How to: 2013 Explorer 3.5L Ti-VCT V6 Water Pump and Timing Set Replacement

[Mike D S]

I’ll think about the AC thing. Tomorrow is supposed to be the tear down. My wife is gone all day so I need to inventory tools in case I need something prior to getting started.

 

[mguy13sport]

I left the AC hooked up and it was doable but extremely tight.

Since you will be solo on the cover install, before you apply any rtv do some slow motion test fits. I found that just dropping it straight in from top wasnt gonna work. I had to start at like 30 degree angle and align as im lowering it in to really prevent rubbing RTV on stuff. Practice makes perfect.

 

[JohnelP]

one note that helped me a bit. you may want to loosen (do not remove completely) the bolts on the "engine/trans" mount on the upper driver side as well. Not the lowest one(3rd). that way the engine will have more up/down play when controlling it with the floor jack supporting the engine. Being able to lift/lower the engine more will make your life easier to position the engine to easiest reach cover bolts+ mount bracket bolts, etc. Just by removing the passenger side mount will keep the engine stiff and you may not get too much play. You'll know what i mean when you will need to deal with firewall bank valve cover gasket and screws. It will help with cover "slide in" the way mguy13sport described.
You'll need to have engine up/down all the time.

i assume you have the ford service manual for the torque sequence and values. You can download it free. But I assume you know that already.
also, pay attention to the hidden intake manifold bolt. you can barely see it, manual mentions it though

And the wire from knock sensor (?) on bank 2 may restrict the easiness of valve cover removal. it is the running over the bank2 (front) valve cover. Not fun, but doable.

Cover the alternator with a plastic bag. Oil will drip, and may get in the alternator. Not really benefic for it.
cover the camshafts with lint free cloth or a thick clean plastic.
Old gasket rubber will be in the engine block holes where engine cover bolts fit. You need to clean them right. Loan from autozone the rethread tool. Will make your life easier. do not leave old hardened gasket maker on the threads in the block holes. brake/carburetor cleaner will clean your lungs, not the old gasket. Don't use drills. It is aluminum block. You'll see what i mean.
When removing the crank pulley, use the smallest 3 arm gear puller. I think the GM model works too, but have not tried that
When installing the crank pulley do not hammer it. It may be tempting, but keep your thrust bearing intact.
I know you know that already, but just saying
If you do it for the first time, take your time. Do not rush. Not complicated, but can be tedious sometimes

 

[Mike D S]

one note that helped me a bit. you may want to loosen (do not remove completely) the bolts on the "engine/trans" mount on the upper driver side as well. Not the lowest one(3rd). that way the engine will have more up/down play when controlling it with the floor jack supporting the engine. Being able to lift/lower the engine more will make your life easier to position the engine to easiest reach cover bolts+ mount bracket bolts, etc. Just by removing the passenger side mount will keep the engine stiff and you may not get too much play. You'll know what i mean when you will need to deal with firewall bank valve cover gasket and screws. It will help with cover "slide in" the way mguy13sport described.
You'll need to have engine up/down all the time.

i assume you have the ford service manual for the torque sequence and values. You can download it free. But I assume you know that already.
also, pay attention to the hidden intake manifold bolt. you can barely see it, manual mentions it though

And the wire from knock sensor (?) on bank 2 may restrict the easiness of valve cover removal. it is the running over the bank2 (front) valve cover. Not fun, but doable.

