Wow made me feel real old! I do understand the difference. It's my nature to wonder why manufacturers feel they can make one item fit all and get away with it. You've been super helpful. I'll keep you posted on how this thing works out. One symptom I noticed is when restarting a hot engine there seems to be a kick-back just as it fires off like when the timing is too far advanced. Ever have that happen or hear of it?

 

All engines should crank at Base Timing (10 Deg BTDC) in most Ford in our era of the Forum.
If you have the wrong ICM installed you may not be cranking at Base Timing and that would explain the hot kick back.

IE: Gray with no start wire accepting SPOUT info, Black with the Gray computer sending SPOUT info before start while cranking.

 

Even my Haynes manual has it wrong. They show 92 and up for the wiring diagram which shows pin 4 on the PCM going through a ignition suppression resistor with the tan-yellow going to pin 2 on the ICM and a tan yellow to the coil. I ordered the DY1077 for a 1995 5.0 and it is black. Should be right.

 

Even the 1995 electrical & vacuum troubleshooting manual has the ICM pin #3 labeled wrong, they have it as START instead of IDM. But they changed it and got it right in 1996.

1995:


1996:



/

 

Bet some poor tech was scratching their head back then!

 

Update on the ICM. Put the black one on and the truck now starts without the kicking back issue I was having. Even though it ran ok the grey module would seem to create a stutter just as it fired off like the timing was advanced on a hot engine. Thanks for all the support.