Willzilla's 2000 5.0L AWD Turbo Xploder | Ford Explorer Forums - Serious Explorations

  • Register Today It's free!

Willzilla's 2000 5.0L AWD Turbo Xploder

Hello everyone... My name is Will, I live outside of Memphis TN, and recently (couple week now) purchased Justin146's explorer. She has a little over 100k miles on it but overall is in fantastic condition except for a few issues that he told me about before I bought the X.

Issues were... PCV valve shot and the X pukes oil on itself from the valve cover breather... Exhaust manifold leaking due to broken/twisted bolts (he gave me a brand new set of stainless FMS headers, gaskets, and hardware)... Broken fog light housing... and everything that occurs to a car that has sat for 2+ years, lol.

Anyways... I flushed out the old nasty rusted out coolant and put some fresh stuff in with some water wetter... I drained out the old oil and put in some 5W20 Mobile 1 synthetic oil and filter... Replaced the rigged up PCV valve setup with an '86 SVO Mustang PCV valve.

What I have planned... Replace all remaining fluids (ie tranny, etc)... Replace the rusted turbo piping and most of the couplers (old, cracking, etc)... Replace rotors and pads... HID match the fog lights to the head lights... Hook up the XM radio stuff... Have the exhaust manifold removed and install the FMS headers (header wrapped) and run 2.5" exhaust from each header Y piped together to 3" straight back to the turbo, and 3.5" or so pipe straight off the turbo... And lots more I'm sure.

Current issues... Door locks sometimes don't want to lock/unlock on drivers side with the remote... They click but sometimes won't fully lock or unlock... Odd... But does not happen often and just noticed it.... Big issue right now though is that I cannot make any boost over 1psi... I've already pulled off both the WG and BOV and took them fully apart, cleaned, and put them back together and re-installed them and the issue remains... Checked all couplers and piping and all looks good, I hear no hissing from anywhere either, so... Issue remains, will look into further during the week or this upcoming weekend or something...

Pictures to come... For more of a background on the X check out Justin146's original thread at http://www.explorerforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=169060.

Thanks!
 



Join the Elite Explorers for $20 each year.
Elite Explorer members see no advertisements, no banner ads, no double underlined links,.
Add an avatar, upload photo attachments, and more!
.





Ooo... Also, I have a 2003 SVT Focus ZX3 with...

Stock HIDs, cold weather package (heated seats, traction control, etc), originally black exterior with black leader interior and red cloth inserts... Aftermarket stuff done...

Carbon fiber fenders, painted from exterior from black to cd silver, 42lb injectors, diablo MAFIa, steeda short throw shifter, smoked side bumper lights, 3" full back exhaust off of the SVT header w/borla muffler, all 3 steeda poly motor mounts, aluminum aftermarket throttlebody, massive comp engine bay and hatch stress bars, H&R sport cup kit, steeda 28.6mm rear sway bar, H&R 24mm front sway bar, custom tune by turbotom of focusfanatics via diablo predator tuner, header wrapped header and ORP, DPIC and AF gauges in pillar pod, dyno adjusted exhaust side cam gear, MSD performance coil pack and 8.5mm plug wires, centric premium front and back rotors, hawk hp plus front and back brake pads, russel 6pc stainless brake lines, ford euro center grill, cfm 2pc alum ud pulleys, aem cold air intake w/bypass filter, 180 degree tstat, cfm billet intake mani lever, anthracite colored team dynamics pro race 1 light weight rims (just a hair over 17lbs each), cfm black billet shorty antenna, ford gt shift knob and e-brake handle... And some other stuff, lol... Turbo in the not too distant future, Torsen LSD, and aftermarket clutch/flywheel also planned.

Thanks! :D
 






Noticed today while crawling under the X that the last... Not sure if it's a resonator or some kind of muffler thing, cylinder shaped, after the 4 cats... has a hole in it about the size of the tip of a pen with black soot blast marks all around it... Perhaps the exhaust manifold leak PLUS this "new" leak = 1psi of boost? I don't know... I think the exhaust manifold leak is getting worse (can't wait to get it in the exhaust/performance shop ASAP)... It boosted fine up until last week when I tromped on it and blew 2 couplers (one IC coupler and 1 coupler off the MAF housing)... Put the couplers back together, fixed the AF and pegged out VAC on the boost gauge, but from then on, no boost over about 1psi...
 






So... I patched the hole in the exhaust with some quicksteel... Still no boost... Going to pick up something to pressurize my system and see if there are more leaks to be found.. Will also take a look at the turbo this weekend.
 






make sure the impeller and turbine assembly spin freely doesn't take much abuse to damage these components or the bearing assemblies supporting them.
 






^ yeah, that's what I plan on doing in a few weeks when I get some free time for once (13 hr days at work and finishing up another semester of grad school)... Hope to take a look soon though!

