I am a bus mechanic for a small bus company(7 ford E-350's). I've only have one van that keeps spitting spark plugs it's a 2000 with a v-10. I've heli-coiled 5 out of the 10 cylinders. Dont go to Ford for help unless your truck is under warranty.Ford insists that it does not have a problem. Ford needs to go to comsumer affairs.com and see how many prolems they have.

 

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This is a known problem, there arn't enough threads on the head to properly hold the spark plug.

Ford has fixed the problem but is not willing to pay for millions and millions of heads to be fixed. They work - but need to be watched. If the plug loosens and is not checked for tq it'll pop out. Best thing you can do is check them every so often to make sure they're tight.

 

do as justin states and a lot of us do inch pound wrench and retorqe .or as you state replace the rest of the holes with repair kits. here's the site of the one a lot of the men have used . and most guys have converted to the full thread ones at the same time.
i am also a mechanic "just retired" .spark plugs coming loose in alloy heads is not some thing new .i've been fixing them since 1964 in alloy heads. infact i fixed a lawn mower head a few days back with a blown plug.
http://fulltorque.com/
http://www.timesert.com/

 

It's always been a problem in aluminum heads. That's why the guy who designed those heads with only 4 threads should be drawn and quartered. Seriously, that guy is retarded. How could anyone think that it would be okay. Especially, when you have plenty of material there to work with. It would have been just as easy to have full threads. I am astounded by it.

 

nothing new or wrong with it. just a plug with only 3/8 of a inch of threads has always done it. just go back to the old air cooled vw's they had a 3/8's plug and always blew them out. so has many old b&s lawn mower engines. it took every motor and car builder a long time to catch on to aveation and marine motor useage of long fully threaded and used 90% to depth threaded areas .
alloy tech. is much different and to do so properly takes time.
also it was not 4 it was 6 with a tapered seat that must be properly cleaned lubed and torqed and rechecked. when so done they don't blow out. lazy and cheap on proper maintinance owners are the problem not the motor

 

"also it was not 4 it was 6 with a tapered seat that must be properly cleaned lubed and torqed and rechecked. when so done they don't blow out. lazy and cheap on proper maintinance owners are the problem not the motor"

Wrong!!! There have been PLENTY of people on this board and especially over on NLOC who have documented that they only have 4 threads and the one hole in particular(I think it is the 3rd one back on the passenger's side) has been found to have only 3 threads by several people.

http://nloc.net/forum/showthread.php...k+plug+threads
http://nloc.net/forum/showthread.php...k+plug+threads

Lazy and cheap on proper maintenance??? I thought the Ford manual said these spark plugs were good for up to 100K miles. I looked all through their literature, manuals, etc, and I couldn't find one place that showed the maintenance interval on torquing and rechecking spark plugs. Hmmm....... It's a faulty design. Period! Why else would they change it in late '02????

" just go back to the old air cooled vw's they had a 3/8's plug and always blew them out. so has many old b&s lawn mower engines."

And in all that time since then, no engineer was able to overcome that challenge of too few threads allowing spark plugs to blow out, until October of '02 with introduction of the 10 thread modular heads. Amazing!!!!

Some people have been able to, potentially, avoid this problem by changing to an aftermarket plug and by rechecking them every 20K or so, but that doesn't change the fact that it IS a BAD design.

 

He has Stock in the Ford Motor Company.

 

There are plenty of threads on message boards, (not necessarily here), where people documented, with pictures, that their heads only had 4 and sometimes even 3 threads per hole. If it wasn't a design flaw, then why did Ford change to 10 threads in late '02????

"just go back to the old air cooled vw's they had a 3/8's plug and always blew them out. so has many old b&s lawn mower engines."

Even more reason why they should have known better. After all those years and all those failures, Ford didn't figure out that 10 threads were better than 4 until October of 2002. Amazing!!!

"lazy and cheap on proper maintinance owners are the problem not the motor"

I looked all through the Ford literature and I can't find anywhere where it states the interval for checking and/or torquing spark plugs. In fact, the only thing I do find is where they tout that they are good for 100K miles. Sure a few guys have, maybe, avoided blowing them out by changing to an aftermarket plug and checking them every 20K (but even some guys have blown them out then), but is that how a modern engine should be designed?? Where you need to check your plugs every 10-20K to keep from having a catastrophic failure??? Yeah, you do sound like a Ford engineer.

