New Corvette owner and not at all an experienced wrench turner, but can do very basic things. Have been reading the forum since purchasing my '78 and see there are many extremely knowledgable people here so I thought I would join the club and contribute where I can but mostly learn from the pros.
Had a power steering pressure line spring a leak last Friday so I check the forum. Got some really good suggestions-cracking open the doors and loosing the T-Tops when raising up the car for one. Discovered that the smaller the hands the better when working on the car as you all know there is not a lot of room to do the work. Hose coming off, 10 minutes. Hose going back on several hours but was eventually successful and we are back up and running.
Since my car only has 25k miles and the previous owner did a lot of work before I got it, the car really does not need much but I want to do a basic tune up to have a bench mark for repairs/maintenance moving forward so I wanted to do a tune up. Basic stuff like oil, filter, plugs, wires, cap, rotor, PCV, fuel filter etc. The oil and filter change looks the easiest, everything is very accessible. I'm waiting to get my ZDDP, should be in the mailbox today so I can get that done and one thing out of the way.
Been reading some threads on changing out the plugs and wires and seems like a project. Read where some of the plugs should be taken off from the bottom and some from the top. Also read that properly running the wires is rather a pain. So I come to the experts for some advice. Hopefully all the suggestions won't be to take it to a corvette shop and have them do it as money is also a factor being married with children. ;-)
Do I have to remove the two heat shields near the manifold? Any and all suggestions/recommendation are welcome and appreciated. Please keep in mind I am a novice so if you get too technical, I will become "dazed and confused".
I will thank everyone in advance as I know i will get a lot of very good advise.

 

Going to tackle the plugs and wires this week-end and if all goes well the coolant change as well. Wondering if anyone is in the Houston, Texas/Pearland, Texas area that would like to provide hands on support and advise. Thanks in advance.

 

Sorry I'm in San Antonio but will give you some advice anyway. Do one spark plug wire at a time so you don't get firing order messed up

 

Plugs and wires are close to next in my list and the wires don't look fun!

 

wires are easy as long as you do one at a time. After you get used to the firing order concept it's a whole lot easier but I still do one at a time.

 

Having the car up on jackstands or ramps makes life easier. Some plugs can only be gotten from underneath. I mark my cap with the 1-8-2 plug positions. Remember, #1 plug is on the Driver side at the front. 1-3-5-7 are on the Driver side. #2 plug is on the passenger side at the front. 2-4-6-8 are on the passemger side. Firing order is 1-8-4-3-6-5-7-2. If you marked your cap you should be good but at least one time in your time playing with cars you will check everything twice and the third time find you have two wires switched

 

Thanks to everyone for the help. Being a novice "wrench turner" I always do one plug/wire at a time. And you are absolutely right in that after checking several times, you can still have wires crossed. Going to see if I can finish up this part of the project Saturday as I want to go cruising with the tops off in this 80 degree weather.

 

Bring a camera....take some photos of your car in different locations!

Then begin Phase 2...............learning how to post the pictures in this thread.

 

Thank you to everyone's advise and suggestions, tune up is complete. Roughly 10 hours for the plugs and wires. That includes taking off all the heat shields and conduits and of course putting them back on. They were more of a pain than the plugs and wires. Hope not to have to do that agin for a while. One last thing is the coolant change. Any recommendations on anti-freeze to use? Thanks again to everyone and I will get a few pics of my week-end mistress on here to share.

 

I just put peak in mine, have no complaints about it. I've read that you should used distilled water and not regular tap water so i bought two gallons of that too, eneded up getting one more gallon to top things off so all in all I used 2 gallons of peak and just a tad over 2 gallons of distilled water.

 

Distilled water is $0.88 a gallon at wally world. Cheaper than buying city water.

 

yeah it surprised me how cheap distilled water was

 

Since you've already done the plugs and wires, my suggestions are an oil & filter change (assuming you haven't already done so) other cheap an easy things are the pcv valve, air filter (and crank case vent filter whatever its called that's inside the air cleaner as well) check/replace your vacuum lines under the hood, and replacing your fuel filter. A little more complex tune up jobs would be to rebuild your distributor (the kits are cheap enough and easy enough to do) and replace your t-stat and flush your coolant. If you're feeling daring (depending on your technical skill) I haven't ever purchased a carbureted car that didn't need the carb rebuilt.

 

Thanks Hideki, also did the oil and filter change, air filter, PVC valve, gss filter, cap and rotor. With 25k+ miles and no major issues, I don't feel it necessary to mess with the carb or dist. Car was running great, coming back from a vette show and began to run rough off the start. Checked all the plug wires to make sure none had come loose. The Delco wires have a good clip and stay on well. It seemed like something simple like a vacuum line. Found a small one off under the air cover, a little worn so I replaced it and not much difference. Replaced the distributor vacuum advance yesterday and it is much better but still not exactly right. Going to check the vacuum lines but without a gage/tester it may be a challenge. Don't really want to start replacing all the vacuum lines without at least narrowing the small problem down. Any suggestions from the group as welcome. Thanks again.

 

I'd suggest getting the Factory Service Manual for your car. The FSM is a 'gotta have' item if you're working on a C3 Corvette. For certain years, like 1975 and 1976, they didn't issue a complete manual, but only released supplements to the 1974 manual. Not sure about 1978 though, so somebody feel free to chime in, if you know.

 

To check for vacuum leaks I always just take a length of vacuum hose one end in my ear and the other end I poke around the suspect hoses. You'll hear loud and clear if you find a leak.

 

Thanks Higeki, I'll give that a try this week-end.