Awesome write-up! Say, if you did not use a feeler gauge to gap the plugs how did you check the correct 0.700mm gap? Are they pre-gapped out of the box? Plus, only two bloody knuckles, I am used to at least 6 knuckle busters and a few sutures when my hands are under the hood of cars! Compared to the Cayman this looks doable!

 

Plugs are pre-gapped. You can do a visual check, just to verify they're close. It's pretty obvious if it's way too big or small.

There's quite a bit of room which makes it easier. And not too many sharp corners to catch a knuckle on .

 

Really nice, thanks!

From my experience, I always add a *small* dab if anti seize, even though many folks say not to. You don't want a seized plug in an alloy head. Also, you hardly need any torque on plugs. Some racers hand tighten only. They won't loosen. I usually do roughly 8-10 ft-lb and never had a problem - even on big cam, rough running motors.

 

Pops used to say "just snug'm up."

 

Yeah, I thought about changing the spark plugs myself but I couldn't find them in the glove box so I gave up.

What ?


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Yeah, I thought about changing the spark plugs myself but I couldn't find them in the glove box so I gave up.

What ?


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Glove box? Put your gloves on and open the box
@TripleZ, awesome write-up! This thread should be sticky, @grim

 

Great summary and does not look too difficult. I think I am going to take my Turbo into my local shop where my mechanic and I can follow these instructions which will allow me to do the first set with some pro help. I figure 2 hours labor or about $150.00 bucks plus the plug set from Suncoast at $111.00.

About 50% of the dealer cost as I was quoted $550.00 today at the service department.


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@TripleZ, getting ready to order plugs for my 2015 Macan Turbo. Suncoast says these are correct but they don't seem to match the part numbers you posted.

https://www.suncoastparts.com/product/6X99917023390.html

Thanks

 

Looking at this again, on the Suncoast site, after the 6X, the rest of the part number matches the Porsche part number you posted. Sorry for any confusion.

 

thanks for posting this DIY, it was very helpful today when i changed out my spark plugs!

 

Thanks for posting, @TripleZ

 

OK, just finished changing the spark plugs and air filters on my 2015 Macan Turbo. First, a big thank you to TripleZ, the documentation was great and very helpful and gave me the courage to tackle this one all alone. I will add a few things that seemed to help me complete the job with zero problems.

First, I took it slow and was open hood to test drive in 2 hours flat. And that included taking a call from my landscaper and also a drink and bathroom break. I ordered my parts from Suncoast and paid $111.00 for the six plugs + $49.00 for the two air filters and $15.15 shipping (no tax). While it seems that Porsche recommends replacing air filters at 80,000 miles, given that I was removing them for my 30,000 maintenance, it made sense to change them now.

Perhaps my tools are a bit different from Triple Z's, but I used the following:

T-20 for the air cleaner removal.
T-30 for the coil packs and also the coolant reservoir fasteners.
T-50 for the engine arm on the Torx side plus a 16mm box wrench.
E-10 (female Torx) for the wiring harness.
3/8 ratchet with 6", 10" and 12" extensions.

First, I did the work with the engine STONE COLD. I did a lot of reading and it does not seem worth the risk to remove plugs from a warm or hot aluminum head! Make your own decisions, but this worked flawlessly for me.

The hardest part was getting the wiring harness off the coil packs. What really seemed to help me was to first remove the coil pack fasteners which provided some additional play. Then, using an empty tipped nut driver, I gently pushed down on the ribbed clip while pulling the harness down and off with my fingers. Of course the one under the coolant tank was a bit of a challenge, but nothing that can't be done by taking it easy. As expected, the coil packs needed some twisting and pulling to break the vacuum type seal, but not a problem. Most all of my plugs came out easy except for two on the driver's side. I worked them slowly out, and if they began to bind, I turned them back in a couple of turns and then back out again being careful to keep the socket and extension straight for a smooth extraction while walking them out. When installing the new plugs, I gently inserted the plug (being careful not to tap the pre-gap electrode) by hand, turned a couple of turns backwards, the slowly started to thread. A trick that I used was to wrap a piece of blue painters masking tape around my bottom extension just before removing the first plug to mark the spot where the plug bottomed out. This made it easy to gauge how much more hand turning I had to do before the final snug-up. I did not use anti-seize as Porsche does not recommend it.

