HELP PLEASE-spark plug blowout
Elder User
Joined: Jan 2012
Posts: 777
Likes: 2
That sucks. My Crown Vic blew a plug on me a few years ago as I was getting on the highway in a snow storm. I drove the ~20 miles home with the injector still connected and made it... hopefully you made it ok too
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Super Moderator
Joined: Aug 2003
Posts: 25,479
Likes: 742
From: Isanti, MN
ON edit: I was a little off. Cylinders 2 and 10 are next to each other in the firing order, so the PCM is confusing those two.
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Thread Starter
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Senior User
Joined: Oct 2012
Posts: 470
Likes: 1
From: Havillah, WA
Made it to my sisters house by Seattle. Made it here without too much trouble. Got some strange vibrations depending on the rpms. Tomorrow is the end of the trip home. 6 hrs with this thing going over two passes. I'm a bit worried but a local mechanic quoted me $1600 to pull the head and fix the plug. If I can get it home, I'm going to team and tap the head on the truck with the good kit instead of the cheap dorman fix kit.
Super Moderator
Joined: Aug 2003
Posts: 25,479
Likes: 742
From: Isanti, MN
Made it to my sisters house by Seattle. Made it here without too much trouble. Got some strange vibrations depending on the rpms. Tomorrow is the end of the trip home. 6 hrs with this thing going over two passes. I'm a bit worried but a local mechanic quoted me $1600 to pull the head and fix the plug. If I can get it home, I'm going to team and tap the head on the truck with the good kit instead of the cheap dorman fix kit.
If you absolutely must drive it home, get underneath and unplug the upstream oxygen sensor on that bank. That'll force the engine to run open loop without falsely enrichening the mixture on that bank.
Cargo Master
Joined: Dec 2005
Posts: 2,296
Likes: 11
From: freeland, mi
I think I would come up with a different alternative. Driving it that far seems too likely to do damage. Ironically mine blew one out last night. I keep a kit I got from O'Reilly right in the truck. Fixed it and drove it home. Hopefully it lasts the one I did on my excursion was still holding when I got rid of it.
Elder User
Joined: Oct 2013
Posts: 715
Likes: 0
Made it to my sisters house by Seattle. Made it here without too much trouble. Got some strange vibrations depending on the rpms. Tomorrow is the end of the trip home. 6 hrs with this thing going over two passes. I'm a bit worried but a local mechanic quoted me $1600 to pull the head and fix the plug. If I can get it home, I'm going to team and tap the head on the truck with the good kit instead of the cheap dorman fix kit.
Thread Starter
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Senior User
Joined: Oct 2012
Posts: 470
Likes: 1
From: Havillah, WA
well we made it home. It did well and got us back safely. She's a good truck. We just pulled in last night and the next couple of days will be very full days at work so i'll have to let the X rest for a few till i have a chance to dig into it. Things i've learned is the dorman kit is strictly a temp fix. It's completely dependent on the condition of the already messed up threads so there's almost no way to tell if it'll hold for a minute, a day, a month or a year. What i did run into is that the plug that comes with it (Autolite HT1) is complete garbage. it's fries itself in a few hundred miles. There's a cross referenced plug that can be substituted (Champion 7989) that worked well. If i had know that to begin with it's possible that the kit would have held. BUT the temps produced by the autolite literally melted the plug and part of the adapter and i'm sure a section on the threads of the head as well so it's no surprise it blew out after another 800 miles. The thing i did notice is that on that blow-out, both the plug and the adapter were in perfect shape so that was strictly due to the threads on the head failing.
I'm certain the only path forward is buying the correct repair kit and attempting it at home without removing the head on the #10 cylinder. It's not going to be easy back there.
I'm certain the only path forward is buying the correct repair kit and attempting it at home without removing the head on the #10 cylinder. It's not going to be easy back there.
Super Moderator
Joined: May 2004
Posts: 29,380
Likes: 118
From: Central Coast of CA
Posted this in your plug thread back in 2013.
Don't do it. Cancel your order.
Cheap is not always best. Cheap can be good and effective, but when it comes to your engine running correctly, I wouldn't use that Dorman garbage. https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...l#post12995926
Don't cheap out on your engine bro.
Stewart
Stewart
Cheap is not always best. Cheap can be good and effective, but when it comes to your engine running correctly, I wouldn't use that Dorman garbage. https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...l#post12995926
Don't cheap out on your engine bro.
Stewart
Stewart