[nate95366]

Today I picked up he parts that came in, the 3 new Autolite Iridium spark plugs, the gaskets for the upper intake manifold, and a PCV valve. I put anti seize on the plugs and installed them, along with the 3 remaining plug wires. I swabbed dielectric grease inside the plug boots, and the coil boots before attaching them. Now I'm battling the PCV valve. It doesen't want to come out. I watched a couple of Youtube videos, but no one had an effective way to remove it. It seems the rubber it seats into hardens up, and it's hard to get enough leverage to pull it up and out. I'm thinking of heating the area up with my heat gun, and see how that works. It is pretty cold now, but it's supposed to be around 40F tomorrow.

It's a real pain in the neck to get out for sure. I put a small break in the part of my valve cover that the PCV valve goes into when I was taking my PCV valve out a couple years ago. I was using vice grips and a wood block for leverage. Not sure I'd recommend the same for you because my work resulted in broken plastic... Fortunately, it wasn't bad enough to cause the new PCV valve any trouble when seating it. The rubber O-ring on the old PCV valve was petrified solid, though, which is what made it so difficult to remove. You need lots of leverage, but at the same time a) you can't really press against a plastic valve cover too much and b) it's difficult to grab the old PCV valve tightly enough.

The heat sounds like an interesting idea that may work - I would also wonder if there is something out there that soaks in like penetrating oil but makes rubber parts (like O-rings) softer? If there was something like that, I would spray it around the PCV valve, turn/twist the PCV valve in its socket a little, and let it "soak" before hitting it with the heat and leverage.