Getting the parts took about 2-3 weeks, as I was looking for decent prices and quality oil and ignition coils. I ended up getting NGK laser iridium spark plugs, as I heard they were more performant than platinum material, even though I heard it lasted a bit longer. The new ignition coil packs I got were NGK as well. I got them for a pretty good deal at walmart.com. I did not know Walmart stocked this stuff, but they do and at a fair price. I think OEM plugs are NGK, but I think the OEM coil packs are Denso. Regardless, I’ve never had issues using NGK over the years and having it pre-gapped makes life easier.

After removing the plugs from the engine, they looked pretty normal for about 100k miles. Not too much carbon build up and not running too lean or rich.

I decided to run a compression check. I wanted the peace of mind knowing the car I was driving was okay, or I was hoping it was. Photos below are cylinders #3 and #4, but overall, lowest compression I had was 160 and the highest was 178.

What the service manual recommends that the compression should be higher than 134 psi and no more than 28 psi variability between cylinders; so I think I hit a safe mark there.

Based on the numbers I got, it’s a healthy engine based on the dry compression check I ran.

Overall thoughts on car: I believe the car is solid mechanically. The engine runs fine and the compression checked made me feel better about it.

I’ll have to keep an eye out for any leaks, but nothing so far. The car was previously turbo-ed which was a concern but probably wasn’t driven to an extreme amount. The suspension needs a major overhaul as well as the brakes. More on that next.

If you’re interested in seeing a video, you can view the install and the diagnosis in my YouTube channel here.