My dad has a 2003 ford f-150 4x4 lariat with 170k miles on her today me and my friend changed the coils and spark plugs on cylinders 5-8 because they all went out yesterday. After changing them we took it for a test drive and everything ran fine the power was back then i heard something sound like something got caught in the fan kinda like a popping or clicking sound then i seen smoke and smelt burning engine oil so i stopped on the side of the road to investigate. I think the sound was oil hitting the cat converter on the passenger side so i took her home and wash her to see were the oils was coming from but didn't see anything so i drove it for 3mins and took a hard left then it started smoking and it looks like the oil was coming from around the starter some were. I was just seeing if you guys had any ideas were it could be coming from? i was thinking maybe a over flow tube if there was one by it or a bad seal or a lose bolt? me and my buddy either tomorrow or Saturday are going to take the headers off to get a better look but any input will help
Thanks
Mike

 

My '03 work truck (5.4) developed a head gasket leak which caused oil run down the back of the motor on the passenger side. The leak developed slowly, but eventually got bad enough to start spotting the back of the truck w/ oil. The leak is caused by a problem during the manufacture of the motor which shows up after about 100K miles. Mine was repaired at 125K.

Location of leak (center of pic) ...




How it was fixed ...

 

Thanks for replying to my thread i was starting to think no one had any idea what was wrong with my dads truck. hopeful me and my buddy take off the header tomorrow to get a better look at the leak I'm hoping its a lot easier like a lose value cover... I HOPE

 

Lol I forgot to do that step when I pulled my heads, we already had half the **** undone and pulled before we were told you need to pull the cab. The body lift on the truck was a real life saver for clearance though.

 

If this had been my truck (being cheap and having no access to a lift), I probably would have tried to lift the cab a few inches (kind of like a body lift), to do the job. The mechanic at work, (who hates Fords, but has grudgingly admitted that our 7700's have been pretty reliable), said if he had to own one of these trucks, the first thing he'd do is put on a body lift so there'd be a little more room to work underhood

 

We couldn't locate the problem so i just took it to the repair shop my guess is its the left head gasket in the back of motor but IDK hopeful its something cheap... I HOPE