like yours, is not to use too much.

 

Yeah... it doesn't take much. Like I said... the way I did it was 2 threads up from the electrode to the top (porcelain). I don't think it would give any problems if a little got in the combustion chamber but I'm so damn OCD that I just like things done the way I want them done lol.

 

It's crazy how the prices of the Denso plugs can be vastly different from one dealership to another. I was originally going the eBay route on the OEM Denso plugs at $4-$5 / piece after calling a local Toyota dealership(Toyota of Grapevine), whom quoted me a whopping $7.48. Just for grins, called Freeman toyota in Hurst, quoted $3.47 /each. Wow, what a difference!

 

Yeah... that's crazy. I think I paid right around $4 per plug when I bought mine. Funny thing was... when I bought them I told him I needed 6 plugs for a Tacoma. He asked was it a 4 or 6 cyl. I told him 4. I'm just buying 2 more in case I happen to break 2 of them