So I've put about 1000 miles on my 03 F250 since buying it, and just the other day it's started leaking from the rear of the passenger head gasket. Enough to drip on the driveway and exhaust, and have some exhaust smell.
126,000 miles, 5.4

Real disappointing...

I've checked with my local ford dealer, and they want $1600 in labor to do the job, so after parts, shaving the heads if necessary, I'm probably looking at at least $2000 for them to do the job. It also needs passenger exhaust manifold and studs, so the dealer price to tack that on would be a whole lot more too since there are already a couple studs broke. A local shop will do it for $150, but it would be best to get it done when the head is pulled.

I've checked with several local mechanics, and none of them are interested in pulling the head on this engine. That has me concerned about doing it myself too..especially since it fits in my garage with only a few inches to spare.

I got a good price on the truck, but if I tack on another $2500 at the dealer, It's not going to be that good of price.

What would you guys do in my position? Get dealer to fix, try to fix it myself, or trade it in/sell?

 

sorry to hear of your difficulties. reminds me of a personal situation in which I paid 4K to replace an engine that was damaged by coolant due to blown head gasket. then the second engine had a blown head gasket. bad deisgn,

so an option if you are ging to trade it in....buy a product called blue devil head gasket repair.

follow the instructions to the letter

also disconnect and cap off any coolant utility systems such as heater lines

perform the blue devil repair

park the vehicle and only drive it to your trade in destination.

the blue devil head gasket repair works by providng the cooling system a formulation that will crystallize into a hard sealent when exposed to heat and air. this seals the gasket.

the repair might last 10 miles or 1000 miles, depends on a lot of factors.

odds are the engine was blue deviled before you bought it.

as far as doing a top end job yourself, before going that route, understand you will be dealing with a lot of seized and rusty bolts that will have to be drilled out, cut off, toruched to loosend. Also, there may be other items that would need repair exposed.


5.4's in a truck have a lot of potential problems....

I would unload it and look for a V-10.

 

if i were in your shoes what i would do is start looking for a donor 5.4 from another truck.
and take it to a local mechanic and have them go over it for you to make sure it is in good shape. or you could rent some special tools and go over it yourslef like a compression tester is a great tool to check a donor engine.
that way if it needs anything a shop can not charge you as much labor to work on it but you will have to pull your own engine and put the donor back in. i myslef have been slightly looking for a donor engine for my truck it is also a 5.4 so i can get one tear it down and send it off to a machine shop and start to rebuild it so i can pull my old engine and replace it with a fresh rebuilt one.
sorry to hear about your problem it hits kinda close to me because i also have broken and or missing exhaust studs and am having a mysterious oil leak that i can smell but not see

 

I have thought about the engine, but then I've got $1500 or so in another used engine.
Would the blue devil gasket repair work on the oil ports since it's only in the water?

I found a couple local shops today that priced it out for me.
One quoted $1400 labor for one side head and exhaust manifold + cost of machine shop for shaving head if needed, said they'd have to pull the engine.

Another quoted $750 labor to change one side head and exhaust manifold + machine shop cost. They weren't going to pull the engine.

 

Are you leaking oil or coolant?

Oil leaks are pretty common on the 5.4's at the head gaskets. I think it has to do with the iron block & aluminum heads expanding at different rates when the truck warms up/cools down. A lot of the guys on the F150 forums have reported oil leaks.

I had an 02 F150 that came with an oil leak into valley, just enough to make it smell bad. Engine only had 75k miles on it and the truck was 4-years old. Fortunately I had gotten it with an extended warranty so they covered it. Drove the truck for another 100k miles and it never had any more issues after that.

Never had any coolant leaks on the head gaskets, even when they were leaking oil.

 

There is not coolant leaks that I can tell...only the oil leak. I can see that it's dripping from the far back corner, onto the starter and runs down around the bellhousing.

Truck still runs great, but I don't like leaving a little puddle of oil wherever I go, and the smell of it dripping on the exhaust isn't great when getting out.

 

Are you sure it's a head gasket and not a valve cover gasket?

 

I can't seen anything coming from the valve cover area. It all looks dry

 

x2 also pull the dipstick out and look at the oil, it would usaly be like a cream color if the head gasket is leaking. Good Luck

 

my truck has what appears to me as blow by from worn oil slinger rings in the cylinder because of three of my exhaust manifold bolts are broken near the back cylinder it is allowing oil to blow past the gasket and on to the collector and drip down on the the exhaust and i do not have a puddle but just a drip of oil every know and then

 

I had a '99 F-150 with a 5.4 that I bought new. It had this exact same problem. Mine was only an oil leak externally on the passenger side rear. Never showed any coolant problem in the oil. Oil dripped down onto the exhaust and smelled. It was fixed once under warranty and then happened again at about 75k miles. After getting a similar quote from the dealer to repair, I traded it in on a '07 F-150.

 

The oil all looks fine. I don't think any coolant is leaking in there. There are 3 studs broke on the exhaust manifold and the exhaust manifold ticks till it gets warm.

 

The only thing stopping that oil leak is head removal and new gasket, the "mechanics" you took it to are no mechanics, really can't even do a head job!!! Too bad your far away if not I would of lend a hand. If you have some know how on engines you can do this job your self and save big $$$

 

It's not hard at all to do the head gasket, it's just time consuming. pull all the accessories off the motor than the timing chain cover, pull intake the valve cover and finally head

 

And this oil leak from the head gasket has been a problem since the 4.6 was designed for the crownvics. I was told Ford designed a new head gasket around 2001 but these motors after that date including my 04 have leaks, and when you look up part numbers they are the same so so much for "updated " gaskets. my 04 has a very slow weep on the drivers head up front near the valley, I can clean it and a few thousands mile later you can see it weeping out from the gasket and staining the block again. a quick cleaning and it's gone and then a few thousand miles later the weeping is back