I'm curious what everyone's take is. I'm going to change out the timing sets and oil pump this spring as preventative maintenance. But I really don't want to screw with the VCT on it. Considering that they're not making any noise and have no visible sign of wear would it be a fair thing to say that it's okay to change out just the pump, tensioners, guides and chains? Eventually later I'm going to install lockouts but I wanted to make sure this is just one less thing on my 5.4 to worry about. 2010 FX4.

 

I have a strict motto I follow. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it"

 

^^^

Exactly. If you’re going in, go in once and get it all done then.

Also, if you’re getting top notch updated parts, there’s really no justification for doing lockouts. It’s the tensioners bleeding off that causes all the timing racket.

Phasers dindu nuffin to get picked on like they do.

Otherwise, just go find an old 2V-equipped 5.4 to toot around in.

 

I definitely get that. I'm just more or less trying to save myself some time because doing phasers on any OHC engine can be a PITA and I'd much rather not have to deal with having to lock the cams, break the bolts, take them off, dink with making sure they're seated right and then torqueing them down...I know it seems miniscule but the only thing wrong is I'm starting to hear timing chain rattle at part throttle. I've had 4.6 2V and 5.4 2V's before so I'm familiar with them...just wanting to save time. I'm only doing the oil pump with a Melling unit because I scored one for free off a friend who was going to do the whole nine on his truck last year but ended up trading the truck in as he got the oil pump in and was still waiting on the timing/phaser sets to come in.

Otherwise, I have fantastic oil pressure, no signs of impending phaser failures and no signs of abnormal metal shavings. My truck was purchased with 130K on it and I now have 225K so I'm doing it more as preventative maintenance since the truck has been a trooper otherwise. I get that doing it all once and being done is a thing, but as someone said don't fix something that's not broken...and I can attest that sometimes it's best to leave well enough alone because I've done things to vehicles thinking I'm improving things only to make new problems come up that didn't exist before and if I can save myself 2-3 hours worth of time doing them, then that's 2-3 hours I can spend double checking my work and looking for that MF'ing 10MM that I swear I just had.