I will start off by saying that this problem is going to be very, very hard to explain, so guys, please bear with me here. This problem that I'm going to attempt to explain is a combination of sounds and feelings I'm getting from my truck. I first started having problems after it was raining one day and I went splashing through puddles for a little fun. After turning my truck off and back on again, the problems started. When my truck is idling in any gear, it seems to jerk every few seconds like someone just shut a door, kinda like the engine is twitching in a way. When I am driving, my entire truck vibrates very bad for about 1 or 2 seconds when accelerating from any speed, but it's worst from a dead stop. If I am very very light with the gas and not trying to go uphill, my truck seems to run fine. But when I try to get on it, even just a little, it seems that I have no power at all, basically as if I and running on only 4 cylinders, and sometimes it feels like only 2. When it is doing this, my exhaust is making a sort of popping reverb sound after each power stroke of my engine. The more gas I give my truck, the more speed I basically lose and the worse the problem seems.
For all of you who have stuck with me so far, ya'll get my kudos. But anyway, if I get on the main roads over 40 or 45 mph, when I keep my truck at a cruising speed (not speeding up or slowing down), it feels like I am having terrible repetative trail jerk. It literally shakes my truck forwards and backwards quicky and constantly, and does not feel like it is in any way healthy for my engine or transmission.
There have been no codes thrown so far that are related to this problem, and all recent codes have been fixed and cleared. Can somebody please help me? I am beginning to get a bad feeling in the bottom of my wallet
Thanks Guys, all that reading wasn't so bad was it?
DRP

 

have you ran injection cleaner in the truck sounds like a bad or clogged injector.

 

About a month ago I ran some of that STP Outlaw gas additive. I don't know if it cleans the injectors or not. I think I read on the bottle that it did, but don't take my word for it

 

This may be a shot in the dark, but could it possibly be the MAS? Maybe it went out, or the connection is loose, or the filter isn't on right. I know with mine, the aftermarket filter came off and it did that. Like I said, throwing an idea out there.

 

I'd bet that you have water in one of more of your spark plug holes causing a misfire.

 

Ditto.......

 

Racerguy, how should I go about fixing this? Does it probably mean I've gotten my coil pack wet too? Also, I would think that if my spark plugs were firing properly, wouldn't that throw codes? I can allready think of 3 codes an engine will give you if you are having a misfire.

 

I would start by pulling each spark plug wire out of their holes and blowing out the holes with compressed air. Depending on how long your plugs have been in there you might want to replace them at the same time.
A 97 4.6 has 2 coil packs that rarely cause problems, unlike a newer one with a coil for each cylinder.
In theory a misfire should cause trouble codes but in reality it doesn't always.

 

I had my passenger side coil pack replace about 8 months ago, so that side is new. I'm not too sure about the dirver's side pack though, it's probably about as old as the truck. I don't know if it may be associated, but for about the past 6 months, I've been getting ticking from the top passenger side of my engine on what sounds like each time a single spark plug is firing. Maybe that may be the culprit?

DRP

 

I agree, pull your spark plug wires and blow the holes out with compressed air. You could also try removing one wire at a time to determine which cylinders are causing trouble.

Good luck

 

To see which cylinders are causing trouble, should the plug wires be disconnected while the engine is running?

 

As easier way is to remove the connector from the fuel injector on each cylinder.
I'd still start by checking for water though.

 

I removed the boots and blew them out. It helped a little bit I think but it's still acting up. I also blew out the injector connectors as well but I don't think that made much difference at all. Also, I noticed that there is some clear grease of some sort in my plug boots, could this be di-electrode grease? I personally have never seen clear di-electrode grease before. Where should I go from here?

 

The grease is probably di-electric. I've only seen it come clear. You might want to do the injector connector thing to try and narrow it down to an individual cylinder/s and pull the spark plug for inspection. It could also be a plug wire or a coil that has gone bad.

 

Any luck DRP? Try revving the motor at nite, in the dark, to see if you have any blue arcing from the plug wires. If so you probably need new wires.