Just wanna put this info out.....I had a tick on my truck, figured manifold, phazers, something notorious that these trucks do, so never paid attention and put it on the back burner. Did my plugs last weekend and found #3 plug loose, backing out. Well long story short that was my tick. My 04 with 88k idles silent and tick less now. Well Monday I heard a friends of a friends tick as he pulled in the driveway, pulled #3 coil, sure as ****, plug loose, torqued it, checked all his others for him, good to go. Today, 3rd time in a week, at my mechanics shop on my way hm from work, he had the head off of an expedition....why u ask???? Customer ignored that tick long enough, spitting the plug, head is off to the machine shop to be repaired......$1800 bill.... Check those #3 plugs my friends.

 

Exactly! The bigger issue is that the plug change interval Ford sets (100k miles) or close to that is way too freaking high. Maybe the ignition system can handle 100k miles but the heads and plugs can't. The plugs become loose or stuck and then you have a problem. Just swap out your plugs earlier. Something like 50K miles sounds good to me. If you do that you'll not have the problems we talked about. Oh, and change out the COP insulators too.

 

Was this on a 5.4, 4.6 or can this happen to both?


Just curious.


JT

 

Good Points.

Also, that expedition could have had the old 5.4L which was notorious for spitting plugs into the hood. I think the expeditions had the 2V for a few years even when the F150 had the 3V.

 

It can happen on any vehicle. You have to had the plugs properly torqued down. Then you need to re-torque them down after 100 miles or so.

 

Do yall torque them down by hand or compressor?

 

By hand, 25 ftlbs

 

It was the 3v 5.4

 

5.4 3v for these three experiences.