So I rebuilt the engine and in the process I could not get the clip for the afm off so I undid the screws well to my surprise and bunch of wires popped out. Has anyone made this mistake and write ups with pictures on what to do?

 

Well you pull the cover off the top and hope the circuit board traces didn't lift off the ceramic circuit board and solder the connector back in place, if it lifted the traces you might be able to redrill and solder jumper wires in place.

Yes your not the first one to remove the screws and try to pull the plug, lots of pictures here search with Google, fwiw these are the same style clips used elsewhere in the engine harness put a small screwdriver under the open end of the c shaped clip and pry it out of the keeper you might need to do both sides and becareful it doesn't fly off into the aether..

 

He may be referring to something like these:




A little more searching here will probably lead you to a picture of what happens when you remove those screws. But you already know that; it's not pretty.

Feel free to post your own pictures; you might save someone else/

 

If you can solder, it's not so hard to fix unless you completely ripped it out. Just remove the plastic cover on top and re-solder the rod wires that broke off. Use an ohm meter to confirm your soldering is sound and also making sure neighboring contacts aren't soldered to yours and then test VAFM doing these steps: http://web.archive.org/web/201209071...33volumeai.pdf. When I "messed up", it was just 2 re-solders. But I didn't pull it completely apart after I realized what I'd just done.

 

Those two phillips head screws are prime real estate for rivets!