 

are u sure about them putting more threads in the heads in october of 02???

i had heard they didnt start using the better heads till march of 03. I hope u are right cuz my truck is a 2003 FX4 model made in oct. 2002.

In any case- there are alot of lucky people that havn't changed their plugs till well after 100,000 miles and are still driving them without blowouts. I hope to be one of the lucky ones- lord willing.

There are alot of fords around here and i haven't heard of anyone having this issue yet.

Dan.

 

This is a quote from another message board. I can't use the name hear because the admin are like ****'s about other boards (why? I have no idea). I was off a little on the date. Looks like it was December, maybe earlier, of '02. BTW, the other website I am talking about is N.L.O.C. dot net without the periods.

" Finally a New Head Design
After countless Sparkplugs ejecting out of 5.4s, it appears Ford has redesigned the Windsor heads. I work in the service department of a local dealer and we see at least 4- 5 5.4s that have spit plugs out a month. ( At Least 90 % are Lightnings ) Well today another Tech called me to show me that the threads on the head Ford sent to fix a vehicle were threaded all the way thru. I dont know when this change took effect but this head had a casting stamp of Dec 2, 02. It appears to have a total of 10-12 Threads now.

Buzz
To infinity and beyond "

 

Here is a link to that thread.

http://tinyurl.com/hanm2

 

Yeah, this is some of the same info i have read in the past. Sounds like they didnt start putting these heads into the regular f-150's till after january of 03 sometime.

But most of the non-lightning blowouts i have read about have happened after a plug change- lots of times not tourqued right or crossthreaded. Although i have read of a few blowing out of oem installed as well. I am hoping for good luck- or should i say praying, lol.

But there are 1,000 other things that could go wrong too- and now with the Time-sert fix i guess it is cheaper than some other problems.

Dan.

 

Timesert is the way to go. Quick, easy, and better than OEM.

My heads on my 2001 L are all inserted.

 

WRONG WRONG WRONG! i don't own stock in any company . i am a retired dealership tech/service manager. haveing spent 42 years working for vw, ford ,chevy, cat, cummins, and detroit diesel.
90% of plug blow outs i worked on were found to be from under torqed and or over thightened pulled threads. and as to 100k plug life it will be the day i see them last that long with out starting to leak past seals, break down and or start miss fireing. "my 05 has 20k and started missing. cause a 100k bad plug "
as to heads with 3 and 4 threads sorry but "personally" i have not seen any in my shop days and won't disagree. i have found way to many plugs not properly tightened from the factory in almost every brand of motor i worked on. and i do mean all. screw ups are screw ups. bad tools are bad tools. lazy is lazy.
i do think and feel we can all agree on several things.

1- the use of timesert and full torqe inserts and up gradeing to the longer full threads when it does happen is the best repair ."personally. i use full torqe. a hardened alloy one to help retain proper heat transfer on a water cooled and timeset on air cooled " and do every hole when only 1 goes bad. if my customer dosn't like how i do a repair. price it else where and ask about the price of a new head or heads
2 - many drivers today with leased vechicles don't give a darn about proper maintinace and use the old "i only rent it " when some thing goes wrong from poor improper service on thier part.
3 - most of use useing this web site "fte "are far more brainie then the av. i only rent it owner/ driver. and do care about our personal rides being properly cared for and repaired. meaning we are not the normal turn the key and run driver who can't even check his/her oil or tire pressure
4- the use of alloy has for a long time caused problems that only in about the past few years have motor companyies starting to say hay we can't use this and build cheaply and still have it last. without causeing us big money later down the line. lets see what others do."marine and aviation"
5- many "not all" buyers don't maintain or even have proper oil changes done. or want every thing thing done for free. or are fast to throw the blame away from them selfs.
6- we and i mean WE are not the av. drivers. and know how to do must of our own work. taking pride in our rides and it shows as such