Cover the alternator with a plastic bag. Oil will drip, and may get in the alternator. Not really benefic for it.
cover the camshafts with lint free cloth or a thick clean plastic.
Old gasket rubber will be in the engine block holes where engine cover bolts fit. You need to clean them right. Loan from autozone the rethread tool. Will make your life easier. do not leave old hardened gasket maker on the threads in the block holes. brake/carburetor cleaner will clean your lungs, not the old gasket. Don't use drills. It is aluminum block. You'll see what i mean.
When removing the crank pulley, use the smallest 3 arm gear puller. I think the GM model works too, but have not tried that
When installing the crank pulley do not hammer it. It may be tempting, but keep your thrust bearing intact.
I know you know that already, but just saying
If you do it for the first time, take your time. Do not rush. Not complicated, but can be tedious sometimes

I appreciate all the tips. I've pretty much lost most of the neanderthal "just hammer it on" urges, but it never hurts to hear it. I have access to the AllddataDIY subscription for the Explorer. So I've got ready access to the manual procedures. I never got the hang of using a tablet around the ship, so I've already stepped through the procedures and printed out all the relevant portions. When I do complex repairs I tend to go slow and check off each step in series. Having it all on paper makes that easier and I can take notes as I go. In a general order, I have the following procedures printed out for easy access.

1. Valve Covers L&R and upper intake manifold
2. Fender liner, crank pulley, crank seal, degas bottle
3. Engine front cover
4. Pump

Good tip on the thread clean out and reminder on covering the alternator. It's always the little side things that can kill a lot of time in the end.

 

[Mike D S]

Ok, quick update end of day 1 morning of day 2. I'm about 40% done and currently have most of the front engine cover bolts loose and am just about ready to pull the front cover.

I ran into several problems that burned up about 2-3 hours yesterday. First was getting the pulley bolt loose. We recently moved and a lot of my stuff is still boxed which includes my impact gun. I spent 30 minutes looking for the impact before giving up. I then spent about an hour trying different things to hold the pulley before taking a strip of 3/8" aluminum stock I had and cutting a C shape into it. I then rested the aluminum C inside one of the pulley holes and he other end on the frame rail and finally got it out.

The second issue was I figured out the belt tensioner was actually shot as well. It still tensions but something inside it is jammed so you can't rotate it more than about 10 degrees to release the tension, so I had to fight with that for about 30 minutes to finally get the belt off. In hindsight I should have just cut the belt and been done with it.

The last couple of issues were positioning and tool availability. I think these should be added to the Gotchya list. First was in order to get the motor mount nuts off the studs on the engine side you need a very deep well socket. The one I had was about 1/4" too short so I had to run out and get another one. The new one was long enough to get it off, but I'm worried about it having enough engagement to retorque it, so I may have to go find an even longer one.

The other thing I ran into was just general positioning of the vehicle. I started out by jacking it up to get the fender liner out and had it jacked up high enough to get the wheel off. This made yesterday tough as it was really hard to reach into the back of the engine compartment jacked up like that. So later in the day I reset the height so the front was lower and that helped a bit, but I'd probably burned 30 minutes in extra effort by that point trying to reach around the back of the RH valve cover, etc.

Plan this morning is to run to the parts place and get a new belt tensioner, new crankshaft bolt and a set of internal star sockets to take two of the engine mount studs out as I cannot get two of the engine cover bolts out past the studs. The bolts are loose, but just long enough they won't clear the studs. For ease of reassembly I want clear access to all the bolts.

The order from Rockauto got delayed, to I wont have the timing chain kit until 2-4 PM so I guess I'm looking at a 3 day job now as I guess I'll have just enough time to get the engine cover back on before it starts to get too dark to work efficiently.

 

[Mike D S]

Update end of day 2. I had a good morning, got the front cover off with no issues other than having to jockey the engine up and down a bit to get to all the bolts. Pulled the timing chain, guides, phasers, secondary chains, etc with no isses. Pulled and replaced the water pump. I used a thick plastic bag partially taped in and partially tucked in and managed to direct 80% of the coolant into a bucket instead of the pan. Drained the pan again and then cleaned up the back of the front cover and the sealing surface on the block.

So that's all golden and I'm ready about 12:30 to start putting on the timing kit. But no Fedex package yet. Fast forward to the end of the day now and Fedex tells me that they are "experiencing high package volumes" and that its not unusual for a package to sit for 24 hours without being scanned or actually delivered. All day today it showed out for delivery but with no scan showing it going on a truck and when I called earlier the first rep told me that "they marked it out for delivery because they expect to deliver it today".

