Hey all. 2003 5.4 with 4R70W. Noticed a few weeks ago a squeaking coming from my truck at idle in all gears except reverse. It turned into sometimes squeaking and sometime ticking. Got it into the local transmission shop today and he's telling me it looks like I have a cracked flywheel just buy pulling he inspection cover, but no way to know for sure without pulling the tranny. He also mentioned the torque converter has been replaced because it is painted silver and the factory converters were not painted. So he's wondering if the previous owner (just bought it in december) was chasing the same issue and was told to replace the converter.

Any who. What are your thoughts on this? I come from the mustang world so I'm familiar with mod motors and mod motor transmissions, and have never heard of a flywheel cracking on one of them. Also, is there truth to what he is saying about it being a new converter because of the paint?


In a few weeks, once I can get my mustang out of the garage and drive it around I'll pull the tranny myself and have a look. Just looking for some input right now.

 

If your tranmission guy called it a flywheel, I would probably go to another mechanic in the first place. It's called a flex plate.

You should be able to turn the flexplate 360 degrees to inspect the lower half of it throught the inspection bay.

 

Dually noted... I guess that should have clicked in my head. I'm so used to manual transmissions it didn't even cross my mind.

He mentioned it looked like the crack was close to the center hub, which is why he couldn't tell for sure.

 

its possible not a common thing that i've heard with these trucks but you never know
a buddy who has a jeep had a really loud noise that could've been the torque converter but he got the transmission off and what do you know the flex plate had broken so it looked like an inner and outer ring with only a few jagged pieces holding it together-replaced it and no more noise

 

I was thinking the same thing.

 

I have seen the flex plate mounting bolts back out slightly, causing a tick/tap noise. Perhaps it could cause a squeak,

 

They don't have bolts. The bolts are in the torque covereter and come out as 13mm studs. So they are only held on my nuts. So I doubt that is an issue. Their can be a lil play if the nuts aren't tight.

 

If it ends up being the flex plate I'm almost positive I have one id sell ya cheap.

PM me if I need to look for it!

Wayne

 

If you don't I do. Was actually about to scrap it. I'm in the middle of a ZF5 swap.

 

There are bolts holding the flex plate to the crank shaft and usually the flex plate will crack around those bolts. Haven't seen it on a F150 but dealt with it a few times on diesel F250/350's