Got it done. Too busy wrestling and bruising my hand trying to get to it, to take any useful pictures. The sender is on the block deck, astern of the intake manifold and just to the driver's side of the centerline. About 9-10" of various extensions and adapters atop to tall sensor socket to get to a level where I could get a breaker bar into play, swinging above the top level of the intake manifold obstructions.
Even after pulling the fuel line, pivoting the EGR live etc, I still have a VERY difficult time gaining access. My hands are Large / XLarge, not very big, but had to contort and jam quite a bit to get in there. And even worse after installing the new sender and trying to plug in and snap down the electrical harness to it. Had to blind-feel the location of the tooth the clip snaps over - different clock position on the new sender vs the old - and at the end I was just barely able to get the electrical connection loosely in place and then just reach it with fingertips to seat it until I got the click of the connector snapping into place. Was about to give up and draft the missus to use her smaller hands and was in fact describing the procedure to her when I managed to accomplish it. Last gasp.
Definitely recommend doing this while the intake manifold is off. It's literally completely in the open then.
I put some teflon tape on the sender threads - it's a large diameter coarse thread, which made it fairly easy to thread back into its hole via socket and extension and by feel.
I also threw a couple layers of wrap on the nut / body of the sender itself, to give it a snug fit in the socket. So as to not drop the sender as I tried to maneuver it into place. And the sender socket is very deep, twice as deep as the sender itself. So wedging it in with tape was a good way to retain it and keep it from driving up into the socket, so some down force could be made while trying to thread it back in.
After 30mins of struggling to get the new sender mounted, it literally only took 2mins to re-couple everything else and fire the vehicle to see a proper ~48psi reading on the gauge. Where before it was pegged at 80psi. That's the typical failure mode of the this sender.
This picture is sort of oriented upside down, given how you have to approach the part. But it was the best picture I had.
here's the old sensor, about 150% of life size
I would encourage any do it yourselfers who are changing their intake manifold gaskets to make this a target of opportunity. ~$30 shipped form rockauto, ridiculously easy to replace while the manifold is out.
37.539 (holy carp)
