if you have a ford

[mdram]

Randy can you look into this? you work for ford right?

http://www.thewbalchannel.com/news/9228832/detail.html

Known Defect Leaves Some Ford Owners Stuck
Maryland Motorists Report Spark Plug Explosions

POSTED: 11:15 pm EDT May 16, 2006
UPDATED: 8:01 am EDT May 17, 2006

BALTIMORE -- Motorists across the country say their cars have a defect, but the Ford Motor Co. denies it.

WBAL-TV 11 News I-Team reporter Barry Simms reported cars, trucks and sport utility vehicles are suddenly losing power, leaving owners stuck -- with hefty repair bills.

Chris Miller, of Crofton, drives a 2002 Ford F-150 Lightning pickup truck. The name suggests a force that moves in a flash, but in traffic last December, Miller said, "There was an explosion."

Miller's Lightning -- with only 44,000 miles -- suddenly lost power because of a spark plug that had blown out of the engine. Miller showed 11 News the spark plug, explaining how there were not threads in the hole where it screws in to the engine.
Click here to find out more!

"It shows the damage of uncontrolled detonations," Miller said.

A Ford dealership replaced the aluminum cylinder heads and changed the spark plugs at a cost to Miller of nearly $2,500.

Miller believes it's time for Ford to take responsibility.

"This is atrocious. This is negligence," Miller said.

Fred Spinicchia, of Manchester, found himself in trouble last March on the beltway.

"I started looking around and see this coil just laying on the motor and there's no spark plug," said Spinicchia, whose 2002 F-150 pickup truck had about 55,000 miles.

Drivers nationwide have complained of similar spark plug problems in Ford Triton V8 and V10 engines. The problem has not only affected F-series pickup trucks, but also Ford Explorers, Expeditions, Excursions, Crown Victorias and Mustangs -- all manufactured between 1997 and 2003.

Attorney Donald Ricketts believes Ford is aware of the problem but refuses to compensate the owners.

"I don't understand why Ford treats its customers this way," Ricketts said.

Ricketts wants Ford to recall as many as 17.5 million trucks and cars sold between 1997 and 2003. He has filed a class action lawsuit in an attempt to get Ford to recall the vehicles or fix them when the blowouts occur.

"There's no question this is a defect," Ricketts said. "Ford won't own up to it and take responsibility for it."

"I think it's wrong. Ford forgets it's the average Joe who made the company what it is," Spinicchia said.

"Anytime a vehicle malfunctions while it's being operated, it's a safety issue," Miller said.

A Ford representative contends it's not a safety issue and the lawsuit doesn't have any merit.

"Improper maintenance, or wear and tear from high mileage, or severe driving can effect the durability of the spark plug threads, but that doesn't mean there is a defect in the part or the vehicle."

However, customer complaints have reached the desk of Joe Benton, who writes about automotive issues for ConsumerAffairs.com. Benton said many of the complaints surround the No. 3 spark plug.

"That raises a red flag in most people's minds, but not in the minds of the people at the Ford Motor Co.," Benton said.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration studied nearly 500 complaints and found that most of the vehicles had lost power, but 99 percent of them did not stall.

NHTSA concluded, "None of these showed any evidence of a serious safety consequence."

As a result, the agency did not issue a recall.

"How dangerous does it have to be?" Miller said.

Ford said it is consistently working to improve quality and has made changes to the spark plug thread design on certain engines at various times, including 2002 and 2003.

[Steve]

I've heard about this too.
Me thinks it was limited to the V10, wasn't it?
Randy, are you able to find other common probs too?

[Randy Stinchcomb]

yep, I see this alot and even more because Im into racing the Modular 4.6 & 5.4 engines and work on and wth many Ford Racing and Performance related web sites.
it's been a problem for awhile, I could go into details but it would prob take a whole day and if someone is not up on automotive engines, it prob won't make much sense.

the heads which are aluminum, were designed wth 1/2 threads in the sparkplug bungs (to quicken production time at the engine plants) so only about 4 threads hold the sparkplugs in place (un-like my 4.6 Ford Racing heads which are a "full thread" design). now due to "detonation" from poor quality gas or poorly mantained vehicles, or improperly tuned vehicles over a period of time the detonation issues starts "hammering" on the plug, which loosens it up and pushes against the aluminum threads in the head causing the plug to blow-out of the heads and taking the threads wth it. there are several fixes for this, 1 is replacing the head wth a newer design "full thread" head and a simplier fix is to use a product called a "time-sert" which is like a steel heli-coil(or threaded insert) that is inserted into the dammaged sparkplug hole.

as stated in the news article above the guy wth the Lightning, well thats a performance vehicle and people who have them along wth Mustang Gt's and Cobra's will have this problem due to the fact that they modify there vehicles wth differen size blower pulleys(Lightnings and Cobras have supercharges) which over drive the supercharger and then use cheap gas along wth computor enhanced mods which leads them to detonation and then the plug problem. we do not see this in everyday "normal" use of these engins in cars and trucks.

[Coop]

speaking of fords,,,my wife purchased a 2006 conv mustang,,,a problem that some have including hers is if you drive with more than 2 people or put items in the trunk, there is just enough weight where a cable hits the diveshaft and makes a grinding sound,,,she called the dealer and they were clueless and said they never heard of the problem,,,before she took it to the dealer she researched it online because the dealer was clueless and she figured out the problem from a mustang forum,,,we couldnt figure out why it would stop when she drove it to work (by herself),,,so we never took it in until it dawned on me that there must be just enough weight to create rubbing on something,,,she researched it and found the problem before we ever got to the dealer and told them the problem,,,my wife, the technician.

[mdram]

thanks for the reply, i can see where it may not affect the everyday driver. but i cant beleive they did this on the performance engines too. oh well, guess they had thier reasons

[Steve]

There have been V10's with less than 5000 miles on them that have tossed a plug, so it's not a maintenance issue.
Octane ratings are checked so I'm not going with the poor quality gas either. Plus, this has happened to vehicles driven cross country so they aren't getting multiple tanks of "bad" gas from one dealer.
Ford simply messed up with the quarted thread or whatever. Just like they messed up on the early 6.0 diesel.

Perhaps the people this DIDN'T happen to are the ones that don't put the throttle to the floor on occasion.

[Randy Stinchcomb]

I agree to some extent that FoMoCo has to take some of blame but wth ALL the "hand-held" performance programmers today, who is to say some of these people are not messing wth the settings, either spark advance or changing the fuel curve or both to get more HP & TQ out of there truck. I see this everyday on the performance web sites, anyone can buy these programmers for @$300.00 and alot don't have a clue what there doing as far as tuning. Im not defending Ford but there is always 2 sides to every story.

[DaveH]

Good answer Randy,Ford will be pleased.I love my F150 PU

[Randy Stinchcomb]

[quote user="DaveH" post="5261"]Good answer Randy,Ford will be pleased.I love my F150 PU[/quote]


yeah, how's that for suckin' up

you just never know when and where Big Brother is watchin' & readin'