(1987 F150, 5.0, 302, XLT Lariat, automatic)
I bought my truck about a year ago and have been working on it and learning how to do mechanical work on vehicles. Attached are some pictures of something that has me stumped. A few people I've asked in person if they knew what it is haven't known. It looks like a pipe or intake opening of some kind. You can see in the pictures that some sort of tape or wrap was around it, and there was a metal clamp around that (I have removed that clamp). It is on the driver side. I have taken a few pictures to show the perspective of its location and of the part itself. Each photo has a green arrow and/ or circle to show the part. Thank you for any answers or ideas you can come up with

The arrow points to the part in question. Taken from the front of the truck to show the location




Side view

 

Do you see any pictures in your post? I don't. Click this & read the first page:
http://www.supermotors.net/forums/th...-and-or-videos

Try looking at this & the NEXT dozen pics:


(phone app link)

 

There are 4 pictures that I posted showing

 

It almost looks like someone was trying to fab up some sort of really ghetto turbo setup off of the stock manifold....or some type of re-location of an EGR valve or something similar. That's my best guess.

 

It might have been my crappy ISP (Hughes/DirectTV) - I see the pics now.

That's the heat riser for the carb air intake. This diagram shows an I6, but the function is the same:


(phone app link)

 

My truck is fuel injected, so it doesn't have a carburetor. Does it work in a similar fashion as a carb heat riser? (I'm not familiar with carbureted engines)

 

My first guess would be that the long block was replaced with an older one, including its exhaust manifolds & heat shield. But then I noticed the heat riser valve in the fresh-air duct in your first pic, behind the radiator cap. That says it's original to your truck, and IDK why. EFIs don't need a heat riser - the EEC compensates for ACT by using that sensor. All '85-up 5.0Ls are EFI, and even though the '85-86 air filter is on the engine, it doesn't use that heat riser.


(phone app link)

'87-96 have the filter on the LHF inner fender, without heat riser:


(phone app link)

I can't explain or guess why your truck was built with it. Post a pic of your VECI label:


(phone app link)