For everyone's general consumption and information:

Yesterday I was leaving work and as I was entering a busy street, I romped on her a bit and she felt like she was misfiring. On the way to the freeway, I romped her a few more times to make sure I wasn't feeling things and then the CEL came on flashed for about 2 minutes. Then she smoothed out.

I entered the freeway without the romp and she felt fine even at 70, then I romped her again and she misfired pretty bad. I called my bride and asked her to meet me at the dealer.

So, over the past couple of weeks, she seemed to have been running a tad rough especially as I approached a stop light and she idled down. Then she'd smooth out.

Diagnosis was that she experienced random misfires. The coils are all fine and no other issues were noted. We decided to change the plugs and coil boots as no other issues presented themselves. The tech did the service, test drove her on a variety of surfaces at my request and she's perfect. No misfires while romping on her and she's smoothed out perfectly.

The cool thing is, while in the shop, they took it upon themselves to update the PCM. When asked why, I was told that Ford wants this done as a preventative measure and to head off possible future problems, of which I'm clueless about. The PCM service was free.

Anyway, the tech told me that even though Ford says to do a plug change at 100K miles, they are noticing more and more EB trucks coming in around the 60K-90K points with the same symptoms that I had. The dealer is now recommending a 60K mile plug change for EB trucks to prevent an issue. My truck has 61556 miles on her.

I was planning to do the plugs at 75K anyway, guess it didn't want to wait.

Discuss?

 

Interesting. guess we now know that the EB engines are hard on plugs

 

I had the same service at 36k same problems.

 

Glad you are back up and running! I'm going to try and hold out to 100K on mine since I have 16 plugs to replace...same thing on my 5.7 Hemi Chrysler.

 

You got your money out of those plugs. A lot of people are changing them around 40k miles. More frequently if they are running a tune. I don't consider it a big deal because it easy to do and not too expensive. I can do it in about a half hour. But one thing I noticed recently when I purchased a new set of Motorcraft SP534's is the price increase. I used to get them at Orielly's for $3.99 each. They didn't have them in stock but they got them in a day or 2. They are now $7.99 at Orielly's and most places are about the same price. I got my last set at Auto Zone for $6.99 each.

 

That's nice to know. I wasn't pissed about the need for the new plugs and boots but kind of surprised that they didn't last a tad longer as I'm bone stock. Anyway, she's all better now and ready for the trip to Fayetteville, NC this Sunday to watch my daughter's last ever College softball game before she commissions in the Army next month. Got some miles coming with trips to and from her college campus and such and I don't need my truck to put me down somewhere between here and there.

 

FWIW, my truck has the 5.0. And a 52k I got a misfire in my truck while returning home in Pittsburgh Pa. from Baltimore Md. Nursed the truck home the best I could and replaced the plugs the next day. So it's not just an EB thing.

 

It seems odd to me that plugs would fail that soon. I've replaced factory plugs at over 100,000 miles on a couple of Ford cars that ran flawlessly; one an '05 and the other an '08. My wife's last Sienna was traded at 84,000 miles on the factory plugs without a hitch.

Perhaps Ford has an issue with faulty plugs?

 

My thought based on no facts at all, let me make that clear first off.

Maybe the direct injection and turbo's cause excess plug wear? I've never dealt with turbo gas engines much so I really have no clue.

 

That's what the tech told me and the dealer is now recommending 60K plug changes if they last that long.

I have a co worker who owns an '09 Tundra with 146K and still using the OE plugs. After I mentioned to him that mine needed replacing, he said that his power and MPG's has tanked a bit. That's the kind of truck that I want, 146K and never been worked on.

 

I'll take that as well! My '10 5.4 still has the original plugs ( but they only have 41k on them ) I need to start a thread now that I'm thinking about it....

 

I now have 61.5K on the truck, I mounted the new tires at around the 50K mark. My MPG's dipped a bit and after today's fill up and ride home, my MPG's are higher than they have been in over 10K miles. All this time i was blaming the new tires and perhaps I was getting my first symptoms last summer and didn't know it.

I have a 500 mile round trip tomorrow to Fayetteville, NC, that will tell me where I stand on MPG's. I'll report on that tomorrow night or Monday after work.

 

As promised, back from the trip to North Carolina. About 525 miles round trip, mostly flat and pretty much all freeway. I averaged 20 all day doing between 70 and 80, what ever I felt that I could get away with. I'm very satisfied with that.

 

Glad to hear she's running well, Tim!

 

Tim, if you don't mind me asking, what did the plugs and boots cost you installed? My eco is in for the exact same thing and my dear quoted me about 450. Just wanted to check if it was in the same ballpark.