So other than the dry humping from Fedex everything else went ok. And of course the station doesn't deliver to residences on Sunday apparently so the earliest I'll get it if the tracing team finds it is Monday.

 

[JohnelP]

You are practically done! Few more little bolts and you'll have a new car

>> two of the engine mount studs out as I cannot get two of the engine cover bolts out past the studs. The bolts are loose, but just long enough they won't clear the studs. For ease of reassembly I want clear access to all the bolts.

I think I recall the two bots you refer to. You mean the two bolts "up in the valley" hidden by the engine motor mount studs?. I recall I did not take them out completely and started prying out the cover. With the cover detached, you get the slack needed to push them around the studs.

On the crank bolt, I see some people put a large breaker bar on the pulley bolt and the ground with the handle opposing the clockwise movement, remove the fuel pump fuse, and start the engine for a fraction of a second. They use the starter as the driving force. I did not use that method, as I do not want breaker bars flying in my garage. I did it like you, put a long bar between the frame and one leg of the pulley, and secured it enough to take the bolt out with a regular breaker bar.
When putting it back may not be a bad idea to lock the flywheel. Either up from the starter, or below from the little window. Just enough to fit the crank pulley and bolt without hammering. Other method I have personally used for lighter locking was to get one cylinder bottom dead center, and using a cylinder leak tester, kept 50 psi in the cylinder. 50 psi on bottom center of one piston will lock the crankshaft fairly well. I am not sure that will be enough for the final torque of the crank pulley bolt, but will take you far enough.

Good work! Take pictures!

 

[Mike D S]

I didn't take a lot of pics of the process itself, but here's two pics of my particular cheats. First off, my ultra custom pulley locking tool. IT doesn't look like much but it worked like a champ. On a side note, I have push button start and there is no way to really "bump" the starter. I destroyed a 3/8" breaker bar by shearing the 3/8 pin off by trying to bump start the bolt loose following google advice. It may work for some people, but I give that method a thumbs down as its unpredictable. Thought a 1/2" bar might have been ok potentially.

Second pic is something my dad taught me though he used to do it with posterboard and manually drawing the parts. This is my bolt board with a blown up image just 3M77'd onto a big piece of cardboard. For complex parts or where's there's a lot of fasteners I tend to do some version of this as it helps keep track of what goes where.

 

[Mike D S]

One of the other things I'm planning on doing is using two remaining engine mount studs on the front cover (removed two to get the above mentioned bolts out of the cover) and installing a handle basically. Two pieces of 1" PVC pipe with a wood bar across held on by the stud nuts/

I hope that having a solid, dry handhold that doesn't involve reaching around the edges of the front cover will help in getting it back into position smoothly. I still need to dry run it, but the thought of being able to keep my hands just above the top of the cover and having a nice solid grip seems like an advantage for maneuvering it back into place. I'll post a pic once I get a chance to try it.

As I know I've got at least 2-3 days until the timing parts get here I find me energy level pretty tamped down as work this week is going to be 7-7 all week and I'm not going to be able to get to it again until next weekend, so borrowing the wife's car all week I guess.

 

[Mike D S]

Ok, follow up and a couple of additional thoughts on the water pump job. I finally got all the parts middle of last week and starting Saturday morning I got back after it. Generally speaking the re-assembly is a lot easier that the dis-assembly. Things are cleaner and you basically know where everything goes, etc.

I had one major close call installing the water pump as I was going to reuse the bolts and when installing everything to 89 in-lbs I had one bolt that was taking more turns to tighten and as it was snugging I heard a small pop. I was using a 1/4" drive torque wrench and fortunately I was going slow. While I thought I had potentially broken the bolt, I was able to back out the bolt with my fingers and luckily though the body of the bolt had broken the thread was still continuous and I got the whole bolt back out. Examining the bolt I found it was significantly elongated in the threads around the break and I just didn't check it close enough before re-using it. I removed the other 6 bolts I already had in and found two others with some thread elongation but nothing like the first one that snapped.