It "sounds" like air is releasing through the BOV at 1psi but I am not certain... Have to motivate the wife to rev the car for me sometime as I listen around the car as well.
 






Have not posted in here in a long time.. Have been extremely busy with new job, grad school, etc... Have not done much work on the truck as of yet... But... Am having all new exhaust (and have the headers installed) and charge piping installed sometime next month. Going to change out all the fluids, and put on new rotors and pads, new plugs/wires, replace the fogs (1 is broken) and put in bulbs to somewhat match the HID headlights, new air filter to the turbo, clean the outwear filter thing over the air filter, and a few other things. Should be fun :D
 






Just put on some new PowerShot brand brakes from ebay, $180 shipped for 4 new zinc plated cross drilled and slotted rotors and 8 new ceramic pads... Looks and stops great!

Putting in some new synthetic oil within the next week or 2 as well as some new tires and an alignment.

Going to have my exhaust completely redone and my FMS headers installed.... Will be a headers to 2.5" Y'd immediately into a single 3" pipe straight back through a Borla pro XS (3" in 3" out) muffler and then into the turbo. Will also have all new return piping made up as well from turbo > IC > intake.

Also plan on putting in some new copper plugs and new wires, and flushing out all of the fluids and what not.
 






Is powershot the Chinese version of power slot?
 












Ohhh..power stop. Still a knockoff but I've ran ebay brakes like that before on my xterra w/ no issues.
 






Ahh yeah... I don't know why I keep saying powershot, lol... They looked high quality and the guy who installed them on my Xploder (wife's step father owns his own automotive shop) said they looked very good... Drove my truck to work today and braking felt hugely improved.
 






Not sure if anyone really reads this... But... What weight oil would be recommended (in the turbo application)? 10w30?
 






Picked up some 5w20, so, hopefully that works fine :D Lol.

About to change out the front hubs (worn out, noisy), spark plugs, and wires... Hopefully AR103 autolite coppers are fine... I believe justin said to gap them at .023, seems like a very small gap, but, will give it a whirl! :D

Still trying to find the vac leak causing my boost troubles, ugh.
 






Factory Spec calls for Platinum Plugs...gapped to .054 (although, that is N/A)....I would double check that gap...that is less than HALF of the N/A gap...that doesn't sound right.


Ryan
 






Copper plugs are fine that's what James from henson performance recommends. The gap should be smaller for a boosted application, but I'm not sure if it needs to be quite that small, if you can't find the info in the thread I would call James and see what he says since he is the one that tuned it.
 






Thanks for the information! Justin said he was not sure, but that was the number he thought it was.. Lol. I was thinking about maybe just measuring the old plugs when I pull them out, but yeah, the "best" gap would be... well... Best, haha. I'd rather not gap and put them in and then have to re-gap around to find the best as it's kind of a PITA :D
 






Maybe Justin meant .033 gap, which I seem to have seen around online for boosted 5.0 mustangs and such... I sent James a PM, hopefully he won't mind me bothering him and fires a response back!

I am going to FINALLY look around for my vac leak here this week or next when i get a moment away from work/school... Short term to do list:

- Change out the oil (Mobile 1 syn 5w20) & filter
- Replace fog lights (one has been shattered since I bought it) and bulbs with bulbs that closely will match my HIDs.
- Change plugs & wires.
- Order all new charge piping & couplers.
- Change out the front hubs with new units.
- Re-coat outwear filter cover.
- Change intake cone filter.
- Fix vac leak!

Mid term to do:

- Follow http://www.explorerforum.com/Singleton/web/pages/at1.html and replace tranny fluid.
- Change all other fluids that I can, not sure how old some of the stuff is!
- Actually replace all the charge piping and couplers.
- Have FMS headers installed and custom exhaust ran (2.5" off the headers Y'd immediately into a 3" back through a Borla XS muffler and then back into the turbo, 4" off the turbo, no cats).
- New tires.

Long term to do:

- Fix minor paint chip on drivers side door.
- New rims possibly, but something subtle & lighter if possible.
- New head unit w/iPod connection.
- Fix up the center armrest/console thing... Does not like to open all the way, and back vents are kind of jacked up.

Already done:

- Oil (a couple times already, as above).
- All new brakes (powerstop cross drilled and slotted zinc plated rotors and ceramic pads).
- Turbo mustang PCV valve.
- Disassembled WG and BoV and cleaned and reassembled.

I'm sure there is more.
 






I was reading around about the fluids... It appears the front diff uses 80W-90, rear diff uses 75W140 w/friction modifier, the transmission uses Mercron V... What does the transfer case use?

And, oddly... My rear wiper, new blades and all, does not seem to make much contact with my back window... Lol, odd.
 



Join the Elite Explorers for $20 each year.
Elite Explorer members see no advertisements, no banner ads, no double underlined links,.
Add an avatar, upload photo attachments, and more!
.











Back
Top