Well...last week the rear seemed to be riding a bit low. So last Friday I went into work a couple hours early so I could take off early and visit the hobby shop to check the shocks out. Found a couple teeny-tiny air leaks at connections, fixed them, then did a soap bubble check to be sure there weren't any afterwards. Easy-peasy.
Decided that then was a good time to change the plugs and wires, since I'm at 195,000 miles and still on the factory originals. Having the car on a lift sure makes access from underneath a heck of a lot easier.
Heh...I said "easier"!
I could get to the plugs and wires on the back of the engine from underneath the car, but dang if I had enough room to get the leverage to twist/pull the wires off the plugs. After ripping one wire out of the boot, I was committed, regardless. With a little creative engineering (vice grips, long pry bar) and a little creative vocalization, I got it done, finally. Managed to clamp my right forefinger in the handle of the vicegrips, which was really exciting as I frantically worked to figure out how to snap the handles back open while they were firmly clamped on a plug boot with no room to get my other hand up there.
Minor bruising under that fingernail, and several scrapes of skin left in various places, plus about two frickin' hours and I was done.
Six plugs, plus wires...that's it. No points, no condenser, no distributer cap, no timing adjustments. Two frickin' hours! It took me less time to do a tune up on the old cars with points and condensers than it takes now, all because of how much of a pain in the keister those three back plugs are to get to.
Good news is the inspection of the old plugs don't show anything bad happening in the engine, even with almost 200,000 miles on them.
Picture of my right arm today, three days later. Looks better than it did Saturday, and not as bad as some other automotive adventures I've had in the past.