It’s true that I am overweight, some would say fat, others more educated would say morbidly obese. It is also true that I spend far too much of my life sitting behind a desk and have done so for the past 5 years. Sedentary life, eating at restaurants and drinking beer and wine daily have lead to me not being in the best shape of my life. Now that I am facing a deadline where I need to physically perform some tasks that take dexterity and strength, my body is revolting. You can take that either way it still works, which is more than I can say for my battered hands and back. Getting under the car and then leaning up with the top of my body while reaching up behind the engine to tighten a blind bolt with a socket that doesn’t want to fit becomes a fight against exhaustion.
I have so little left to do on the Prius it is so annoying that I can’t finish it now. I just spent an hour and a half working on something that I could have done in 20 minutes when I was fitter. Yes it is my fault, but that just makes it more infuriating. I am also double and triple checking my work. I printed out a set of torque specs for many of the jobs I did two days ago. I managed to torque the exhaust manifold, manifold heat shield, intake manifold. engine mounts and almost did the valve cover until I double checked and realized I had not put any seal packing on the joint between the block and the timing cover right where the valve cover would go over it. So I removed the valve cover, added the seal packing, and replace it along with the bolts and torqued It down In the prescribed order.
The next job was to replace the spark plugs. I could have done this when the head was out, but I figured if I waited there would be less opportunity to bump them and change the gaps. I almost regretted it. Cylinder #3 spark plug was particularly difficult to get out, not sure if the end was corroded or the threads were just exceedingly dirty, but it was s b!0tch to get out. Happily it was not cross threaded and the new one went in without issue. If something had gone wrong and I had to remove the head to fix it. I would probably have walked away for a month. But with all 4 done I installed the 4 new coils and then put the belt on the pulleys. I had to move the adjuster all the way down to get the belt on but it is a good design that will keep the belt tight enough to drive the water pump and ac compressor. I have not torqued them down yet I will wait till last since I may need to adjust it after the engine starts anyway.
Having drunk four 12Oz. bottles of water and had the fan blowing the whole time I decided that’s enough for now. I know I need to finish it today /tomorrow morning, but with 61% humidity and 87ยบ I have sweat through my shirt my shoulders are sore, by back is aching like hell and my hands will only be useful as clubs for the rest of the day anyway. I better make a list of what needs to be done to see how much I can procrastinate, how soon I need to get back to work on this little gem.
ToDo
- Install water temperature sensor in head.
- Install throttle body.
- attach hoses and wires to intake manifold
- Install air filter housing
- attach hoses and wires to head and valve cover
- attach wires to catalytic converters behind engine.
- replace the radiator overflow tank and hose
reinstall the brake fluid reservoir- Add correct type and amount of oil
- double check the radiator petcock is closed.
- Add correct type and amount of radiator fluid. burp the system
- reinstall Passenger Wheel
- reinstall 2 underside splash panels
- Add tray across shock mounts
- install motor and wiper armature
- install wiper arms
- Charge the starter battery and install it
- plug in the main battery.
Well now that I look at it, I doubt this will be ready in the morning. But afternoon looks possible so that still works. Hell it’s her birthday till midnight technically. But to be sure, I probably need to go get the fluid and oil and put the battery on charge tonight.
I did make a trip down to the shop later and unhooked the battery for charging. While there I looked at a couple of things. I reinstalled the brake fluid reservoir which required moving some hoses attached to a plate, I installed the plate but it looks wrong, I will have to check my photos I took when I was removing everything, hopefully it catches that. After that I decided to call it quits, I took the battery up to the house and gave it a 12 hour charge on 10 amps.
