I've got a 1999 F250 5.4 manual SC long bed. after lurking here for years I'm wondering if I'm risking shooting a spark plug by revving too high, like 4000.
It's slow but I love my truck. Have to since I pull up hills with a load. have always been a Ford fan so even if it happens I still love my truck.

Had a gm once and I paid for it twice. Once when I bought it used and then again by having to replace almost every dern part under the hood.

Had it serviced by a local shop who replaced the plugs. I don't know if they used antisieze on them.

 

if that was the case i should have blown every plug in my 5.4 v8 and 6.8 v10. i do alot of WOT and the tranny shifts at 5k rpms way more then once a day.

now my 5.4 has blown a plug(67k miles on it currently factory plugs except the one that blew). before i owned it though. now for the year before this it had the classic loud almost exhaust leak noise which they later foundout it was the spark plug being loose.

listen for noises, otherwise you should be fine. these motors like to rev...4-5000 RPMs is nothing out of the norm.

 

4000RPM is not hi rev for a mod motor..

your well within its normal power band.

and revs arent the given problem stemming to plug popping its. not checking your plugs torque setting and leaving it to slowly loosen and pop out..

the real trick is getting in there and making sure each plug is set to the correct torque, using a simple rachet is NOT going to work..

 

dont worry about it.

 

just floor it and let the chips fall where they may.

 

What kind of sounds would one hear in the event of a plug coming out? I torqued mine properly, so hopefully we're all good.
Also b-uno, seen a bunch of posts by you, don't think I've ever said thank you for your service sir.

 

my expedition 5.4 sounded like it had a bad exhaust leak before the plug blew. there was no exhaust leak it was the spark plug being loose causing the sound. almost like a rod knock it was that loud. i only heard it the one time, then it blew the plug. after it was fixed it doesnt make any odd noises so that had to be the noise. i've heard of others mentioning the noise with a loose plug.

 

are you racing a cop car in your avatar?

 

Haha, nah, that's the Ex and mini-me sitting out front of the station one morning after getting off work.

 

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Nope. Torquing the plug incorrectly will blow the plug. Properly torqued, they will not blow. Ever.

And I would wager the most common time to blow would be during full throttle at mid rpm, where cylinder pressures tend to be highest.

 

No unless there already loose,just check the plugs once a year and torque to 22 foot lbs dry,i believe the recomended 15 or so to be not enough....and you do not need anti-seize on the 2v tritons only on the 3v. If u used it and torqued to 15 ft lbs in reality it would be compounded by the lub of the anti-seize to around 40 and that will deff strip the threads and blow them suckers right out

 

"and revs arent the given problem stemming to plug popping its. not checking your plugs torque setting and leaving it to slowly loosen and pop out.. "

"Nope. Torquing the plug incorrectly will blow the plug. Properly torqued, they will not blow. Ever."
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Well, these statements can not be true either . Because Tmehrkam ( a frequent contributor in the V-10 discussion group) had a blown-out spark plug after replacing his plugs . He not only properly torqued them but also wrote up a procedure after his meticulous and methodical work . Unfortunately , his precise torque did not prevent a blown -out plug. This is a fact (Search within Ford V-10 engine section ) .

Some experts blamed Ford , for a 100K plug design , they called Ford "stupid" . My in-law's 1999 Chevy Lumina also has aluminum head and Chevy recommends 100K plug change in the owner's manual . My wife's 2007 Toyota has also aluminum engine head design and Toyota owner's manual calls for 120K miles interval for plug change .These are just facts . So, I guess Chevy and Toyota are stupid too.

It does not appear that we have a scientific handle why the spark plug blow-outs are occuring, at least not yet . We have loads of theories , just like we have loads of spark plug torque values floating around .

Ken

 

Ken,

Do you know which plug blew? (Cylinder #)

My thoughts have always been that it will be the rearmost plugs that will go due to the difficulty of accurately torquing the plugs.

And Rexhound I respectfully disagree with the statement of setting the torque values of 2v heads higher. A lot of blow-outs mentioned here occur after a recent tune up and most 2v 5.4 owners followed the factory recommendation of 100k. If the torque specs were too low from the factory, I think we would read more about sub-100k mile engines popping plugs. And, keep in mind those plugs were installed when the heads were out of the vehicle.

However, with AlaskanEx's 67k mile Triton ejecting the plug makes me wonder if it wasn't wrongful installation from the factory (doubtful) or length of time, 13 years, which led to the ejection.

 

do not discount alaska, as our hot to cold cycles of an engine can cause thermal expansion and contraction more compared to a place like phoenix arizona.,