1. Park vehicle with wheel turned right.
Yes, but I was able to turn mine when the car was lifted (had a car on 2 stands).
2. Remove wheel and plastic wheelwell liner.
Correct
2.5 Remove the electrical fan to have enough room to work with an alternator
Take a picture of all metal and plastic clamps for all wires and hoses
3. Remove serpentine belt.
Correct, label the belt orientation
4. Remove alternator (was this done from above in the engine bay or from the wheelwell?)
Correct, done from above with MAIN radiator covered as you don't want to damage that fragile part. Alterator is very heavy.
- Undo all hose clamps and move all lines away.
- Remove the serpantine tensioner (will give you more room to work).
- Remove the belt pulley from the alternator (it's a must, the last boly is right under).
- Undo and remove 3 long bolts on the alternator
- Push the unit a bit down, twist a touch and slowly pull forward.
- When cables are accessible undo the electrical cables on its back. Some youtube videos are telling to remove the cables first (before pulling the alternator), but it's not about E70.
Before alternator re-installation make sure you tighten the nut (on the engine block itself) that guides the top alternator bolt, in my case it was yellowish. The outer thread on that nut is
left-threaded (opposite from normal). This will save you a lot of time when you'll try to align that beast during re-installation.
5. Remove oil cooler lines from thermostat (do this while thermostat is still bolted to engine?)
No, I removed mine when the thermostat was out as there is one extra bolt to undo. Make sure you unplug the metal cooler lines from the radiator rubber lines first. And of course lines were bolted back to thermostat before the installation.
Find a good thermostat picture to see the bolts location.
Most manuals are showing only 2 bolts, which is wrong in our case! Better find an actual product picture.
6. Remove the 2 accessible thermostat bolts from the wheelwell.
Correct, with several socket bar extensions, when the wheel is turned right, top left and bottom left bolts are accessible (both different T or E socket sizes.).
7. Remove the last bolt (from above in the engine bay?)
Correct. From above. Squeeze your hand inbetween all those hydraulic and coolant lines. Buy or "rent" a tiny camera in Home Depot to see what you're doing, have enough light. No rush, take your time, all is aluminum and fragile!!!
Am I missing anything? Also, when you talk about protecting the radiator, do you mean the oil cooler radiator or the main coolant radiator? Thank you!
Cover the main coolant radiator. You'll do a lot of hardwork from the engine bay.
I wiped everything I could. Make sure nothing gets into the thermostat opening when the unit is out as it's actually the engine.