Well the picture sums it up. How would i go about getting the broken spark plug out of the cylinder? its not magnetic so no luck there. i might try a vacum.

is pulling the head my only option?

 

Tape a firm rubber hose to the vacuum tube and stick it into the plug hole....
Make sure the vacuum is clean so you can tell you got that broken bit out...

If that doesn't work I would just leave it and hope it makes it past the exhaust valve.... Unless you can get a camera in there to see it and then remove it with a retractable claw...

 

my brother and I ended up breaking two plugs like the in the picture. the first time we screwed the pusher tool all the way in, and you can see the results. but the second time we didnt screw it in anywhere near all the way and it still cracked the porcelain piece.

We fashioned a straw to a shop vac and got some of the porcelain out from one cylinder but i think we are going to try and rent a borescope from oreilley tomorrow.

do you know if turning the engine over with the plugs out will blow out debris? ive heard this works but i am extremely hesitant to do that

 

I did this when I was rebuilding my motorcycle engine last winter,worked great but I was able to see the debrie that fell down the crankcase. In this intance I would try a very thin pencil type magent.I think both options would be worth a try

 

Leaving it in there is a horrible idea. That's like playing Russian Roulette, seriously.

 

well we vacummed out both cylinders and were able to get porcelain out. but now we have a new problem. the thread ring of the spark plug came off put left the rest of the entire plug behind. ive grabbed on to the top part with needle nose pliars but its stuck so bad that i literally cant pull it out by had.

anyone have any suggestions or have this happen to them before?

 

 

Do you still have the hex'd portion sticking out of the plug hole? Or are you saying that part broke off too?
If its still there then an impact gun may break it free.
If it somehow snapped and just the threads are remaining, then get a very fine tipped flat head screw driver, slide it, or carefully wiggle it between the head and the threads and then use the leverage from the screwdriver to bend it in on itself.... This should collapse the threads toward each other... After you do that once then try to get a better bite this time with the needle nose and give it a bend and twist motion while pulling up..You may need to bend it in at least twice to break the seizure of the threads to the head... If you damage the thread in the head, then chase it with a tap to reform and clean the threads out...

You can also carefully heat it up with a blow torch to soften the metal up and make this a little easier...

 

we actually finished it up. what i ended up doing was grabbing the top part of the spark plug with a set of needle nose pliers. it then broke roughly in half. we ended up going ahead and using the pusher, which ground it up a little so we were able to vacuum some out. then we just pushed it through the tip of the spark plug. we ended up getting junk in three different cylinders, which we hope that we successfully vacuumed out.

Never doing a plug change again. Much less buying another 5.4/f150 haha