Cowl Removal

[Pat]

I'm in the process of removing the cowl, but I have a question - does the plastic piece that holds the wiper control arms come off as one unit or does the whole wiper assembly have to be undone first?

Thanks,

Pat

[Blackened300a]

I'm in the process of removing the cowl, but I have a question - does the plastic piece that holds the wiper control arms come off as one unit or does the whole wiper assembly have to be undone first?

Thanks,

Pat

Im not 100% certain which part you are talking about, I pulled the arms off, then removed the phillips head screws from the panel against the windshield, that removes the upper cowl, then there are 6 or 8 bolts that hold the lower cowl onto the body and the plug for the wiper motor. Once the bolts are removed it should lift right out. There is a plastic cover that sits right above the drivers side cam cover, that don't have to be removed to remove the cowl.

[Pat]

OK, got the cowl removed like you suggested.
Pat

[fastblackmerc]

OK, got the cowl removed like you suggested. But the valve cover won't come out, does the upper intake have to come off first? The valve cover is loose but I can't get it to slip out, I'm thinking the upper intake has to come off.

Pat

No the upper intake does not have to come off.

[Pat]

OK, wasn't holding my mouth correctly, a little twisting, turning and canting did it. Covers out and all looks OK, follower's in correct position.. Putting it back together.

All this is to try and diagnose a severe clicking from the drivers side. Found by using wife's stethoscope. you can hear the clicking from a block away. Plugs tight and burning OK, compression test - cylinders 5,7,8 = 240 lbs, cylinder 6 = 180 Lbs.

Well looks like a bad valve, seat or both. To the shop in January. Shop says $2500.00, labor and machine work. Parts extra.

There goes all my egg money.

[Blackened300a]

OK, wasn't holding my mouth correctly, a little twisting, turning and canting did it. Covers out and all looks OK, follower's in correct position.. Putting it back together.

All this is to try and diagnose a severe clicking from the drivers side. Found by using wife's stethoscope. you can hear the clicking from a block away. Plugs tight and burning OK, compression test - cylinders 5,7,8 = 240 lbs, cylinder 6 = 180 Lbs.

Well looks like a bad valve, seat or both. To the shop in January. Shop says $2500.00, labor and machine work. Parts extra.

There goes all my egg money.

:eek::eek::eek::eek: Im so sorry to hear this Pat. This happened on the drive home on Sunday?

[justbob]

Sorry to hear the news Pat. But $2500???

This was posted live, in real time.

[bolsen]

What happened?

[1stMerc]

^^^^WHat he said Pat^^^

[Pat]

I'm not sure what happened, may be just an internal failure due to mileage, certainly not abuse. Car has 103,000 miles.

200 miles from home, leaving the restaurant, is when I first noticed it, at least that loud. With the Centi the motor makes lots of machine like sounds. Car drove OK, at highway speeds 65-70.

I will have the shop make a determination and then decide on how to proceed with the repair. Just a matter of time and money.

Tell you what, removing the cowl and TB is madatory in taking the valve cover off.
Getting the wiper arms off also required a little bit of saavy. Theres a locking device that needs to be pulled to get the arm off of the mount.

My next step is to do a leak test to determine if the compression is being lost through the intake, exhaust or piston rings.

To do this I need to drain the oil and find TDC on the compression stroke of #6,, then air up the cylinder and see where the air is escaping - through the oil drain hole (piston/rings), exhaust pipe (exhaust valve), or throttle body (intake valve).r

[ctrlraven]

You don't need to drain the oil. I'll be doing a leak-down test here soon myself.

Also do a dry and wet test. Wet test is where you squirt 10cc of oil into the chamber (try to get it on the edges of the piston and see if it creates a better seal, if it does then that's a good sign of the piston rings.