[Engine] Fuel smell in cab and engine knock

[bertimbo]

I'm new here so hope this in the right place.
I noticed a knocking noise coming from the top end of the engine. Its a 1.4 petrol. I had a good listen around but couldn't pin point where it was coming from, so I thought it may be tappets, or fuel injectors. I checked the tappets and couldn't find a problem. This has been going on for months, and as it wasn't affecting how the car drove, I put it down to old age. Anyway, last October on the way back home on the motorway my Wife said she could smell petrol fumes in the cab, and I noticed it too. So I had a look around on this forum and other places, where the general consensus appeared to be injector seals.
I know I should have dealt with a fuel smell a bit quicker, but time has flown by, and it wasn't that bad.
 After lots of sniffing and searching under the bonnet I couldn't see any problems, but ordered some new seals, and today with a decent weather window and my haynes manual decided to change them.
I was a little bit concerned about disconnecting the battery, as I had read a lot of horror stories about the ecu, but did it anyway. Took off the air box, throttle body and the coil pack to get at the fuel rail. I noticed a lot of soot on a couple of the sparkplug HT shrouds. I wondered if the plugs were loose, and indeed they were, 3 out of the 4 were not tightened correctly, one very loose.
I removed and checked them all, put them in and tightened them up properly. I decided the injectors could wait for another day, as I thought I had found the problem.
 Putting the coil pack back on was a bit strange as there didn't seem to be a positive seating, so fiddled about with this for a bit, but have found that after putting the bolts back in its all seated correctly. Put it all back together and now it is all fixed. Connected the battery negative back on, and its all still working - phew.
Both faults have now gone, no fuel smell and no knocking noise. 
I didn't even consider spark plugs, so there you go. Hope this saves someone a bit of head scratching.

[Tomcat3]

Hi Bertimbo welcome to the forum. The injector seal problem you have probably read about concerns the 1.6hdi diesel engine not yours. It sounds like you have sorted both your problems so good luck and you are correct its not until you bolt down the coil pack that it feels like the caps are on the plugs correctly.

[bertimbo]

Thanks Tomcat3, good to know I may not have to have a go at the injector seals any time soon, and its great to not have to be smelling fuel all the time ! Cheers.