I am at half-time (driver side finished) on my spark plug replacement and thought I would come into the house and do a little write-up of my own...

I took a look at the YouTube video and found it to be both positive and negative for me. I have the following notes:

1. I have read other reports that it will only take half-hour to do the whole job. So far I have about an hour and 15 in.
2. I don't know why there are star head bolts on the engine - other then to say to amateurs - keep out. When I first saw that I would need a star head socket, I could not think of where in the world I would find one... Looking at the video, I saw that the filmmaker used a normal 5mm socket so I went with that. I put very little pressure on the wrench and was prepared to abandon the job if I felt any deformation of the head.
3. Unsnapping the coil connector cover is not simple. It has a lot of resistance. And being timid about wrecking anything on the engine doesn't make it any easier. But I finally put enough force on the cap for it to spring loose. The others were just as difficult, but by then I had more confidence I was not going to break anything.
4. I tried using a spark plug socket with a rubber insert - it was fine for getting the plug out, but when putting it back in the rubber caused the socket to remain stuck on the plug. I was able to fish it out with long needle nose pliers I have laying around. A magnet would not have had the strength - so I recommend NOT using a spark plug socket with a rubber insert. Instead, get one with a magnetic insert.
5. In the video, the filmmaker had difficulty removing the 2nd and 3rd coils and started removing nearby parts to get clearance. I had no such problem. I just had to rotate the coils until they found clearance.
6. There was no way my torque wrench was going to get enough clearance so I snugged them all down without using any gorilla strength.

Well, back to the garage.

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2006 X5 Sport 4.4i