Soo, I'm trying to change out my spark plugs.. four broke. I have the lisle tool, all was going well until I pulled out the casing on one of the plugs with the extractor and a piece of it was broke off.. It is a very small piece.. Do i have to pull the head to get it? It is metal, not ceramic.

 

Try a long handled magnet. Or a long tube on a blow gun, into the spark plug hole and try blowing it out.

 

The one that broke on mine did the same thing. We ended up leaving it and haven't had any issues. It's been over 15,000 miles since we changed them

 

I just changed my soak plugs today and one of the plugs I broke I thought it had something that broke off into the cylinder but the I noticed on one of the ones I didn't break had a similar piece missing so I think it's just where the plug is worn and burnt through

 

I got it done.. I know a tech at a dealership pretty well so I brought the piece to him and asked his advice. He told me that it did not actually break off, but the ceramic just pushed the very tip of the plug so it became "detached". It wouldnt matter for such a small piece anyways. It would have just blown out of the exhaust. I had a small piece of ceramic break off on another plug and he said to not worry about it. It was too small to cause any damage.

This was the hardest job I have done on a vehicle. It took me about 8 hours total to change the plugs out. And that was for four of them. I was being a sissy with the Lisle tool because I didnt want to push anything too far and have to tear the engine apart to get it. Oh well, its done and I got rid of three misfires. I didnt buy all new COP's either. I just bought four new boots for like 5 bucks a piece from autozone.

Good luck to anyone that tries it. It's not a hard job, but it will work your nerves the entire time youre doing it!

 

This is a huge problem with these trucks. I can't tell you how many people bring their trucks in after attempting one or two then realizing it isn't like most vehicles. My favorite part is when it is someone who has scoffed at me for quoting them 3hrs plus what ever time it takes to extract broken pieces and then two days later they are bringing it back happy to pay for my time. lol
Glad you got it done, not an easy one.

 

I was quoted somewhere like $642 to get FOUR plugs done.. I knew of the problem, thats why I brought it in at first.. For that price, I decided to do it myself.. It was miserable, only because of the panic you get 1) when it breaks, and 2) because of the trouble you'll run into if you push the ceramic too far..

Needless to say, I'm more than happy that it's over with.