Hi forum,

I set out this morning to change my spark plugs in my 15 3.5 eco.

right out of the gate the plug is stuck on the boot so bad I can’t get it off.. then as soon as I got after it real hard the plastic of the plug shatters and is still stuck on the coil pack.

any advice?

 

is the hex head part of the plug still in the head? If it is, pull that out and replace the coil pack rather than mess with it

 

It’s the grey plug on the coil pack… i appears to be very brittle and pieces of it fell of completely …

 

oh thats not a big deal, just get yourself a new connector pigtail

 

Looks like it may come off the wire here…

 

And is there anything I can do to make the next 5 come off without so much trouble?

 

 

Read this and it should help you out. What you are looking at is the Grommet Cap. It is still installed properly as you can see the retaining tab is still in the slot. The terminals are actually held in place by the TPA (Terminal Position Assurance). Page 7 shows a 16 way connector by your 3 way connector parts are similar.

If the housing is brittle and breaking, you can probably get a replacement from one on the electronic supply houses like Digikey and swap out the old parts for new without having to cut and splice wires. It looks like it is in good enough shape to reuse until the replacement comes in.

 

See page 33 on un-mating. All the dirt that has got into the connector and is up against the seal is probably what is making it so hard to un-mate. Clean everything up good and use some dielectric grease on the outside of the connector half that it on the COP. This will help keep the dirt out.

 

Thanks. I’ll see about getting replacement parts … I’m on the third plug now I’m just hoping nothing breaks on this one