Been a good long while since I've updated this thread, but that's because it's been just as long since I've even touched my 3. Health issues, life stuff, etc. kind of get in the way, I reckon.
That said, however, I've started working on it again over the last few days. New battery and oil change, then today I broke into the engine to check and see if the car had the HPFP upgrade done and to replace the plugs. Well when I pulled the plugs the middle two were rusted to no end. They came out just fine, which turns out may be a bad thing. Looking down through their holes I can see there is definitely rust inside the cylinders as well. I drove the car from where it's been sitting up into my driveway to work on it today, so it surprisingly still runs exactly as it did when I parked it around the time I made my first post.
I got the intake, battery, ECU, intercooler, and harness out of the way to pop the valve cover off and inspect further, but that thing is absolutely stuck. On the rear side I can see what appears to be some kind of make-it-yourself gasket squished out. I am assuming that is serving as an adhesive at this point and not letting the cover go. Before I start cranking on it to pry it free I wanted to see if anybody could tell me if there were any non-obvious points where the cover is attached. I hit all the screws on the perimeter of the cover, and the few in the center. There shouldn't be anything beyond those, right?
Also I wanted to get opinions on how screwed everybody thinks I am here. I'll see if I can get the picture attached so y'all can see what I'm talking about. The plugs are a rusted mess, and that carries over to the threads and holes they sit in. Hopefully the picture comes through well enough that you can see them.