The elongation on the bolt that snapped was about 2mm and the others were about 1mm. With the pitch of the bolt I can't see you getting this much elongation at 89 in-lbs + 45 deg. I'm 99% sure I didn't rotate multiple bolts 1-2 extra turns at full torque (which is that the elongation looked like) so I'm assuming it came that way. But I ended up pitching all the WP bolts an getting new ones from Ford on Saturday morning. Maybe this is a no brainer for everyone else, but I'd definitely recommend going with new bolts for the WP based on what I saw.

After burning an hour with the extra WP work and the run to Ford, I got back at it and the timing kit went on smoothly. I had to fiddle the cams a few degrees with a wrench to get the phasers back on but it was pretty straight forward. Thanks to the notes in the other thread and the piece of paper that came in the timing kit I knew about the need to release the secondary tensioners by pressing them down. I ended up replacing the phaser bolts, secondary chains, secondary tensioners, main chain, guides, and crankshaft timing sprocket. The Cloyes kit came with a main tensioner, but it just seemed very cheaply made. The one I got had a rough casting and the shaft had a little play so I ended up cleaning, inspecting and reusing the original main tensioner as it seemed to be in good condition with good spring force.

Putting the front cover on was easier than I thought it would be after taking 3-4 practice runs. I left the AC line connected but pulled back and zip tied, I stood on a cooler to have really good top down visibility and after a few tries I could guide the engine cover into position without rubbing the gasket side on anything. I did two things which made it easier from my viewpoint. The first was I used some PVC pipe to make a good handle on the cover using two of the engine mount studs. This gave me a good solid handhold for moving and tilting the cover while using my other hand for finicky parts of the move. The second thing I'd say is that while you could do this without the guide pins, I realized quickly that trying to line up the crank and the rest of the cover correctly was not easy. I fabricated two wooden dowels sticking out about 3" to use as guide pins and it made the whole job much easier.

With the guide pins, you lower the cover down keeping plenty of clearance and once its down to the right height, you tilt the cover forward at the top to engage the guide pins. Once the pins are in the holes, the whole cover slides forward easily and the two pins keep it aligned pretty much perfectly. While I wouldn't necessarily order the $50 alignment pins listed in the repair procedure, I second the recommendation made by someone else to get two new bolts and cut the heads off a pair of old ones to use as guide pins. The dry run after putting the pins in was so much easier than the 2-3 before the pins.

After getting the cover on, I did the race to install all the bolts. I had my bolt board ready with all the bolts cleaned and in their slots. My wife helped me out by handing me the bolts in order and marking the ones I had torqued so other than a bunch of up and down it went pretty smooth. From there it I went ahead and installed the belt tensioner since it was easy to get too at that point and then went to the engine mount and valve covers. Everything went smoothly until I accidentally pinched the alternator main lead under the edge of the LH valve cover. I had left the negative battery lead accidentally connected after unlocking the doors and as I tightened the cover down I got a bunch of sparking and hot wire smell. I yanked the neg terminal and that stopped it, but it was late on Saturday and it wasn't immediately obvious what it was so I called it quits for the night.

Sunday morning had me checking things with good light and I quickly figured our the alternator wire was pinched. It had gotten pulled into the valve cover as I moved the wiring harness around putting the cover on. The retaining pin on the harness that runs up the left side of the cover had caught on the alternator wire and I didn't notice when tightening it down as the pinch was directly under the harness. With better light I ran my fingers around the cover and could immediately tell the alternator wire didn't have any play. Removing the cover exposed the pinched insulation. I repaired it with some self fusing tape and some plastic spiral wire loom for a little extra protection. Testing after that seems to indicate no electronic or electrical issues, so I think I lucked out.

