Woh woh woh woh....

Damage Control Here...

Lets answer a few questions...

First off, my experience has shown me that codes pertaining O2 sensors and Converters are usually the result of a problem.

If you have a misfire, you will have extra o2 in your exhaust gas, and that will cause a lean code.

When you inject HC into the intake, it mixes with O2 (and other gases that make up the air we breath, incuding N2).

The process of combustion mixes HC+O2 and results in H20, CO, CO2, NOx, and HC (and other things we tend to not care about). Hopefully this reaction will result in no O2 left over. If no 02 is present, the O2 sensor will generate a voltage. If O2 is present, no voltage will be generated and running like this for periods of time will cause a lean code

This can be caused by extra air introduced into the engine past the MAF sensor, or it can be caused by a misfire.

If you had a bad intake gasket, I would suspect your problem to happen at idle, and go away under acceleration. This is because at idle, you have very high manifold vacuum, creating the opportunity for air leaks. during acceleration your manifold vacuum drops, in which case an intake leak will become less apparent as your throttle body is wide open, so it is easier for the air to enter through the throttle body than an intake leak.

I would bet you have a bad ignition coil.

I have replaced many on these trucks. It usually comes from the truck being detailed and washing the engine bay. Water gets in there and shorts the coil out.

If you had a scan tool of some sort, you could really help yourself out alot better.

Otherwise when push comes to shove, all we are doing is guessing. If it was my truck, and I had to put 1 part on it, it would be that ignition coil.

The other option is to swap your #7 and #8 coil with your #1 and #2 coils. Then have your codes pulled when this happens again.

Fords are very slow at setting misfire codes, and alot of times will not set a specific cylinder misfire code. You will need to go into something called Mode $6 data, and watch PID's 52 or 53 I think. The PIDs will have a seperate ID, and PIDs 52 or 53 1-8 will be your misfire cylinders. Dont quote me on the 52 or 53, but its somewhere around there.

Hopefully you did not ruin your catalyitic converter.

Quick test for that is to run the vehicle and observe the inlet and outlet temps of your converter using a non contact thermometer. The OUTLET should be hotter than the inlet.

Another way to do this is kind of complicated, but essentially you warm the vehicle up, pull the fuse for the injectors and ignition, and inject propane into your intake. You should be able to see the same thing with your converters (outlet hotter than the inlet).

I'll try and monitor this if you need more help.

 

Just watched your video too. That does sound like misfire. Keep in mind another thing about spark plugs. As cylinder pressure increases, the resistance for the spark increases.

If you give it gas off the line, your cylinder pressure will rise, and your spark will try to find the path of least resistance. Maybe at idle the spark plug is the easiest route out, but when cyl pressure increases the easiest route out is through the spark plug boot to the cylinder head, or maybe through the coil windings internally shorting themselves.

 

It doesn't do it in park either though. I can rev it to 5 grand.

Its doing it a lot worse since I took cylinder 7 and 8 and swapped them. Its doing it around 2k rpm's and its almost constantly... I am thinking those two COP's are bad. I will record another video, this time maybe it'll do it more often. The video above is before the swap of the two coils.

I got a quick question though regarding the coils. My Cylinder 8 came out easy. My Cylinder 7 coil was slid over the plug at least thats what it felt like. When I put them both back on I wasn't able to get either to give me the resistance that cylinder 7 had given me. It wasn't terribly hard to pull out, but it gave up a lot more fight then cylinder 8.

Cylinder 7 and 8 are both on the driver side correct? They are both towards the back. Cylinder 8 being right next to the firewall, and 7 right next to 8 right?

I just read your post above. Sorry I didn't see it sooner. THANK YOU. I will swap them out tomorrow and give that a try. The engine was detailed when I got it. Its done this since I got it. 39 bucks a pop I will replace the two coils for cylinder 7 and 8, after I swap them over to 1 and 2. Cylinder and 12 are on the back side of the passenger side correct? I didn't think I had an in-take gasket leak either. I sprayed ether all around the in-take and never got nothing to happen, even when I drowned it, and then took it for a drive, absolutely no change.

It could be the plugs to. Something makes me believe the stealership didn't swap my plugs out, and charged me, but I am preying that its the coils because I never wanna take this truck back to them again. They tried to sell me everything under the sun for it, and I use to work there so its got some bad blood. I'll keep you updated on my issue.

 

Take every COP off remove the boots and clean the springs out with carb cleaner. Then take sand paper and scuff up the inside of the spring. Put some di-electric grease on the boots where they slip over the spark plug. Then re-install them. Get some electrical contact cleaner and clean ever COP connector.

7&8 are drivers side rear and 1&2 are passenger front.

 

i would say not to use ether but use carb or brake clean next time, ether will cause a flash fire way to easy. carb cleaner is my choice. i used to use ether but got tired of putting customers equiptment fires out.

 

Well just to give an update here. I went to advanced auto and had the code read again, after I had already had the codes cleared. Since swapping and cleaning cylinder 7 and 8 with contact cleaner, apparently cylinder 5 is now misfiring, also giving a lean code on bank 2. So I went out there in the snow, pulled the "COP" off cylinder 5 and cleaned it with some contact cleaner. Took it for a drive, and I still got a misfire because the popping and sputtering was still happening. So no change. It did have a smell to it, the boot that is, it smelt like burnt electronics I figure since there is a spark there constantly it would have a smell to it anyway. I may go out and try cleaning cylinder 6 as well and see what happens there. I am beginning to suspect the plugs though.

Thanks in advance for any responses!

 

On the reving at idle:

Keep in mind that you are in a no load situation. The cylinder pressure will be low compared to when you are accelerating down the road.

This sounds like a misfire the more and more we talk about it...

Where I worked before, every time they would bring a F150 up from auction and the engine bay had been detailed, I would be replacing coils.

But the cheapest things you can do is just swap both coils to #1 and #2 and monitor your check engine light.

 

As I said now Cylinder #5 is showing a misfire, and cylinder 7 and 8 are not. The issue has gotten worse, it now happens at a lot lower RPM's with a lot less throttle applied. This changed right after I swapped Cylinder 7 with Cylinder 8, and cleaned them. I have cleaned Cylinder #5 as well now, and it was still acting up, but not as bad.

The most recent codes are a lean code (again despite being cleared), and a Cylinder #5 misfire. After cleaning it, it was still happening at lower RPM's with less throttle.

 

I got another question, when my 4x4 is engaged sometimes it makes a grinding sound, if I re-engage it, it goes away. It also feels like while driving around with it engaged (the roads are slick and snowy here), that its dragging the front end...

What kind of fluids does the transfer case take? Does it take differential gear oil? Or does it take Transmission fluid?

 

Still no luck as of yet on this issue.

 

There is a diagnostic flow you can use to test the O2 sensor. All you really need is a good multimeter, the flow chart, and some time. It can prove or disprove the faulty O2 sensor and also help you eliminate any possible wiring or PCM issues that could be causing the code. Fuel trims are helpful diagnostic info as well. I would also suggest you take a look at fuel rail pressures as well. I had one instance where a truck was acting very similar to yours and it was injectors sticking and also a sticking fuel rail pressure sensor. If the PCM thinks pressure is sufficient and it actually is not then it does not tell the fuel pump driver to speed up the pump for the additional fuel consumption. This was on a 2005 I believe. For the diagnostic flow chart I highly recommend alldatadiy.com, they have very useful information and will guide through this step by step. Good Luck.

 

Chris did you ever figure this out?

 

COP was bad just not bad enough to show a code till the day I took it to a dealership then it showed the code after I paid 90 bucks for them to scan it... never showed it before that just that day it chose to show bad cop...