where do i look to find a wreaked truck ican fix to use a diesel of course.

 

On the 5.4 track, IT's not just the engine that could use some tinkering. CIA, Exhaust/headers, and tuning do a lot, but there are some other items to consider. If you are using over sized tires gears are big help. The Torque converter is also pretty low, plus a valve body mod helps with the 1-2 shift chirping.

For the money you'd spend figuring out how to wire and buy the diesel, you could probably just slap on a centrifugal supercharger for less. I've a little, but a supercharger and 1800rpm converter are on my list to do.

 

what if i do a shorty header i have all mandrel bends in stainless so i was going to do my exaust and a cold air kit with a tuner. well for the gear i have a 410 now i would like it to kick in overdrive and stay there on the highway without a slight upgrade in the road to make it down shift. would i notice a bunch in these mods or am i pissing in the wind? i dont really want to do the supercharger but we will see.

 

Don't worry about running at 3000 rpm with these engines they are made to run like this.

I can't say that Cold air kit will really do much of anything since your not supercharging the engine.
As for the exhaust it could help but not enough to change it like you want.
The Tuner is the best chance for power gains but without forced induction you can only so far.

I can't say I would recommend towing in OD unless you're in a dead flat area as the "hunting" for gears will kill the transmission. You may very well need to diesel or even modded diesel if you want such effortless towing. In my opinion at least.

 

oh good! sounds like you got lotsa parts and a fair deal. Your $800 price tag had me worried for you for a second there.

As far as you not seeing appreciable power gain, I can't help but wonder if there is some difference between the 'tune' on your 06 F-150 5.4 and my 03 SD? maybe? what do you think?

Also, I just can't help but suspect the cat-back packages may be designed more for sound aspects than for simple pure and efficient power gain.
I have not yet seen a resonator cut open, but logic tells me that it adds travel distance (friction loss) and possible added restriction that exhaust must pass through before exiting. Seems like this would hinder opportunity for power gain as compared to simply swapping out for a nice wide open pipe and a straight-through muffler design.

that there's my theory anyway

 

There are a few websites out there to help you price out your vehicle for the area that you live. A couple of good ones would be Edmunds and of course Kelley Blue Book. They have vehicle appraisal calculators that allow you to put in the information describing your vehicle specifically and it will spit back a value on your truck.

Not knowing where you are, I appraised your vehicle on those sites as if it were here in East Texas where I live. I haven't seen your truck either, so I took my best guess on some of the questions based on what you said above.

Edmunds gave $2734 for average condition, private party; $4257 for clean condition, private party. Kelley Blue Book gave $5775 for good condition, private party; and $4925 for fair condition, private party.

Hope that helps you out some. Like I said I was guessing at some of the stuff. If you check out those websites you may be able to arrive at a better value based on what you know about your own vehicle and I don't.

 

with all the impressive and ambitious work you've done so far; it seems like you've had a good parts source for a while. can they not provide you with a good lead?

You obviously have a lot of skill, but I would be nervous about buying a salvage yard diesel engine. From what I've read, the diesel crowd indicates that proper maintenance on a diesel from day one is critical. You never know what kind of bag of problems you're going to inherit from someone else's checkered past with an engine.

 

Sounds like ReAX and Hybris are giving some very, very good feedback here. Do you notice that the Tuner keeps coming up over and over again?

From my personal experience, ReAX is absolutely correct when saying . . . " CIA, Exhaust . . . do a lot" On my truck I installed a Magnaflow 12589 and K&N 5725252 and the combination of the two really unlocked the engine's power.

So on that point I would have to disagree with Hybris :
From my own personal experience, adding the K&N CAI was what really opened the engine up a few months after I had installed the Magnaflow. It was the two together that really made a difference.

I think Hybris is wise and insightful and really pounds the nail smack on the head with this one though: The key parts being "what you want"

Everyone tends to agree that a free-flowing exhaust will help you, but no matter how many mods you can make to the 5.4, you may never be satisfied if you expect it to act like a diesel. It's just a different animal all together, built for an entirely different purpose. If all you want to do is tow, tow, tow then maybe you DO need to look into a diesel.

welder1 - I'm sure you can tell I'm very much interested in your project here. I hope you will keep posting as you go along and show us some pictures eventually.

 

how do i post some pics i will show you some pics i was too lazy to take pics during but i do have after pics

 

I don't know how to post pic inside a thread post myself; but I have put a number pics in my 'Garage'. There's a couple ways to get there

First click on your user name in the welcome box on the right hand side of the screen above the blue header bar.

This will take you to your Profile page. On the right hand side of the screen, you will see a box for your Garage. Click on the blue link inside that says 'go to welder1's garage'

You can click to 'add a new vehicle to your garage' then in step 4 you can add photos. It will prompt you to select photos from your folder on your computer. After you have added them, you can later go back the same way to edit or delete them as you wish.

Another way to do it is to click on User CP on the left hand side of the screen in the blue header bar. this takes you to the User Control Panel.

Then on the left hand side of the screen you click on Pictures and Albums under Networking under Your Control Panel.

Then on the left hand side of the screen underneath the blue header bar you should see a blue and green key that says Add Album. Click that and it should get you going. It will prompt you to select photos from your folder on your computer.

good luck