great writeup - love the humor scattered within - " or your truck will explode" - lol

oh man i think i need to do this job too.

so much oil in my engine bay and i can only assuming it's the valve cover gaskets....doesn't look fun though and i need to clear out my garage (and motor less life long project car) first

but great write up, thanks

Great information, thanks!

Awesome write up! Quick question, so you didn't have to bend the tabs for the
spark plug seals? I'm assuming it's because you froze the seals? Thanks.

Very nice detail. Well done. The mods should definately add this to the references

I just didn't have to. I don't know why people say they have to...I don't think it has to do anything with the frozen seals

I'm assuming people do it so they can use the 34mm socket as a seal driver and they need the tabs out of the way. When I do this job, I'm going to try it your way and if all else fails just bend the tabs. Thanks.

Very thorough. Well done. I also thought mtbtim's video quite informative on the subject as well.

Nice write-up.

You did go a little overboard on the FIPG though with the big long bead you put over the cam body and half moon. You only needed to put it in the 4 corners where the raised cam body makes a 90 degree corner with the flat surface of the head and then over the 4 junctures of the half moons. So, 8 small beads of FIPG per head.

I don't know if you knew about the video @infamousRNR and I did on this repair but here it is in case you or somebody else finding this thread would like to check it out.

Thank goodness for supervisors!!!
And great detailed write up

Wow man! Nice work, super appreciate the write up and detailed pictures!

Yes, I know I went overboard, the pictures in the manual showed the exact locations it needed it, but I decided I wanted more than that . . I'd rather have a little too much than not enough.

Yes, I saw your video on TW and on here, but I got impatient with how long it was and decided to make a picture writeup for those that don't have the patience to watch the video

Yeah, our videos are long but I decided when I started doing these videos with @infamousRNR that I'd rather give people too much information than not enough. I figure if people want to know how to do the job, they'll sit through a long video if it means they will have all the information they'll need to be successful doing it. And plus, there's always that handy fast forward button if somebody wants to skip something or is tired of hearing me talk.

I've personally always preferred a good video to a good write-up, because a write-up, no matter how well it was done, just can't show the level of detail a video can. It's basically comparing 2 dimensional with 3 dimensional and there's just no comparison. I use write-ups as one of my resources to research jobs Sean and I are going to do, so they are a great tool and I'm grateful to the people who took the time to put them together.

I guess you'll really hate our next videos coming out because they're even longer than the valve cover gasket repair. We've got two axle seal videos coming out soon and they're going to be around an hour each. Oh the horror!

Bookmarked for later, thanks for the write-up! The video will also be useful as well, just venturing into 4runners with an 02 SR5.

What is the torque setting for the cam plug cap? 12 ft-lb?

Yes, 12 ft-lbf or 144 in-lbf