Mobile browsing sucks.

 

I think all vans aRe 2V motors.

Should be no issues removing plugs.....3v motors had the removal issues.

Do you have a van?

 

I literally prayed before I squeezed the trigger on the DeWalt. It came out perfectly.

 

Yup 2v motor.

Gap is huge!!!

Bet you need all new plugs.

 

The picture doesn't do justice. The old plug gap looks fully 3 or 4 times larger than the new one. Amazing.

 

Yes sir it's a van with 2v and yes I've heard all vans have the 2v.

Im putting it back together with the old coil. Control my variables.

 

Van is fixed. Runs perfect. Actually is impressive. Inspires me to (pay someone to) change the other 9 spark plugs.

 

welllllll now that I'm hooked up to the 7000 pound enclosed trailer and pulling around town. I definitely feel a misfire. However it seems to go away with heavy throttle. Which is different than it was before I changed that one spark plug. Another update will follow.

 

Same thing all the way home last night- real bad miss at normal throttle but then heavier throttle would defeat the miss. this was with the heavy trailer hooked up, highway driving.
So this morning I embarked on replacing the other 9 spark plugs. I had some new Autolite units from years ago.
Right now all of them are in and all I need to do is replace the boots and reassemble everything.

Check out these pics:

I suspect this is factory original on my 314,000 mile van. I know it's at least 200,000miles on these plugs.

 

That is one big fugly looking gap

Do the rest ... You already did probably the hardest one to get to on a van...

That "miss" might be that one cylinder producing MORE power than the rest

And do the boots while you're there.

 

I spent about 3.5hrs on it. Cleaning everything as I go. Trying to be thorough and everything.

Replaced the remaining 9 plugs and all ten boots and springs.

 

i like your comment about the one cylinder lol

and actually the middle cylinders were the most difficult - the fronts were relatively easy just going under the hood of course and the rears were very easy because of easy access from inside the cab.

And in the same box of new Autolites (ordered from Rockauto a long time ago) I found ten new boots with springs. Nice! The ones I took out were actually pretty decent condition except for some splitting when squished between my fingers. I would have reused them if not for having new ones ready for install.

And I know I keep saying this: but man the pictures don't do justice to these old plugs. I put a lot of effort into getting good pics you guys to see but then I posted what I had and looked at them and ... if a picture is worth a thousand words, then seeing these in real life is worth a thousand pictures.

 

So I saved all the old plugs and I was going to get more pics and whatnot and then I re-looked at the pics on post 18 and 20 and I realized that any new pics wouldn't really add to the conversation.

Aside from the wear, do you all have any clues to whether or not these are factory originals? Maybe the part number? I notice the ones I removed have the same part number except for the last digit(s).

I finished the job at 3:15pm and I was late for an event so I reconnected the battery and let it idle for 10minutes before going inside to wash up and change clothes and hurry off to the event.
I had the battery disconnected during the job to clear the codes (does that work? Did I do that right?).
Then I fired it up and towed the trailer about 30 miles- no interstates: mostly city and smaller highways. It still has some misfire during the tow but it was driveable , and heavier throttle cleared up the miss every time.
The event was a few hours (parked with engine off). On the way home I noticed NO misfires. Smooth and happy.

It even did an accidental burnout once as a light turned green (pavement was wet). And a couple more less accidental ones
a freaking wet pavement wheelspin with a trailer attached. I find that amazing.

today ill drive it about 3 miles and tomorrow I'll go the usual 120 miles to Orlando and back.

 

Yeah, disconnecting the battery will completely clear codes and the KAM (Keep Alive Memory) which makes the computer relearn everything.

Those plugs look original based on the amount of wear - they were spec''d to go 100K miles by Ford. That usually means the gap doesn't change a lot, otherwise emissions would go in the toilet. That said, those things look like they've got close to 300K miles on them.

The boots, if they are cracking at all should be replaced anyway. The COPs are a pretty high voltage for coils, the better insulation you have, the better.

That low-load misfire sounds vacuum related. Look around at all the vacuum stuff especially the PCV - the misfire might be because it's getting too lean because of air getting past the MAF without being measured.

Another cause just might be injectors. But this came on suddenly, didn't it?

Side note: All those other weird codes you got could haev been caused by the "noise" on the 12V rail caused by misfireing COPs. The amount of noise that comes out of an ignition coil when it misfires is amazing. The "noise" drives all the other electronics nuts because they basically all share the same 12V rail - the + lead on the battery

As for burnouts, yeah, the V10 has a lot of low-end torque - 80% of it available at 1000RPM - and with an automatic, you automatically hit around 1500RPM from a dead start (pun intended). So the torque you're putting to the ground when completely stopped is even more than 80% of the peak.

 

I think you will be fine.

The disconnected battery may have reset some things like STFT short term fuel trim.

May be why it started running better after a little while.

Still 300k is a lot for 1 set of coils.

$250 will get you 10 new Denso oem coils.