You absolutely do not have to lift the cab and I can't see how that would possibly be easier. I asked the mechanic at the dealer where I bought the engine that does their engine transplants and he doesn't life the cab either. There is plenty of room with the transmission off to get the engine out through the top without even taking the hood off. I have the luxury of a lift so that certainly makes things easier but I take the wheels off and put some wood blocks under the lift at the point where the brake rotors just about touch the floor. That gets the truck nice and low where you can lean in and work on the engine without breaking your back. With the radiator, fans, etc out, you can stand in the engine bay with a lot of room to spare in front of the engine. I did remove the grill and radiator upper support as the books say. That is probably necessary to get the engine out. It is close as it comes up past the condenser but no big deal. My engine hoist easily cleared the height of the grill support which was a big worry I had. I had it on the longest setting which is rated for a 1/2 ton. You could tell it had a load but it handled it fine. I decreased the length for more capacity once the engine was out. My hoist is your typical Northern Tools or Harbor Freight type.

The mechanic I talked to said that he unbolts the motor mounts from the engine and leaves them in the truck when he pulls the motors. I did it the other way and unbolted them from the crossmember so they came with the engine. That seems easier to me since the crossmember is slotted and bigger on the top where the studs feed in as you come down with the engine.

Once the intake, trans, and accessories are removed, there is a ton of room to lift the engine out. It does help to have a leveling beam so you can rotate the angle of the engine as it comes out.

I've put about 300 miles on it so far and everything is going well (knock on wood).

 

I think the ideas for pulling the CAB were relating to a series of long articles at Flat Rate Tech dot com. The idea is that the amount of things that need to be disconnected to remove the cab out of the way is much less then the amount of things need to be disconnected or removed to pull the motor...

This makes sense when you do not need to replace the motor but need access to the entire top and length of the motor to rework any top end items like intake or heads

 

I can see where the cab could be pulled to work the heads. It still seems like a lot of work but I've never done it.

I wouldn't pull it just to work the intake but to remove the heads or maybe work exhaust studs, I could see the merit in doing it.

 

I read the entire steps for the procedure and though it was pretty slick... not worth a damn for those of us who don't have a 20 foot high ceiling in the shop and the "cradle" for the cab to be lifted up without damage

If you think about it, there really is not much to disconnect or remove to get the cab free of the frame and brake/steering components

 

I had the truck on the lift and looked carefully at the heads. I don't see PI stamped into them anywhere so they are probably not the PI heads. I guess if you order a 99 engine from Ford, you get a 99 design engine and not the newer 2V design. You could eat the core price if you really want the newer head design and just order the later motor. Truthfully, they probably wouldn't notice if you turned in a 99 core for a later motor but you would take your chance losing the core value. In my case that was $1000.

 

I wonder if there's a difference in core value between the two motors?

PI being more common, I doubt they would have coughed much at getting a '99 motor back.

But then, you'd need a new PCM, or at the very least a re-flash - which a dealer would probably never do for you ... you'd need to have it "tuned".

I see '99 heads on eBay soon

 

nice post samdog. and good luck with the repowered ride.

can i ask if the dealer offered you the installation package motorcraft lists in the web site or at least talks about? seems it has gasket hoses filters and such from the list and if so how much more in $$$

 

Great post!!

Thanks for sharing!!!

 

I didn't look too much at the Motorcraft install kit.

There was no difference in core values at my dealer between model years as I did ask that question. Different places have different core values though. In my case, it was $1000.

I agree that you could probably turn in a 99 core for a later engine and they wouldn't notice or care but I didn't want to gamble the $1000.

 

The problem with installing a PI engine in place of a NPI is the intake manifolds are different. The ports are squarish on a PI and round on a NPI.

 

Anybody know if any aftermarket motors are available with different pistons and rods and such, maybe a little different compression? Not looking forward to it but I will be swapping out my motor early this summer, hopefully it lasts that long. I think the supercharger has taken it's toll particularly now that the motor has 100,000 miles on it. I had the supercharger off and sent back to Kenne Bell for repair so I figured while it was off I'd do some tests. Much to my dissappointment the results were less than favorable. I ran a compression test and a leak down test and discovered that 50% of the cylinders have moderate to almost severe leakage. From what I could tell the exhaust valves are the culprit. I've noticed for a while now that something was going on because my mileage has been slowly deteriorating and the power isn't what it use to be. The guy who does the tuning for my truck is checking on a new motor for me that is built to better withstand the pressure the supercharger generates (pistons, rods, etc). Not looking forward to that bill.

 

Rods and pistons, there are parts for the 5.4 that can be used in the V10.

The exhaust valves? Might need some better seats. Or, you've been running lean and overheating the poor things.

With the blower, I'd be thinking the rings were the biggest problem from the boost and heat. But if the exhaust valves are leaking, sounds like lean or you need better seats (and valves).

Whatever the 5.4 Lightning folks do to keep the rods INSIDE the block, sounds like you should be doing too

The only thing is, and make sure you mention this to the machinist/mechanic, the piston/rod weights need to be the same as stock - otherwise the balance shaft will require re-balancing. And I'm not sure any engine balancer is setup to do that

 

The guy that is going to be building it builds Lightning motors designed for the race track so I feel pretty confident that it will be done right. I'm just not looking forward to the bill. But like a buddy of mine has told me, "you have to pay to play". How true this is.

 

These guys have internals for the V-10. I haven't used them and I hope I don't have to for a while. I am going to have my 99 V-10 w/ almost 160K compression tested before I have the heads reworked due to exhaust stud breakage.

http://www.sullivanperformance.com/index.htm

 

yes sullivanperformance. they seem to be the only ones putting together packages fo pistons and rods for the v10. all very nice manley products that we all know work.