While doing routine spark plug replacement on 1996 C280 yesterday, I managed to damage either the wire, insulation or connector which attaches the wiring harness to the coil pack on the #4 cylinder. I'm hoping someone can tell me what to do next.

Background: car has 285,000 miles and was running fine with what I believe are all of the original coil packs, spark plug wires and connectors, and wiring harness. I am aware that some people routinely replace connectors to the three spark plugs under the coil packs. The insulation on visible wires at the thermostat looks fine. I installed the genuine MB Plugs.

After replacement I quickly determined that plugs 3 and 4 weren't firing, though there was no CEL. Since plug 3 is fed by the coil on plug 4 I focused in on the wiring feeding the coil pack, since I could see some copper through the insulation about an inch away from the connector. When I pull the wires out of their trough, the car runs fine. I unwrapped the fabric insulation (which was deteriorated) around the wire , and found two separate stranded copper conductors going to the connector. I tried to wrap each conductor separately with electrical tape up to the connector, but the car doesn't want to run when the wires are tucked back into place.

I have glanced through some of the posts about "waste spark" systems, but I really don't know how these things work. I am assuming that neither of the wires should come into contact with ground, but are they supposed to be touching each other? Are they connected together at the connector? I can see copper through the back of the connector, so it is possible that something isn't right in there, and that something moves when I rotate the connector on the coil pack to put the wires where they belong.

Fastlane sells the connectors individually (W0133-1634589) for a few dollars. Would they just crimp on to the end of the wire? Should I be unravelling these wires to some point away from the engine and replacing them somehow? I believe that these wires are part of the expensive engine wiring harness, which I don't want to replace, as I have no other problems.

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1996 C280 289K Traded
1997 E420 167K Traded
2001 S430 240K Traded
2010 E550 4matic 80K
2000 GMC Jimmy 198K Gone to Boneyard
2003 Camry LE 196K
2011 Mazda3 i Sport 31K