I'm looking at replacing my '98 expedition with a newer one or an F150 screw. I have looked at a couple ('05, '07) that seem to have this problem. The '05 sounded like a diesel and the oasis report on the '07 showed that the heads were replaced. I'm curious if at any model year did Ford change the design to solve this problem. I have heard that around '09 they change something to solve this as well as the spark plug (2 piece) issue. Is any of this true or even if I get '11 it will still have a real risk of this problem. I run my trucks for awhile (190K on my current one) and don't want to be having to change the heads several time in its life. Any insight would be very welcomed. Thanks in advance

 

Modulars are gone in '11, the spark plug issue is fixed from '08+, I have heard the same on the phasers being fixed in '09. We have 2 '09 Mod's and neither sounds bad, one at 75K miles and the other at 30K, my '08 Mustang never sounded bad in 23K miles. I to test drove some '05-'07s 5.4L's that sounded horrible and decided to either go with a 2V 4.6L on those years or '09+ 3V's. Was lucky enough to find an '09 3V 5.4L for the right price that is nice and smooth.

One other nice thing about '09+ is the 6spd tranny.