The single hardest part of replacing valve stem seals is reseating the exhaust valve keepers. The intake side is no picnic, but the exhaust side could be used as a CIA "enhanced interrogation technique". So I thought I'd share my strategy for installing exhaust valve keepers here. Once I had it down, the exhaust valve keepers weren't any harder than the intake valve keepers. Still not a fast job, but not infuriating either. A few hours and all five cylinders will be done.
The trick here is to install one keeper on the rear side of the valve, rotate it up to the front side, and then install the second one on the rear side as well. (I use the terms "front" and "rear" to correspond to the direction of the vehicle, so the front side of the valve is the half closer to the grille and the rear is the half closer to the muffler.) The keeper wants to fall to that side of the valve owing to the angle of the engine, so you just have to work with that. It's nearly impossible to finely manipulate a part in there and get it to stick to the front side of the valve.
After applying a liberal blob of assembly lube (Permatex Ultra Slick), the best way I found to get a keeper into the area of interest was with a gooseneck pickup tool. But that would only let me drop it sort of generally into the cylinder of the spring compressor; upon releasing the keeper from the pickup tool, the keeper would fall more or less randomly. So I used a pick to manipulate the keeper onto the rear half of the valve, where it stuck, thanks to the assembly lube. It stuck well enough that I could use the pick to slide the keeper to the front half of the valve without it falling off. Once on the front side, it was a matter of repeating the preceding steps to get the second keeper installed.
If you're struggling with exhaust valve keepers, give this method a shot. I spent much less time yelling at tiny bits of metal after developing a strategy. And there are probably other ways to handle this. The most important thing to remember is really that you need a strategy. There is no way to brute-force the keepers into place. Try new methods and tools until you find something that works consistently for you. Once I had a strategy, it was just a matter of sweat and podcasts before the job was done.
Hope this helps someone!