For the coolant reservoir I unsnaped the top wiring harness to give my wife some extra play to move the tank out of the way for replacement of the last plug. I did the passenger side first and finished on the driver's side, with the most difficult plug saved for last. The plugs did not look too bad, but they are done and I am good for another 30,000 miles. And, it felt really good to save $600.00 bucks and do it myself!

Attached are some pics of the removed plug and the old air filter at 30,000 miles.

 

Just changed our plugs yesterday. It's so nice when old married couples can still wrench together. The one thing I did differently was on removing the connectors from the coil packs. I had a hard time getting enough force with my fingers to undo the snap so I pushed down on the snap lever with a long thin screw driver. This opened the snap and pushed the connector down and out at the same time. I didn't think of disconnecting the top wire harness to make moving the coolant reservoir out of the way easier. Something to remember next time. Thanks very much to the OP for the fine writ-up.

 

Official torques from WM (2015 Turbo):
- spark plug, new - 25 Nm (tolerance +1.5 Nm), don't use lubricant
- spark plug, re-used - 31.5 Nm (tolerance +1.5 Nm), don't use lubricant
- fastening screw for ignition coil - 10Nm
- fastening screw for coolant reservoir - 5 Nm
- torque support pan-head aluminum screw - 20Nm + 180degrees - new screws must be used

Electrode gap - 0.8mm +/-0.05mm

 

@grim, could you add this list of torques to the original post. - Thanks

 

when changing out the spark plugs, the dealer insisted on having the coil packs replaced as well, hence the quoted price I was given for the job was crazy high, just less than $1,000 Cdn. I asked why the coil packs need to be changed out as well, dealer replied back saying that's the proper servicing protocol when doing the spark plugs.

I then talked to my independent mechanic and he said if there are no issues with the coil packs, then it is really not needed to be changed out. My mechanic quoted me $250 Cdn for just the spark plugs part and labor for 1 hr charge.

So, for those expert out there, is it necessary to change out the coil packs for doing spark plugs replacement ?

 

You don't need to change the coil packs. You probably don't even need to change the spark plugs. This is just more Porsche service rip-off BS. Pretty much every other car on the road, including many many turbos, has a 100k plug service interval, and recommends changing the coils only if and when they fail. For context, my last car, a BMW twin-turbo N54, went 100k before changing plugs (the recommended interval), and BTW the plugs were clean and not eroded when I did change them.

 

thanks for your comment.

I trust my indep mechanic opinion more so now. I ask in this thread because I had couple of misfire in the last month or so and that prompts me to look into changing out the spark plugs. Right now, I am at 37,000 miles (or 60,000km).

 

FWIW, sometimes misfires are caused by a faulty ignition coil. In my 2000 Jaguar XJ8 I have had brief periods of rough running lasting 5 seconds. Checking with OBD-2 it tells me misfire in cyl # "x" & then I replace that ignition coil & problem solved.

 

I wonder whether the spark plug life has any relationship with how hard the car is driven.

On my Macan, I can see the boost gauge showing more boost during hard driving.

 

I just completed this job on my 2015 Macan S at 36000 miles. Thanks for the great write up including list of tools.
Since I typically work alone on car maintenance projects, I added a couple more steps to get the coolant reservoir completely out of the way.
There is a small sensor below and to the left of the reservoir (circled below) that I removed from the bracket. It shares the wiring harness with the coils so i wanted to have it loose to give more room to move those wires around. I also removed the electrical connection to the reservoir and disconnected the small return hose at the top of the reservoir using the quick disconnect (circled). Have a towel ready to catch a small amount of water from the line. With these removed the entire reservoir can be moved to the left and allowed to rest on top of the motor. You will need to guide the bottom hose on the reservoir up around the harness. Sorry I didn't get a picture of this. This made it very easy to do the rear plug on the drivers side. After reconnecting everything, run the engine up to operating temp, then open the burp valve (arrow) (by pulling the metal clip up so it points out away from the valve) for a minute to remove any air that was introduced when disconnecting the hose from the reservoir.

