2008-2010 Subaru Impreza/EJ25 Driver's side Valve Cover Gasket Remove/Replace

2008-2010 Subaru Impreza/EJ25 Driver's Side Valve Cover Gasket How-To

• Remove fuel pump relay fuse, fuse 12, 15 amps, in my car under the hood.
• Crank car up and let it stall out, crank it one more time to make sure fuel system is depressurized
• Jack up left side of the car to drain the oil out of the head, make breakfast.
• Lower car again and get out the following tools: 10, 12 mm sockets and spinner wrench, preferably the flex-end gear wrench types and 10mm box wrench, thin flatblade screwdriver, flashlight, simple green in a spray bottle, shop air(if you can), lots of rags, tape.
• Disconnect and remove battery, bracket, and battery tray, blow out leaves and weep that your battery tray is rusting, in fucking Texas.
• Disconnect both spark plug wires and take note that your spark plug tube seals have also failed, assholes. Put the wires up on top of the plenum, break a couple of the wire holder things in the process for good measure.
• Using your 12mm wrenches, remove the metal cover over the fuel rail. There are four screws, one in the front that'll necessitate a box wrench, since there's a sensor of some kind in front of it.
• Remove the PCV tube and cover the hole with tape or something
• At this point, I stuffed rags in the spark plug tubes and washed down the whole top of the engine with simple green and then let it soak a bit, rinsed with water, and then used shop air to blow some of the ridiculous amount of gunk and shit off the top of the engine.
• Using a 10mm box wrench, remove the oil filler tube, cover the hole with a wadded up paper towel. This is how it'll look at this point. http://ift.tt/29jAt3m
• Using the tiniest monkey hands you got and that flat bladed screwdriver, prize the blue retainer clip into the black body on the fuel rail connector, and pull the blue tab thingy out(not all the way!, you'll lose that fucker) and your garage will now smell like gasoline!
• Using the 12mm socket, remove the two bolts holding the fuel rail/injectors in.
• Pull the fuel rail/injectors and push them over to the side, stuff paper towels in the injector holes
• Now comes the fun part! Using all your fucking guile, figure out how to get the six, 10mm valve cover bolts off. The bottom-rear is a motherfucker to get to. Lose your 10mm socket and be perplexed where the fuck it went. Make sure you're wearing gloves or else this will happen when you whack your finger into the very sharp oil filler flange: http://ift.tt/29cp6GH http://ift.tt/29jAuUB
• Leave the blood in the engine bay, this stupid piece of shit is yours now, BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!
• Yes, there is enough room to get this motherfucker out, you need to be patient and rotate the cover up and rotate it/slide it forward and up at the same time, no I did not jack up the engine, and neither will you. http://ift.tt/29coRvk
• Boom
• Remove and replace spark plug seals, I used fel-pro 'improved design'! From rockauto ~$25
• Peel the fucking gasket off the head, try to keep shit clean and keep grit out of the valvetrain, stupid.
• Put the new gasket in the valve cover, clean the cover while you're at it, you filthy animal, check your rubber glove to make sure it looks super gross and full of blood.
• Tetris that sumbitch back onto the head, it'll go, don't be a pansy, but don't force it around the valvetrain and fuck the gasket up, stupid.
• Tighten the bolts back up in a distributed torque sequence, making sure to try to keep the cover level with respect to the head as you go, kinda how you torque a wheel up, if you don't know how to do that, fuck off to the dealer with this job.
• They really don't need much torque, I bottomed the bolts out in the head and then gave a little snugness, the bottom-rear bolt is still an asshole.
• Pull the paper towel wads out of the injector ports and maybe clean them with q-tips, my rear port had all kinds of shit in it from somewhere.
• Replace the injector/rail assembly into the ports, while at the same time pushing the rail's tube into the black connector, you'll have to fiddle with the connector to get the blue tab back in, but trust me, it'll go in, just don't force it. If it's too hard to push in, you're either too high or too low. Refer to the passenger side if you need help.
• Replace and tighten the two 12mm bolts holding the fuel rail in
• Replace the oil filler tube, using 10mm
• Replace the fuel rail cover, 4 12mm bolts
• Replace and re-clamp the PCV tube
• Reconnect all the sensors
• Reinstall the plug wires, and fucking pay attention and don't put the front one in the rear hole, maybe wipe the oil off them, I dunno.
• Reinstall the battery tray, box, and reconnect the battery
• Make sure you didn't leave any tools in the engine bay, and make damn sure that fuel rail connector is seated correctly, you don't want to cosplay burning man.
• Reinstall the fuel pump fuse
• Start that bitch up and make sure you didn't fuck up and it pisses oil all over.
• Go get a beer
• Catte http://ift.tt/29jAjbX

-Montrose https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AHI4DL2BZc

• Go cry in your beer while listening to Montrose and petting dat catte, because this fucker's only half done. http://ift.tt/29coTmW

I was quoted $600 to do both sides, so at this point, you've just saved at least $300. I'll be back to post the other fucking side.

Submitted July 01, 2016 at 09:45PM by UhOhPoopedIt http://ift.tt/29h0nEd