When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
Have coolant leak on heater hose on my son's 2003 5.4 . Looks like it's a gasket. What is this part called? Its leaking where it attached to engine. Thanks
109% it's the intake manifold. The plastic gets brittle after many years and cracks apart. You have to replace the manifold and the gaskets. It is not a hard job but it is a little time consuming because you have to remove all this stuff off the top of the engine first. Label everything put the fasteners for it in bags and keep track of the order in which you do things. Take photos before and during.. helps with rerouting hoses, tubing, wires, etc and getting them back into the right places.
While you got it all apart ... Clean the throttle body and idle air control valve... you will need a new iacv gasket. replace all the spark plugs and new Denso coils, pcv tube, heater pipe and o-rings, and heater core hoses. Just speaking from experience. This is just one of those things every one of these trucks need at high mileage and years.
I would not worry about replacing the injector o-rings... Aftermarket o-rings do not appear to be identical size anyway...
Get all your stuff together, you will need to order stuff, and plan a weekend for it. One day to take apart, one day to put back together. Good time to change the coolant and Tstat at the same time too. Just less things you have to fool with one by one later.
Clean the manifold gasket surface meticulously.... And torque carefully exactly according to instructions with the correct torque wrench. Unfortunately some OEM parts are getting hard to find
2003 model year got an improved composite material manifold that lasted longer than the previous ones. But they still fail eventually. My 2003 made it up to 300,000 mi + . Installed on its second engine.... Before it failed. In retrospect I should have replaced it at the time the engine was replaced.but it appeared okay at the time
if you clean the grime off, you will see its not attached to the engine / head...
Its attached to 1/4 - 1/2" thick black piece of plastic, thats the intake manifold.
the o rings sandwiched in-between the plastic intake & the metal crossover,
Agree with replace the intake
However
I've never had ANY trouble using the Dorman replacement for 100 bucks
Granted, they are cheaply built
everything Dorman I have used in the past on my personal beater vehicles have failed on me...
Especially their plastics parts....
If your installing Dorman on customers cars if youre an actual tech, you may Neve know if it fails.....
They may not return to you for whatever reason, they trade it in, etc...
Just saying as big as a job that it is, pay once. cry once...
If one fails on me, I will know about it
Master tech for 28 years now
Regular master for 12 before that
Problem is sourcing a factory manifold and mine is Aluminum
I just tell my clients that I won't guarantee jack, especially manifolds
Hell, the Ford ones failed in 2 years anyway
Well, the original ones. They changed the composite in 2003 and they were much better. My 2003 lasted until 2021 or so.
They have been in and out of production a few times currently I'm able to find the oem on some sites and add them to carts.
2L1Z-9424-AA
While most of the parts for these trucks have been dropped due to age, the manifold still seems to have some production runs.
Some people have had okay success with the dorman, but I would not use it unless I could not get something else personally. It seems to be sold under a lot of other quasi brands as well.... Probably all made in the same factory.
