how much of a pain was doing the seals yourself?

 

Not bad at all. Borrowed a valve spring compressor from the parts store, used large vice grips to gently clamp the old seals and spin them off. Then used an appropriately sized socket to tap the new ones on.

 

I did the port and polish on my heads. The polish is probably only a minor help, but the port job definitely wakes her up. Port match to the gaskets on both the heads and the intake manifold.

You have to remember, these heads were designed for a 3.5L engine and they're on a 4.0 or 4.6L, so they're obviously going to be a little bottle necked.

 

Thanks guy. I'll look into port matching the intake and heads if time allows. I'm placing my order for the timing chain set and water pump now. Anything else? is the oil pump worth it at my mileage (77$) ?

 

Oil pump is worth it every single time you take off the front cover. These engines love to eat oil pumps