After that it was all down hill. Reinstalled the LH valve cover, inlet manifold, and the rest of the parts. Double checked the oil pan was fully drained, swapped the filter and filled the engine with clean oil, filled the coolant and reinstalled the fuel pump fuse. After a few cranks it fired right up and I went through the coolant bleeding procedure. The first few times I ran it I got a little worried as I had a fair amount of smoke coming up from the engine bay, but after a little inspection is was just a little bit of oil from the rear cover which had dripped on the exhaust manifold. The smoke cleared up after a few 2-3 minute runs while bleeding the coolant.

After that I took a short test drive around the block then checked all the fluids and found no issues. So then I took a 15 minute drive with about 8-10 minutes on the freeway at 65. Stopped and check everything again with no problem and headed home where I took another look and didn't see any drips and the fluids looked good. So a this point I think I'm good and saved several thousand doing the work at the end of the day.

 

[endmout]

I know this is a bit of an old thread, but I completed this job last week as well, and this tip was a lifesaver. I was able to hold the front camshafts still using a large wrench on the hex hold feature and the cam shaft tools, but on the firewall side of the engine I could not get the wrench in there. This method with the socket and a prybar rather than block of wood worked perfectly. (I did not have a block the right size but my pry bar fit in there perfect!)

In case anyone is interested, here was my shopping list including tools, supplies, and parts. Total cost for me was $1101 so I saved over $3500 on the dealer cost. Thank you so much for all of the help in this forum. You all really are the best!

Thanks for the list this is awesome. Could you let me know where you got the procedure for the job? Alldata? Thanks

 

[jons901]

Thanks for the list this is awesome. Could you let me know where you got the procedure for the job? Alldata? Thanks

It was a combination of the Ford procedure and youtube videos. There are a bunch out there on the 3.5s. After watching the videos and reading the forum I followed the Ford procedure from the service manual.

 

[peterk9]

Thanks for the list this is awesome. Could you let me know where you got the procedure for the job? Alldata? Thanks

Welcome to the Forum.

Peter

 

[ttrebing]

Hi All. Recently changed out the water pump on my 2013 Limited and replaced all timing components while I was at it. Watched the YouTube videos by fordtechmakuloco and the tips posted here by mcpcartier (Thanks to both!). Happy to say that it was a success and I think I caught the failing WP before any coolant contaminated the oil (at least based on visual examination). I wanted to pass along a few tidbits that might be helpful to others contemplating this job.

• It’s a big job but more tedious than physical. I followed the FSM but for one key difference: Like mcpcartier suggested, I did not evacuate and disconnect the indicated AC line. The AC line is in an inconvenient location but you can work around it. I used a zip tie to hold it out of the way as much as possible without damaging the line.
• It took me roughly 20 hours split over 3 days in total but I’m slow. I could do it faster now that I’ve done it once but it would still be a 2 day job.
• I was alerted to the problem by a smell of coolant when the engine was hot and the undeniable coolant dribbles on my driveway. Coolant level was also low in the degas tank. Lastly an inspection of the area near the water pump weep hole showed an obvious stream of coolant leaking right after driving when the system was under pressure.
• Get the special tools: the cam shaft holders to keep the cams from rotating and especially the Torx Plus bit. These are different than regular torx. You’ll need the TP-55 size for the cam phaser bolts. All were cheap and available online. I can share links to the products i chose if anyone is interested. I did not find need to use the locating pins as noted in the FSM.
• Honestly for me the worst parts of the job were: 1) reaching and disconnecting all the harness clips from the firewall side valve cover without destroying the clips; 2) maneuvering the front cover back into position without bumping something and messing up the bead of sealant; and 3) the absolutely obscene torque sequence and quantity of bolts involved in snugging down the front cover. If you’ve seen the procedure you know what I mean.
• Practice maneuvering the front cover back into position as many times as you need to get comfortable with your process before applying the sealant and going at it for real
• The crank bolt did not want to budge initially but after a couple mins of heat from a propane torch it came off easily
• The smallest 3 jaw puller in the set from HF worked just fine to remove the crank pulley
• Use a paint pen and mark the bolts as you torque them to final spec. You really don’t want to lose track and have to check them all again especially if you spread the job over a couple of days.
• As indicated in the FSM, I did have to raise and lower the engine slightly to install/remove some of the front cover bolts that were obscured by the frame rail.
• Finally, when tightening the crank bolt or phaser bolts, the camshafts will want to spin. This kept causing the cam holder tool to lift out of position and in one case it popped clean off the camshaft. Doh! To address this, I found that a deep socket (craftsman 9/16” in my case) fit perfectly in the vct solenoid bore and could be used with a wooden shim to wedge the camshaft holder in place. I’ll try to post or attach a pic below.

