Well, my "good intentions" from around 30K miles ago appear to have gone down the drain.

I bought a pair of aftermarket heads (looking for my receipt now) which I know were cast in INDIA, and machined in California. My 93 Aero 4.0L has the early style open chamber heads (used on the Aeros from 90-96 per the web). Back around 195K the van was seeping coolant from the block/HG junction..... and I'd read extensively of these heads which are crack prone. Trying to make the right investment to get the van to 300K and my retirement, I bought a pair of these aftermarket heads and paid an Indy mechanic to reseal the entire top end.

So the plan worked well until about a month ago, when she began to misfire on cold startup..... also seemed to follow damp mornings, so I suspected plug wires & perhaps plugs. Posted a thread here several weeks back, and based on that advise I replaced the TPS and also the IAC (it had a HIGH idle occasionally). With the idle fixed, the misfire condition has progressively gotten worse. At the beginning of this I checked coolant as a matter of course and it was dead on normal. HOWEVER last week the van overheated on a 70*F day and I found the radiator level was less that half, with no apparent leaks. After that discovery, I've inspected the tailpipe upon startup and of course I have a quite wet mixture spitting out.

Going back into the shop this evening to pull the plugs on the pass. side to expose what I expect to find.... at least one white clean plug. She's still running but I expect I've barely got a 4 cylinder now.

Just read a few year old thread about pulling the heads with engine in situ...... not exciting at all. However my goal is the same... at least 300K out of this old FORD. Since the INDIA castings apparently are crap, I've still got my OE FORD heads, and will have to decide whether to have them inspected for cracks and a valve job perhaps. I also read these 4.0L engines eat pushrods and I might even need another set of rockers! The beat goes on......... I'll post what I find.

 

Well I short changed the duration a bit..... here is my original thread when I vowed "to do it right" with new heads:

https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...ap-in-car.html

Looks like my aftermarket heads made about 30K miles, and just over 4 years since the install and work by the Indy mechanic.
Choices for replacement heads seems even more limited now compared to 2014; just a few sellers on eBay. Looks like this time it will be a DIY project; maybe I can blackmail my son into helping me later in May when his school is out.

Any other experiences with aftermarket heads? My choices will be (1) rebuild the original 93 heads with 195K on them or roll the dice (2) and buy another set of China/India castings.

 

mine needs the drivers side head removed and replaced but its insane how the top of the engine is jammed up into the dash.

 

Update on this issue:

After searching dozens of threads on the 4.0L, Rangers & Exploders typically, it seems there is a fair chance my issue is intake manifold gaskets..... instead of my supposed heads.

My Aero is going out of service for some months..... as I have Volvo wagon to complete & flip. I've had a list of items to give attention to including fuel pump (still running the original at 225K miles), rear end oil change and drum to drum brakes, and now it looks like I will be removing the top end of the 4.0 and hoping to find loose intake bolts, a harbinger of coolant getting ingested. I have already purchased a full set of platinum plugs, new OEM wires and I previously changed the coil block with NOS, but I will inspect closely.

Hope springs eternal.... and I'm hoping a combo of ignition work and intake gaskets will remedy the Van.

More to come once I get the disassembly time (perhaps in June)

 

My original intake manifold gaskets was leaking from a couple places, both oil and coolant. Apparently the one-piece design is subjected to a lot more vibration than the typical two-piece type. I replaced it with a Fel-Pro set over 10 years ago, ans it's not leaked since.

 

Right there with you! Replaced heads at about the same time, now I am having misfire issues and some coolant loss. It started with #3 mis-fire, pulled the plug and it was fouled. I did an oil change a couple weeks before with full syn and I thought that maybe it cause some old crud to collect on the spark plug. Flash forward 6 months and a couple weeks after another oil change, #3 mis-fire again. Pull the plug and it is soot/oil covered. Replace it and still feel a slight miss. Put it on the Snap-on at work, do a cylinder contribution test, and #1 and #2 are dropping out. So I pull those plugs and see #1 is covered, and #2 is white. Great a bad head? Well replaced those and still feel a slight miss, put it on the snap-on and now #2 and #5 are dropping out. Ugh, I am really getting tired of fighting the good fight.

Coil is only a year old, Motorcraft. Wires are only 3 years old, Motorcraft.

For #1 and #3 it looks like it is too cold of a plug. I went to the chart, and saw that the APP103 is a very cold plug, where the APP605 is a hot plug (which the Motorcraft SP486 crosses over too). Well this time I slapped APP605's instead of the APP103s and see how long those last.

Here are pics of my plugs I took out a week ago.

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.for...fd4e7830b3.jpg

Top-Bottom #3-#2-#1

https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.for...f693ddad2e.jpg

Top-Bottom #1-#2-#3

Really getting tired of trying to do things right, and they just don't last. I did use the Felpro HD head gaskets along with the improved design intake gaskets. If I have to go in again, I am gonna RTV the lower intake ****, no more wasting money on gasket sets.

 

Seems we are in the same trench fighting this war agains the 4.0L.

Mine is using much more than "some coolant"..... When I drive it ~ 50 miles my radiator is down a third! It won't do better than about 65mph on the highway and when you open the throttle it vibrates badly (mirrors shake like a Harley).

I've also read here and other FORD forums that the pushrods & rockers are under oiled and problematic on these 4.0L engines.....makes me wonder if I have a mechanical failure (mine idles poorly as well) that could have cracked one of this China/India castings. I won't know until I get into the beast. Unfortunately I have no idea what type of gaskets the indy mechanic (He is a FORD ASE tech by days) used when he redid my engine in 2014; claimed all his parts came from NAPA.

 

i wonder if losing the torque to yield head bolts and replacing them with arp head studs would help.of course theres not enough room to do that.

 

I don't think that the head bolts are the issue, it is the actual head design that is the problem. Mine appears to be a mixture of leaking rings/valve stem seals, and for #2, maybe lower intake gasket, or crack in the head letting coolant in.

DET17, if he used Napa gasket set, this is probably the one he used:

https://www.oreillyauto.com/detail/b...sket+set&pos=0

It has the old style lower intake that we have mentioned having issues not being strong enough, especially around the front coolant ports.

This is the upgaded intake gasket set that I installed:

https://www.oreillyauto.com/detail/b...e+gasket&pos=3

There is a reinforcement in the rubber around the coolant passages to help from a blowout. But those are the style I had on back in 08 when I had a shop do the heads and they still blew out in '15. But it might have been because of a cracked(?) head because after the repair, I was blowing out weak coolant components, heater core, coolant divert-er, and finally I had a geyser coming out of my over flow tank.

 

BTW doing head swap is not too bad, once you have the upper intake off you do have a lot more room.

 

When I get that far, if the intake gaskets aren't found with "loose bolts" I'll pull the stinking heads. The guy that did my job in '14 cussed those exhaust mani's at the head pipe... says half of the studs broke off right in them.