After feeding and bathing the kids, making sure the wife was all happy and
, I hit the garage tonight at 8 PM. Im on a steroid right now for some sinus problems, and a side effect is insomnia. Sooooo, I got some stuff done.
As dumb as it sounds, Ive never bothered to gap spark plugs when swapping them in the past. Glad I decided to do that tonight, cause a few were almost closed completely... Gapped them all to .035, snugged them in their homes, then installed my new dist cap and rotor. Followed that up with running my sweet yellow plug wires, but couldnt stand the coil wire running across in bright yellow. Covered it in a black loom so its a little more... not bright yellow.
I double checked all vacuum lines, grounds, sensors, basically all connections in the engine bay. It was then that those two harnesses, one over each CC plate were staring at me. I rerouted them lower. One just under the air intake tubing, the other right along wiring on the driver's frame rail. Everything reached as far as connectors, easy peasy. I considered the hood latch cable, but its so small, I decided its ok where its at. Now both CC plates are fully accessible.
I had forgotten about my rust repair paint scratches until rerouting those harnesses... So I scuffed and touched up the passenger strut tower where I had scratched my new paint while lowering the engine in. Then I installed my clutch fan and shroud, and realized I needed a belt. I measured and quickly ran to Advance Auto for a belt before they closed, which fit like a glove and allowed me to tighten those fan/water pump pulley bolts. I was thinking of calling it a night...
I looked over and my transmission and thought, "I could bolt up the exhaust hanger and mount, and hand tighten the crossmember to it... Oh, and reinstall my clutch fork with the new throwout bearing..." And the next thing I know, my non stop energy had me bench pressing the transmission in place under the car. Its 100% in and tightened down, all the connections are hooked up, it just needs fluid.
Then I see its 11 PM and decide its time to head in for a shower, so I can lay in bed until 2 AM wide awake. Havent gotten to the shower yet, decided to let out more energy from my fingers to update the thread.
And now that youve scrolled past all that Madmike style rambling, here are pictures.
The completed bay, minus a good wash. Just stock with a tubular manifold... I will be painting my stock CC plates after the car gets aligned as well, but for now love that I rerouted those thick harnesses off them.
A sideways pic of the T5 up in place, with a non freshly painted crossmember nor exhaust hanger. Ive gotta find ways to keep
@madmike1157 awake at night with me after all. Insomnia party!!!
Not gonna lie, I kinda want to go back out and install my mini starter, but its now 11:30 PM. Probably better to shower and go do some laundry and earn some brownie points for future purchases and nights in the garage. I still need to drop the gas tank after all.
