...but on my 88 5.0 4x4 f150, where is my throttle body, what does it do, and how can i clean it? Any help for a semi-competent amateur is greatly appreciated...

 

heres the throttle body:



to put it simply it lets the engine suck its air in...to clean it, id say just pull it off and douse it in carb cleaner :S

 

So you just undo the hoses coming from the air filter and get busy cleaning?

 

i would unbolt the whole unit and do it. its not hard to do...for the record if you sand it down and paint it ford blue it looks pretty

 

So it's metal? What a coincidence...I have an extra can of the spraypaint that I used to paint the truck. It was supposed to be navy blue...it ended up too bright...more like a Ford blue.

 

im pretty sure its aluminum...and also when you take it off, theres gonna be a gasket that will most likely break/rip...id look in to buying a new one. only a couple bucks.

 

Cool...thanks for the help man...I appreciate it. I'll probably do that this Saturday morning before the wedding I have to go to. I'll try to grab the gasket on the way home from work on Friday night.

 

On the paint, I'd aim for high temp paint cuz it gets rather warm under the hood

 

Good thinking. In related thoughts...is it worth replacing the position sensor just cause? Do you consider that part of "cleaning" it?

 

If you're going to take the throttle body OFF the engine -- your gonna want to clean your IAC thats connected to it, and replace the TPS if its old. At the minumum you want to clean the IAC becasue its right on the TB... once I did mine the engine ran SOOooo smoothly...