Tothemax

The IC is hollow. You don't have to go "deep"

Just because you didn't instantly get anything to come out doesn't mean its not working. Go drive it and check it in a hundred miles or so.

Justin-co

Thanks. I have quite the acceleration hiccup! After all of the research I was expecting it to act like a popped pimple!

Tothemax

Make sure you change your plugs to the 534's and hap them at .030
You can also clean the sensor behind the air filter and on top of the air intake.
If you still have issues start replacing coil packs and boots. If it still is around its probably your throttle body.

somtrans

Good post on drilling the intercooler. I
also had concerns regarding rough idle, occasional power loss and stumbling on hard acceleration and suspected water or oil from the cooler.
After 56k on a 2014 ecoboost, I drilled a .050 hole in the lowest part of the intercooler. A slight amount of oil leaked out while engine was off but when started, the oil and some water blew out violently onto the air dam. Sorry no pics (I'm from a different generation) but I estimate about 1/4 cup of sludge sprayed out and for several days oil continued to leak onto the ground and blow onto the air dam.
Now after a week there is no measurable amount of condensate or oil exiting the cac but I assume the initial amount took 56k miles to accumulate so I wouldn't expect much now.
As to the hesitation and other symptoms, they are all gone but unfortunately I don't know how much to attribute to the drilling since I did a throttle body cleaning, a seafoam intake and valve service, replaced the plugs and replaced the thermostat at the same time.
Anyway, I feel better knowing the cac is being evacuated constantly and there are no issues with noise, or pressure drop because of the hole.
BTW, this isn't the first time I have drilled a cooler--- I have had several Audis in the shop that would burp oil into the turbo because of a poorly designed oil separator and filled the cooler with engine oil--occasional major smoke problem like you can't believe.
Simple 1/16 hole solved those problems with no adverse results.

tetvet68

I have an '11 FX4 scab (43,000) and drilled the hole a few months ago after two of the dreaded limp-mode episodes. I also have a competition grade catch can and a cold air intake. Plugs have been replaced and had the intake cleaning done 18 months ago. I still had a high-idle miss on cold starts that would go away when the RPM's dropped back to 1000. Had the SM scratching his head. SM suggested a $200 cleaning but I decided to try running injector cleaner through the fuel system. Miss is gone and the truck runs like new...mileage is back up too. After seeing all the crud filtered out of the PCV system, I'm a believer in the catch can and now a believer in injector cleaner. I held off on the hole and now am sorry I didn't do it sooner...simple fix that takes 2 minutes.

jdunk54nl

Careful on the injector cleaner. It burns hot which can cause the turbo's to overheat as well as can break off big chunks of carbon which will destroy the turbo's when they go through the blades.

Here is a video explaining it.

Tothemax

Yep. There is a ford approved cleaning method out.

05 super

Tothemax....thank you sir. im gonna look for this next weekend..With 90,000 miles on mine, it prob needs it.

jdunk54nl

So they say to spray it past the MAF sensor in the air intake....what about the one right before the throttle body? Should we be in front of that or take it out and use that spot to spray the product?

tetvet68

Thanks. I knew there had to be a down-side..