Mine has 178k on it. Smokes more than I want it to. I could drive it as is, sure, but I'd rather just have fresh valve guide seals. Needs a timing belt, plugs, crank bolt (to be safe) and valve cover gaskets anyway.
So after a work week of an hour here and there, I had the intake off by Friday evening in time for fondue party. Yesterday afternoon I had some time and I looked at what else needed to be done. Honestly, this engine is a total PITA to work on. The amount of brackets upon brackets with shared bolts through critical components etc. is just a little bit absurd. Manageable, sure, but when I started digging down to pull the valve covers every time I would get excited about making progress I ran into another buried component that made me groan.
I also don't have compressed air or any of the special valve guide seal tools so would likely be pulling heads to take them into a shop. I called up the shop that was recommended for the valve work. This time I actually talked to the guy who does the work and he seemed to know the engine very well and thought he might be able to do the guide seals without pulling heads. A big improvement over the guy I talked to last time who seemed pretty clueless. In any case he gave me a smaller estimate for the whole shebang, pull head, check valves, valve guides, resurface as needed, timing belt, water pump for about 1300-1500; cheaper if he can do it without pulling heads. I could do the work myself but he seemed to know the drill and taking heads in, amd buying all the gaskets, t-belt parts etc. is going to cost me half that quote in parts alone. I have 4 other cars that need less fiddly jobs done: brakes, control arms, that kind of straightforward stuff. I'd rather pay someone to deal with this job and spend my garage time on the less fiddly stuff.
So anyway, after removing the intake I pulled all the old plugs. 4 of 6 were coated in sticky oil goo from the leaking rubber grommets (or what is left of them) on the valve covers. Gaps were between 0.060 and 0.090!! They were either original or still there from the first scheduled maintenance. (previous owner told me they had recently been changed...yeah, sure). Incredibly it ran really well like this! At this point I decided to put it all back together and take it over to the valve guys shop this week. Got it buttoned back up in about 2 hours Saturday afternoon. Drove it around the neighborhood awhile to make sure everything was working proper...no problems at all. Finished up the eve watching some Olympic slope style.
Pulling the intake really isn't that bad. Pictures and some masking tape to label the bolts helps with this job for sure. I'd feel confident doing it in the field now and that's what I was really wanting to accomplish. Probably could do it fairly quickly after just one run through (1.5 hours, tops for removal). I learned what I needed to about the motor and really I wouldn't ever be digging further into it in the field anyway.
Brake parts are on the way and when she comes home with fresh valve guide seals that will be next on the agenda.
I appreciate the pushes to do the job myself and I think anyone with some basic mechanics skills, and some patience, can do it. At the moment I am just a little bit lacking in the patience department for this job.