P0172, P0174, P0300, P0301-3, P0316 after summer vacation

[codysmith105]

Alright, sounds good. Will do.

 

[Tom Thomsen]

Awesome, thanks so much! I'm in a situation where driving the truck is a bad idea, so I'm going to do everything on food / public transit and go ahead and start the teardown. I'll start with provisioning tools / parts and go from there. I might make a video or write something up after I'm done.

Wish you were in SoCal, I'd be game to assist! You're an engineer (me too). Use your logical mind to figure this out. If someone else can do it, so can you! Please post updates! I just bought my 2004 Explorer yesterday. Drives like a dream but has a vibration when stopped and in gear. I checked and there were the same codes you had stored. Other than the issue I stated, my new purchase is in excellent condition so I plan to be very active on this forum and learn this car inside and out!

 

[CodyS]

I might have gotten locked out of my account. Don't care right now, point is it's me.

I'm at Carnegie Mellon's Silicon Valley campus in Sunnyvale, CA.

Dad's flying in this Thursday, we've got all the stuff. All the bolts, the cam service kit, the Cloydes kit, gasket kit, tools, and I have two guys on Craigslist ready to sell me a hoist and a floor jack.

I'll do my best to document the process.

Thanks for the wishes Tom, if you need help diagnosing your issue I'm happy to help.

 

[Tom Thomsen]

I might have gotten locked out of my account. Don't care right now, point is it's me.

I'm at Carnegie Mellon's Silicon Valley campus in Sunnyvale, CA.

Dad's flying in this Thursday, we've got all the stuff. All the bolts, the cam service kit, the Cloydes kit, gasket kit, tools, and I have two guys on Craigslist ready to sell me a hoist and a floor jack.

I'll do my best to document the process.

Thanks for the wishes Tom, if you need help diagnosing your issue I'm happy to help.

I might have gotten locked out of my account. Don't care right now, point is it's me.

I'm at Carnegie Mellon's Silicon Valley campus in Sunnyvale, CA.

Dad's flying in this Thursday, we've got all the stuff. All the bolts, the cam service kit, the Cloydes kit, gasket kit, tools, and I have two guys on Craigslist ready to sell me a hoist and a floor jack.

I'll do my best to document the process.

Thanks for the wishes Tom, if you need help diagnosing your issue I'm happy to help.

Thank you for your reply, Cody. My immediate problem is the harmonic balancer. The center is loose! Next, will be what you're doing. Luckily, I have access to every tool you can think of and a lift, engine hoist, and transmission jack. This needs to be right....it's for my daughter!

 

[codysmith105]

Uhg, this has been a mother of a effer.

First we hit the Ford proprietary tranny cooler line "quick disconnects" which we still don't have off even after having bought several AC / Tranny / Fuel quick disconnect kits.

Next we ran into issues with the intake manifold, which we did get off.

Then it was the starter. I forgot that I have the 4x4 option, meaning there's a whole drive shaft right smack in the way of the starter / hole to access the flywheel / flexplate. We got it off after a while. That's where my father wanted to throw in the towel. Now we've got 5 of the 9 transmission bolts out but the other four near the top read of the engine are being extremely elusive. And we just dropped our 3/8" socket with the 14mm (I believe) down behind the engine. We think it's chilling out somewhere on top of the transmission, but as far as we know it could have fallen into a black hole and could be in 1692 chilling with the locals.

I'm really not sure if this is going to end well.

 

[Littleant]

Cody try not to set a time frame for this job. Look at it this way. Ford's perverted joke on us for creating this nightmare. Take your time and when things seem to be going bad use any cuss word beginning with F or S and ending with Ford may help.

 

[Littleant]

Cody try not to set a time frame for this job. Look at it this way. Ford's perverted joke on us for creating this nightmare. Take your time and when things seem to be going bad use any cuss word beginning with F or S and ending with Ford may help.

 

[codysmith105]

That's pretty great lol.

Unfortunately I only have dad here for another few days. He flew in to CA from FL to do this job. If we can get the engine out and back in I believe I can finish the job myself. If we get it out but not back in, yikes.

Oh and Sunnyvale has a provision only allowing repairs for three days which we're technically passed and inappreciable cars get towed pretty quickly even from the driveway.

We've been pretty incognito about this though so hopefully we can button it up today / tomorrow and make it look like it's back running.

 

[Littleant]

I think you and your father will get it done. If anyone complains hand them $10.00 and tell them to go away.