I hope this is helpful to someone!

View attachment 166136

Awesome tip.

My right side exhaust camshaft phazer bolt is STUCK tight. I actually bent the holder after using a cheater bar to try and break it loose. After putting a big wrench on the camshaft and adding a strap wrench on the intake phazer, I literally snapped my T55 clean I'm half. Ordering a couple of TP55s and another set of holders that hopefully for a little tighter, I'll give it another try.

Any suggestions would be appreciated...

 

[mguy13sport]

Awesome tip.

My right side exhaust camshaft phazer bolt is STUCK tight. I actually bent the holder after using a cheater bar to try and break it loose. After putting a big wrench on the camshaft and adding a strap wrench on the intake phazer, I literally snapped my T55 clean I'm half. Ordering a couple of TP55s and another set of holders that hopefully for a little tighter, I'll give it another try.

Any suggestions would be appreciated...

I also had to use a big wrench in addition to the cam plate as it was lifting up unevenly. Through trial and error of getting my leverage positioned right i got it to break lose. I slid floor jack handle over the breaker bar for more power. Use a Craftsman torx bit or something name brand.

 

[peterk9]

Awesome tip.

My right side exhaust camshaft phazer bolt is STUCK tight. I actually bent the holder after using a cheater bar to try and break it loose. After putting a big wrench on the camshaft and adding a strap wrench on the intake phazer, I literally snapped my T55 clean I'm half. Ordering a couple of TP55s and another set of holders that hopefully for a little tighter, I'll give it another try.

Any suggestions would be appreciated...

Welcome to the Forum.

Peter

 

[Irish Reiver]

Excellent write up and I am sure it will help me tons when I tackle my water pump next week.

One question - given the lack of quality in the Ford waterpump (mine failed at 50k miles.) Is there a better aftermarket replacement or is it recommended to stick with ford?

 

[boominXplorer]

Excellent write up and I am sure it will help me tons when I tackle my water pump next week.

One question - given the lack of quality in the Ford waterpump (mine failed at 50k miles.) Is there a better aftermarket replacement or is it recommended to stick with ford?

I look at it this way. Ford designed it, Ford updated it and Ford knows its failure points. Anybody else coming to the plate just copied the Ford design but was it the 1st or 2nd design....?

I only install Ford pumps but since I'm an outside shop recognized by Ford I can provide a 2 year warranty on the job. Ford would pay me parts and labor to do it again if it failed in the 2 year period.

 

[peterk9]

Excellent write up and I am sure it will help me tons when I tackle my water pump next week.

One question - given the lack of quality in the Ford waterpump (mine failed at 50k miles.) Is there a better aftermarket replacement or is it recommended to stick with ford?

Welcome to the Forum.
Thank you for supporting the forum through your Elite Explorer membership.
I would also say to stick with the Ford pump. Basically, Ford replacement parts carry a 2-year unlimited mileage parts and labour warranty.

https://parts.ford.com/content/dam/ford-parts/wcdocs/WarrantyDocuments/PartsLimitedWarranty_08_2020.pdf

Peter

 

[Irish Reiver]

Thanks guys, so follow up question.. does the motorcraft pump on rockauto count as a Ford pump or do i need to pay a visit to Ford parts department?