Thanks! Good to know.
If you wanted to have the cleanest spark plugs in town, you needed new spark plugs. It seems you agreed to have the spark plugs replaced based on appearance. The small amount of deposits seen in the picture does not indicate the need for replacement.
The spark plugs were (past tense) Champion RE14PLP5 as shown in the picture, those are original equipment. Check the information on the under-hood engine label.
Those cheap Bosch spark plugs wonāt last 100,000 miles.
Your problem is not with the convenience store where you buy gasoline.
Are you saying that the plugs were previously replaced with OEM, or that those are the original plugs and they werenāt replaced? Sorry for not following.
Thatās unfortunate. Fortunately I donāt drive very much. But stillā¦
Yes, based on appearance, the mechanic gave the impression they needed to be replaced. I guess he was wrong. Thatās unfortunate. Well, at least hopefully the gaps in the new plugs will all be correct, unlike with the previous plugs.
I concur w/@Nevada_545 above, other than the cracked plug, the appearance of those plugs doesnāt look out of the ordinary for used plugs to me. The cracked and missing plug suggest the mechanic isnāt being careful enough doing the work though.
George- youāre being way too gentle, that āmechanicā is a slob.
1 Like
I donāt believe the spark plugs in the picture are 20 years old, they have been replaced before.
Air filters are sold using the same technique.
Your mechanic dropped the old spark plugs when removing them (one was never found), did he drop any of the new ones?
1 Like
The rear bank on the V6 is difficult to reach, he likely used an air ratchet to remove the spark plugs. I hope an air ratchet wasnāt used to install the new plugs.
I hope not! 
1 Like
Speaking of the mechanic being sloppy and dropping a plug and cracking a plug, as well as accidentally disconnecting the brake booster vacuum hose (different thread, posted today) ā even though he test drove the vehicle after the work, but somehow didnāt notice that the brake pedal was extremely hard to press until I brought it to his attention; and even though he told me afterwards that he had āheard a hissing soundā but didnāt know where it came from so just continued (!!) ā given his lack of care and accidentally dropping and disconnecting things, I have a question on a slightly different topic.
This morning when I put my car in reverse the car didnāt move. I pressed the accelerator and the engine revved, but the car didnāt move. I tried that a couple of times, but it didnāt move. Finally (I think, not sure) I put it back in Park and then Reverse, and then the car moved, and has been fine since. This has never happened before in the 18 years Iāve owned the car.
So what Iām wondering is: could he have accidentally done something that would have affected that, such as the linkage from the shifter to the gears, or something else?
Thanks.
It is quite easy to inadvertently disturb a vacuum hose or electrical connection in the process of doing a repair.
What Iām saying is ā is there anything that could have been accidentally disturbed or disconnected that would cause the symptoms with the gears not engaging that I described in the previous comment?
Also, yes, itās easy to to accidentally disconnect a hose. But then to hear a hissing sound and ignore it? And take the car for a test drive without any power to the brake pedal and not notice anything??
OK, others may have had different experiences but I have been doing this for over 30 years and have never Accidentally disconnected the brake booster hose, started the engine with it now revving way more than normal at idle, and much louder then before, and then drive the vehicle with much harder to apply and stop brakesā¦
Either you are completely misunderstanding what the mechanic is telling you, or you have one of the biggest idiots working on your vehicleā¦
Most of the time a baked on, from years of heat, rubber brake booster vacuum hose has a clamp on it and even with the clamp removed, still takes some force to remove itā¦
And as Nevada already pointed out, the Champion plugs are the OEās, Not those junk Bosch plugsā¦
The vacuum hose was disconnected in order to reach the spark plug in the rear bank of cylinders, failing to reconnect the hose was an oversight. Unless you witnessed him perform the road test, donāt believe the vehicle was road tested.
I am not digging up your vehicle info, what year and engine is it??
EDIT: I lookedā¦ 2003 Caravan 3.3L flex right?
Did you try putting it in drive to see if it would move forward any??
Check your ATF level in park, engine running and at full operating temp on level groundā¦
If the level is full and if it still has a delayed engagement forward or reverse, then you might have a low-reverse piston housing gasket that is shrinking and has began to leak internally due to age. common complaintā¦ It will require a Pro level Transmission specialist to fix it, not one of the people you tend to go toā¦ It is also a computer controlled transmission and a solenoid may have stuck or something, hopefully just a glitch, but if it keeps happening, well, you may not like the bill $ā¦
Sorry about that! I actually intended to include it in the new post, but forgot.
Yes, 2003 Caravan SE, 3.3L flex fluel.
OK, I just spoke with the shop manager, and I did misunderstand a little. I asked how he could have test driven it with the brake pedal almost impossible to press in. Hereās what he told me.
He told me that he did test drive it around the block, but that the hose didnāt get disconnected until after he test drove it.
Apparently, he dropped the spark plug into the engine area somewhere and he thought it heard it hit the pan at the bottom. So after he test drove it, he was reaching down into the engine area, looking for the spark plug and thatās when the hose came loose.
He never found the spark plug, and wasnāt sure if it was still in the engine pan or had rolled into the shop area somewhere while he was doing the work.
After he figured out why the brake pedal wasnāt engaging, he showed me the hose, and I asked if it was on securely now. He said yes, but he took it off and put it back on to show me, and pushed it on firmly. It was pretty easy to take off and put back on, and there was no clamp on it.
Thatās unfortunate. As I mentioned to Nevada, at least I donāt drive very much, so hopefully theyāll be OK.
Yeah, as I noted above to dave, I misunderstood when the disconnection actually happened.
Also, wanted to note that when the hose was disconnected and I started the car, I didnāt hear the engine revving way more than normal at idle. It still sounded totally quiet.
Nevada said that with the hose disconnected the engine would have been revving 1500 rpms. Not sure if thatās enough to make a difference in sound, but I definitely didnāt hear any high revving of the engine. Sounded normal to me.
OK . your vehicle is Flex Fuel so you could use E85 . It is usually cheaper but does not give the same miles per gallon as regular E10 . But no more than you drive you may save a little money .
I saw a video once where they ran two brand new engines for the equivalent of 60,000 miles ā one on regular unleaded, and the other on either E85 or straight ethanol (donāt remember which).
At the end of the test, the cylinders run with regular gasoline had carbon deposits in them, whereas the ethanol/E85-run engine was still clean.
So I actually would prefer to use E85, despite the lower MPG you get with it.
Unfortunately, itās hard to find near me, and is getting harder and harder to find. Iād have to drive 15 minutes out of my way just to fill up with E85, and I just find itās not worth it. So Iāve been using regular gas, though I used to use E85 when the places closer to me carried it.
You posted that .
Yes, I did. Not sure what your point is.