 

[codysmith105]

Ok so this is roughly where we left off when dad flew back home.

Intake is off, exhaust bolts are out, we managed to get the tranny bolts out (somehow), etc. etc.

The radiator is still holding on by that one infamous bolt which requires removing the transmission cooling radiator to get to, and the tranny cooling lines are still attached.

We have not removed the tranny and I'd really really like to keep it that way.

As far as I can tell the only thing holding the engine on is the mounts and the four bolts from the fuel injectors. Maybe some wiring too.

I'm thinking I should go after those transmission cooling lines on the radiator which require a special tool to disconnect next. Then I can finish dismantling the radiator without touching the condensing unit and at least that's done and then I should be able to move onto pulling the engine.

 

[Littleant]

Starting to wonder if it would be easier to leave engine in and do the fronts and drop the trans to do the rear. One hell of a lousy job. Great design ford.

 

[hahatherapy]

I'm just wondering how you're making out? Did you finish the job? I came here looking for some info and started reading your posts when I realized that they are from this month. I am putting my tools and parts together at this time to pull my engine for a full timing set also.

 

[codysmith105]

I'm waiting for a McMaster Carr order to arrive with the bolts to pull the engine. I already ordered bolts earlier last week but the chain I have is too short. There's another thread I posted about the engine pull that goes into it. PM me a Skype / Discord / Google Handouts or a phone number and I'll happily tell you all about it thus far.

 

[hahatherapy]

I'm waiting for a McMaster Carr order to arrive with the bolts to pull the engine. I already ordered bolts earlier last week but the chain I have is too short. There's another thread I posted about the engine pull that goes into it. PM me a Skype / Discord / Google Handouts or a phone number and I'll happily tell you all about it thus far.

Ok, will do. Any help that I can get in preparation will be much appreciated. I have a 2004 Sport Trac with the 4.0 and not too happy to learn that I have to pull the engine to do the timing set. I'm also not willing to pay to have someone else do the work that I can do. So it will have to be done.

 

[codysmith105]

Alright boys, we're in this to win it now....

One last sneaky tranny bolt was holding on, took a while to get it. It was on the drivers side, not pictured here. I just took this picture for diagnostic purposes. Took a while to feel out where ish it was. Couldn't see it until I had it in my hand. I really thought we had all of them.

I should note that we did NOT have to pull the radiator out, even though we took it apart all ecept for that one infamous bolt from hell which we then decided not to deal with. The engine, water-pump and all will come out if you turn it sideways as shown.

Also I screamed for joy when it finally popped loose. Dad was there via Discord video chat. Couldn't have gotten this far without him.

Engine is sitting wrapped up in a tarp around the side of the house. I need to figure out the engine stand bolts and order them. Once I have it on the stand I'll start cleaning and disassembling it. But that will have to wait until this weekend likely.

 

[hahatherapy]

Congratulations! That's a major step and accomplishment so far. I'm pretty sure that I have the weekend off so I'll be in touch and maybe we can chat about the job. Good luck.

 

[Littleant]

Good job Cody.

 

[codysmith105]

OK now I'm really confused, the passenger side chain guide is in near mint condition...

Not a great picture, but I've looked down there, no plastic bits, nothing out of norm. How the ford does the passenger bank go out of time without an issuer on the cassette on that side?

 

[codysmith105]

Does that look like an OEM timing guide to those experienced with these things?

I'm going to definitively check tomorrow morning whether or not the engine is in time, but the reason we're here is I was told by a reputable mechanic who I paid $300 to do a leak down test, that the rear passenger side chain was so loose it whipped around and cracked the valve cover.

The cover isn't cracked, and that chain looks brand new. Other than it being discolored / miss-colored? SO that leaves me wondering, WTF? If the engine is out of time, well that kind of makes sense and I'm just going to have to assume that someone actually fixed a timing problem, did a piss poor job (probably torqued the stress to yield bolts wrong or reused them or something) and that I lost time somewhere other than the guides.

In that case, I would know what's wrong, how to fix it, parts in hand, only unusual thing is the not cracked valve cover and the perfectly OK rear cassette. I guess I could live with that.

If the engine is in time... whooaaa people got some splain' do. Cuz that means A. something else is wrong, and B. I likely pulled an engine as an academic exercise.

 

[donalds]

My old engine with coolant all over it lol

It has the original timing components
Funny thing it they're not broke

Hope this helps