[s-cars] check your spark plugs often!

[matt ludwig]

hello all,

i will just start off by saying this:

"CHECK, CHECK, CHECK AND THE RE-CHECK YOUR SPARK PLUGS FOR PROPER
TORQUE."

on a long weekend trip up to maine this past weekend w/ the avant, we
had a slight, um, issue.

car ran great, no issues, saw several urS4/6's is conn., got stuck in
traffic, nothing more to talk about. start it up the next morning to go
to the beach and about a mile down the road, smoke out the back, loss
of compression, hesitation. oh no.
pull over, pop hood, see moisture/oil against black cover on firewall
and oil sitting on outside of #2 exhaust port. oooooooh boy.

take the car to a local shop in conway, nh and have it diagnosed. take
off the coil pack cover and find the #2 coil pack has exploded in a
million pieces and all 5 spark plug valley's are full of oil. end
result: all 5 plugs are loose and #2 blew out of the head taking the
threads w/ it, shattering the coil pack. had all coil packs, plugs and
valve cover gasket replaced and #2 plug bore helix-a-coil installed.

car has been driven back and runs like a champ. pulls super hard and
runs just fantastic. my bad luck was put in the hands of and completed
beyond my greatest hopes by the outstanding guys at Covered Bridge
Motor Works (http://www.cbmwnh.com)  in Conway, NH. if any lister is in
the area, this is by far the most professional, clean, knowledgeable
repair facility i have ever witnessed and they tune german cars daily
like many of us could only dream. they have cars shipped to them from
all over the NE and US to be worked on. there is a local customer's
beautiful red '94 urS4 there that is highly modded all around and a
whole slew of assorted BMW vintages and models in rare,
high-on-fun-meter stages.

again, i cannot stress enough to those out there not checking there
spark plugs, check, check, and re-check them for proper tightness. i
had checked mine very often but obviously not enough. cost me a bunch
to get back to right, but my avant now runs superb.

whoops, probably shouldn't have said that. we all know what "AG" stands
for.

sincerely,

matt ludwig.