traylor23

Exhaled a huge sigh of relief today. Talked to the Ford Service Specialist and he said that everything was 100% covered under the program and I will be getting a new engine. Yay!

digitaltrucker

Wow thats great news for you!

Tradesman

Damn, that would be a serious leaky injector. I hope I never run into that problem. Can't afford to fix anything right now. Already in the hole for my last trip to the dealer, and I still gotta take one more trip. I hope Ford has updated injectors.

08screwCA

Do they make any aftermarket injectors that are less noisy?

traylor23

I'll know more about the new injectors after I get the truck back (next week). My guess is the action on those injectors will be just as loud. I haven't heard of anything aftermarket being of any marked improvement.

digitaltrucker

Just did my 08, 2.5 hours, sorry guys gotta love the 08! only thing I lost my 7mm!!!!

matty 532

I just changed the plugs in my 2005 F150 5.4. It has 129,000 miles, and was starting to run very rough. Low RPM load could shake you out of your seat, right before it would switch to a lower gear to get the RPM'S up. Also, when passing under heavy throttle it felt like it was only running on 6 or 7 cylinders. Other than that it would run fine at highway speeds, in fact i just finished a 1000 mile trip and you can get around those problems listed above by pressing the OD button until you get up to 60 MPH, and by not 'flooring' the pedal.

I bought the truck at 96k miles and thought the spark plugs had been changed, the missing started at around 113,000 miles.

Either way, thank you very much for posting the tutorial and pictures. I was inspired to do the job myself.

Got the Lisle tool, deep creep, carb cleaner, various extensions, and went to work.

Passenger side:
1-Broke, my first use of the tool: i did not go all the way to the mechanical stop with the tool, because of someones comments about crushing the end of the spark plug and pieces falling into the cylinder. this is a mistake, when using the crusher, GO ALL THE WAY till a hard stop. When using the left handed threading tool, go all the way till a hard stop.
It will push the porcelain through the end, however this is the only way to ensure a full bight with the left handed coarse threads.
2 - broke
3- Came out great!
4 - Broke. Hardest one to reach and was the most difficult to remove. Usually when these break, the metal and porcilen break at the same point. On this one, only the metal broke, leaving the entire porcelien portion of the plug remaining in the hole. The top metal portion broke at the normal point and basically came out like a sleeve.
After much deliberation and fun times, I re inserted the metal sleeve of the spark plug and re tightened. After tightening, i think it broke the remaining portion of the plug, (what i wanted) and the top half of the broken plug came out together. I have never been so relieved to have a broken spark plug. I have attached a picture. I was then able to use the Lisle tool


Driver side:
I started from the back this time:
8: Came out great:
7: Came out great
6: Came out great
5: broke, at this point I was so well versed in the removal tool, and the location was a dream compared to #4, i had this one out in a few moments.

For those that broke compared to those that didn't: The only thing i did different was: on the drivers side I used a mixture of carb cleaner and deep creep, instead of only deep creep on the pass side, and they were able to sit a bit longer than the passengers side. Results: Drivers Side: 1 broken, Passenger Side: 3 broken. If you are patient enough, loosen the plugs 1/8 turn and let them sit for 2-3 hours with the penetrant. On the other hand, some will break either way, and the tool works great so sometimes you just want to get to work!

The plugs that came out cleanly made a wonderful creaking sound like an old door hinge. I say "wonderful" because when i heard that sound I knew the plug was coming out.

I did not use any air tools as described in other posts, but I think if they are going to break, they are going to break, give the deep creep and carb cleaner some time and get to work.

I showed pictures of the plugs, notice how far the tool pushes the porcelain through the end of the plug. Also notice the different breaking points in the porcelain, but the metal always shears at the exact same point. The most interesting was #4, which i mentioned above.

I thought 4 for 8 was good for 129k miles.

The truck runs great now, better than it ever has. If you believe it, the engine light is on now. I am not sure why, but it doesn't make any sense. When the truck ran bad, no engine light. Now it runs great....I will wait to see if it clears.

Thanks so much for all of your information, this forum was my inspiration to tackle this job.

Rusty Luck

Mine is an 08, is there less problems associated with the 08's?

digitaltrucker

If they have never been changed and you have BROWN boots, you have the new heads and will have no issues.

Key is the color of your boots. But they could have originally been brown and someone has changed them out to black.

southwest wind

isnt there an exact engine build date on the 08s to fugure out good or bad??