4.2L engine in 1997 F150 bombed at 80k miles. No warning to speak of. Came to work, and it was running good. Left work, started truck, and the engine responded with a loud "clack, clack, clack ...". Oil was clean. The only evidence whatsoever of a malfunction was a slow subtle loss of coolant, but since there was no green puddles under the vehicle, I simply ignored it, topping off the coolent at every oil change.

I am original owner, and at 25k miles, had to get a new front cover gasket, as the engine was leaking green fluid onto ground. Luckily that was under warranty. According to leakingfords.com, there is also a defect with the lower intake manifold gasket, that can stealthily leak coolent into the cylinder heads

My garage installed a Reman'ed motor, at $3700, which included a lotta new gizmos, like new lifters, water pumps, belts, hoses, etc. I got tagged with additional $400 for rental car as well. The mechanic said "oh yeah, we get these 1997 Fords in here all the time. In fact, I have 2 more come in right behind yours".

I sent an email to "wford@ford.com", and received a call back from Duncun Alderson, of Ford Executive Offices. Phone 313-322-3000. Hit 0 twice, and ask operator for Duncun. Duncun patiently listened to my story, got my VIN# and put me on hold to "talk with engineering". He returned about 10 minutes later, saying that there is nothing he can do. Me: so thats that? Him: yes, thats that. Sorry ....

Consumer Reports lists the 1997 F150s as very reliable. I suppose most of those surveyed have the good Triton V8 motors.

 

MY 98 4.2L 4x4 reg cab started leaking coolant at about 63000 miles. The forums and leakingfords.com pointed towards the lower intake gasket. Took it to my father-in-law to fix. He did it for me over a cold and windy October weekend. Its been running great since. I think we got to it before any damage was done. Thanks to a patient father-in-law. Dont know if I could have done it myself, alot of stuff to take apart to get to it. But he's very good at fixing anything with wheels. He's a Chevy man, so I had to deal with the razzing about leakingfords.com.

 

And for Ford to say this problem was corrected with the 98 model year is BullS**t!!!!

 

Correct me if I'm wrong. In the newly redesigned F-150 the v6 is not an option. Only V8's. Hmmm??????

 

Yep. V8's only for 2004's with the new bodystyle. I think 04 Heritage models are available with a v6.

 

The reason for that is the new '04s are much heavier than the 97-03's. Not reliability reasons. The 4.2 just doesn't have enough power.

 

The V-6 along with the 5spd is coming back for 2005. They didn't bring it for the 2004 because they don't really sell that many anymore..most sold are V-8's The 98's are fixed...anything built after about Feb or March I think is when the new gaskets were used.

 

Re. the lemon 1997 4.2L, I learned the lesson that ANY coolant loss is a warning sign. Before I had only checked that there was enough coolant, and that none was present on the ground, or in the oil.

Re. the 2005 F150, I think the v6 is fine, but I am not sure about the manual tranny. if its like the old one, I think they are super light duty. The towing capacity for 1/2 ton trucks w/ manual tranny is approx 3000pnds. The same truck with auto tranny is double that. You gotta buy a Superduty F250 to get a decent manual tranny.