Post by 90GTVert on Jul 16, 2011 21:13:07 GMT -5
My mother has a 2001 Ford Mustang GT (4.6L V8). Nothing special. It's got a MAC cat-back and a K&N filter. Typical Mustang mods, pretty cool car for a 60 year old woman though.
Anyway, onto the point. A couple of weeks ago, my father was going to drive it to work. He said he fired it up and it made a very loud noise that went with engine speed, so he shut it off and took another car to work. I went out and started it and immediately I could tell it was leaking compression. It's a very sharp, loud, sound that you tend to know once you've heard it. On closer inspection, I see that the spark plug boot on one of the coil packs is blown apart. I pulled the coil pack out and, sure enough, the spark plug had blown out of the hole. The coil pack's boot and spring were also damaged, but those only cost around $7 shipped on eBay.
The spark plugs on a modular Ford in the Triton engine family sit way down in tunnels, recessed in the head. That means repairs are not easily done with the average tool. I look into it, and a company called Timesert makes kits to repair these heads, without removing them from the car. It's sort of like a helicoil, but it locks itself into place a little better. Helicoils often come out with the spark plugs, these are not supposed to. They are also aluminum inserts, rather than steel. The steel inserts are said to cause hot spots that can induce detonation in the aluminum heads. The down side to this kit... it costs $370. Could have had a shop do it for less I imagine (I hear Ford will do it for around $300), but then I thought with my luck it'll happen again, so it's better to have the tool for slightly more cost and do the work myself. That way if it ever happens again, I can cover it for free.
The tool worked very well and the repair went smoothly. I used a lot of grease on all of the cutting and threading tools to catch metal debris and then used a shop vac with a drinking straw taped to it to suck out anything else that might have been in there. Of course the piston was setup with the valves closed to minimize the risk for debris traveling anywhere. Seems to be doing just fine, and the insert is actually rated to handle more torque than the stock head. My main complaint here, is that this is a common problem with these heads. It's kinda BS to me that a manufacturer puts out cars and trucks that commonly blowout spark plugs.
So, a couple of weeks pass. It's Saturday again, so my father is going to take my mother's Mustang to work. Today he comes home and says it's leaking coolant, and it looks like it's coming from around the thermostat. OK, no big deal. Probably needs a new gasket or o-ring. He went and picked up a new o-ring and a new thermostat, just because I was in there anyway, so he thought I may as well replace that.
When I pulled it apart, I discovered that the intake has a crack from the lip where the thermostat housing seals down near 1/4". I sealed it up with some gasket maker the best I can. Then I went to install the new thermostat, which of course is the wrong one. Put the old one in with a new o-ring and it's curing overnight. Hopefully the sealant will keep it from leaking this time.
I know there are a lot of benefits to plastic, but if you're gonna make a major engine component out of plastic, couldn't you at least make it kinda beefy? I couldn't help but go to my older 5.0 and look at my aluminum intake, which has never cracked. I'm not even that old, and I find myself saying "they just don't make them like they used to". In a matter of a couple of weeks this car has had problems with the cylinder head and the intake manifold, two major components. It seems to be right about on par with my Chinese scooters lately.
I'm not really sure what the point of this rant is, I just had to do it. Sorry.
Anyway, onto the point. A couple of weeks ago, my father was going to drive it to work. He said he fired it up and it made a very loud noise that went with engine speed, so he shut it off and took another car to work. I went out and started it and immediately I could tell it was leaking compression. It's a very sharp, loud, sound that you tend to know once you've heard it. On closer inspection, I see that the spark plug boot on one of the coil packs is blown apart. I pulled the coil pack out and, sure enough, the spark plug had blown out of the hole. The coil pack's boot and spring were also damaged, but those only cost around $7 shipped on eBay.
The spark plugs on a modular Ford in the Triton engine family sit way down in tunnels, recessed in the head. That means repairs are not easily done with the average tool. I look into it, and a company called Timesert makes kits to repair these heads, without removing them from the car. It's sort of like a helicoil, but it locks itself into place a little better. Helicoils often come out with the spark plugs, these are not supposed to. They are also aluminum inserts, rather than steel. The steel inserts are said to cause hot spots that can induce detonation in the aluminum heads. The down side to this kit... it costs $370. Could have had a shop do it for less I imagine (I hear Ford will do it for around $300), but then I thought with my luck it'll happen again, so it's better to have the tool for slightly more cost and do the work myself. That way if it ever happens again, I can cover it for free.
The tool worked very well and the repair went smoothly. I used a lot of grease on all of the cutting and threading tools to catch metal debris and then used a shop vac with a drinking straw taped to it to suck out anything else that might have been in there. Of course the piston was setup with the valves closed to minimize the risk for debris traveling anywhere. Seems to be doing just fine, and the insert is actually rated to handle more torque than the stock head. My main complaint here, is that this is a common problem with these heads. It's kinda BS to me that a manufacturer puts out cars and trucks that commonly blowout spark plugs.
So, a couple of weeks pass. It's Saturday again, so my father is going to take my mother's Mustang to work. Today he comes home and says it's leaking coolant, and it looks like it's coming from around the thermostat. OK, no big deal. Probably needs a new gasket or o-ring. He went and picked up a new o-ring and a new thermostat, just because I was in there anyway, so he thought I may as well replace that.
When I pulled it apart, I discovered that the intake has a crack from the lip where the thermostat housing seals down near 1/4". I sealed it up with some gasket maker the best I can. Then I went to install the new thermostat, which of course is the wrong one. Put the old one in with a new o-ring and it's curing overnight. Hopefully the sealant will keep it from leaking this time.
I know there are a lot of benefits to plastic, but if you're gonna make a major engine component out of plastic, couldn't you at least make it kinda beefy? I couldn't help but go to my older 5.0 and look at my aluminum intake, which has never cracked. I'm not even that old, and I find myself saying "they just don't make them like they used to". In a matter of a couple of weeks this car has had problems with the cylinder head and the intake manifold, two major components. It seems to be right about on par with my Chinese scooters lately.
I'm not really sure what the point of this rant is, I just had to do it. Sorry.
My old dryer finally failed though and I had to buy a new one, as simple as they come this one, hope it can go for awhile. I think it's true though. Everythings designed to fail. Thing is , we won't go back to the same company, and we don't tell our friends to buy one, so they are really hurting themselves.