 

I changed mine at 30,000 miles and posted my before pics. They needed to go.


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62,000 miles - warranty gone - replaced plugs today
$51 - bosch plugs of ebay
time 2 hours

top tip - when I was at the dealer I asked about spark plugs/lube, etc - the lead tech said a little baby power maybe at most.
Well they did my plugs last time and the coils came off like butta.

 

I changed mine at 30,000. It took about 1.5 hours, and only one skinned knuckle. When I pulled off the plastic engine cover, I found rat turds and a couple of chewed wires. Had to tape up the insulation with electrical tape. Those are the hazards of living in a rural area next to a neighbor with chickens. (I guess it could be a city hazard as well..,)

 

A great write up. There were a few comments about coil packs. Generally as stated they are either good or not good. However on an Audi A5 I had the car ran fine to me. Audi had a coil recall and the difference in idle and performance was noticeable. So perhaps at 80K it might be worth it to change them.
Now from experience I will say change your plugs at no longer than 60K. The big issue is the steel spark plug and aluminum head will create some galvanic corrosion. Plugs will seize in the head and when trying to remove the threads will come out with the plug. $$$$$$. Remove head , replace or helicoil.
Change them , cheap insurance.

 

Great write up, I am hoping to do this soon. However is there any way we could get the pics from the original post back up? They are saying some photo bucket error message.

Thanks

 

Not likely soon. Photobucket changed their terms of service and I'm unwilling to pay $400 a year to reestablish the 3rd party hosting links. I have to rebuild each of my posts manually with a different hosting service. Its taking time.

 

Any update on reposting the pix. Would be a great help. Thanks

 

I changed out my plugs today and noticed something. The part number stamped on the new plugs matched the Porsche part number stamped on the old plug. I also noticed that there was another 3 digit number stamped on each plug. For example 458. The new plugs had one number and the old plugs had another number. I called my local Porsche dealership and they checked another new set of plugs and they had a different 3 digit number. I wonder if those numbers refers to different lots? Anyone else see this? Also, my old plugs appeared to be gapped at ~ 0.7 mm. Anyone else check this out? Thanks to everyone who posted. Very helpful. I too used baby powder on the coils. One last thing .. you can replace the plug on the passenger side (last plug closet to the firewall) without removing the torque support.

 

plug change

Thanks tripleZ. Did my first plug change this morning and it took a bob seger and 3/4 of a Steppenwolf cd. The writeup was perfect. It was actually much easier than on my boxster. As I expected the plugs I took out were still perfect.

 

I’ll add to this that these are great instructions even without the pictures. I have very little to add. My 9 year old and I did this in under 2 hours.

I like to blow all the dirt off the area around the coils before I get started just to be sure not to get anything falling into the engine.

The one hard plug to do is made easier with the right extension. I used this set from HF. The longest made it so the socket wrench was above the fender. Easy! https://www.harborfreight.com/4-Pc-38-in-Drive-Quick-Release-Extension-Bar-Set-67976.html I did pop the coolant tank up over the valve cover and it just held itself there out of the way.

Be careful with the coil pack on the hard one. You don’t want the screw to fall out and I can see where someone might damage the wire case trying to snake it down to the plug. Just be aware, nothing big to worry about.

Air filters.... comically easy. Anyone with 2 hands should be able to get this done. Maybe a good way to get into wrenching if you’re interested.

My impression of the plugs at 38,000 miles: actually about time for a change. I can tell where they are eroding, but still looked fine. I’m 100% sure with the coils and such Porsche runs the system could compensate for another 60,000 miles, but I swear it idles better now. I bet the new plugs added 20 hp...kidding, just kidding.

Just my 2 cents on the project.