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I have a 2003 F250 Super duty that I bought new that has ben nothing but problems, the latest one is that #8 plug which has a time-cert thread repair insert has blown the center of the plug out on 2 occasions,
any ideas as to why this is happening? I just assumed the first time was a defective plug but it happened again 1 year later to the same cylinder.
It's a spark plug failure and nothing to do with the thread repair. Where are you buying the spark plugs from? If online you have to watch out for the imitations that claim to be OEM.
I thought that also, the first plug was a Motocraft that I bought on Amazon and I thought probably counterfeit, the second plug was a autolite bought at the local Napa. One thing that I forgot to mention is that this was a reman engine and both times when removing the failed plug a Time Sert repair sleeve unscrewed with the plug, the first time I bought a new insert, put red locktite on it and screwed it back in using the new plug as the install tool,
I find it highly unlikely that two spark plugs would be bad and fail on the same cylinder within about a year and 9,000 miles. Both failures happened while towing a trailer.
I have had this truck since it was new and have lost track of how many spark plugs have failed because of the crappy thread design, it has happened so many times that
it is really not a big deal, I just unplug the injector on the bad cylinder and drive it home. One time it was 500 miles with a 8,000 lb trailer.
I have been a die hard Ford fan for about 40 years but my experiences with the 6.0 diesel, 5.4 gas and cab forward design have finally convinced me to never buy another one.
If this is not a time sert what is it? The first time this happened I did not know what kind of insert it was, from looking at pictures it looked like a time sert, I bought the one pictured from amazon as a Time sert insert
That is possible, when it came out the first time I just bought a new insert and screwed it in with the plug, the original insert came already installed in a reman engine that came from Napa.
Actually the insert unscrewing with the plug is not that big of a deal, the real problem is why does the spark plugs fail in that cylinder.
I am actually thinking of purchasing the Cal Van kit and doing that cylinder over, trying to determine if the Cal Van Insert is larger than the Time Cert Insert, just looking at pictures it appears to be larger.
I thought I would post a update on this, I did use the calvan kit and reamed out and rethreaded the cylinder where the plug failed twice, when I ran the reamer in it removed only a very small amount of material, I went ahead and threaded it and looked at the new threads with a bore scope and saw that it only cut new threads on part of the hole, I went ahead and installed the new calvan insert but then later I decided to pull the head.
What I found is that the aluminum around the spark plug hole appears to be partially melted and was there was a gap around the edge of the insert. The second picture is another cylinder that I did a insert on and it looked perfect.
I ended up buying a rebuilt cylinder head then put calvan inserts in it and also the other head so now I have all 8 with calvan inserts.
I believe that the problem started when the engine rebuilder used a head that should of been junked.
Also in this scenario it seems plausible a Time Sert could come out. They "flare" the last couple threads when properly installed, almost like a wedge anchor.....but if there's nothing to wedge against....
