Hello could someone please try to help me figure this one out.

Driving home today my 1998 F150 4.6 W just started missing real bad,
So I stopped at NAPA and my local napa guy thought well maybe I needed to clean injectors so Ive started running fuel injection cleaner but the problem hasnt cleared up so Im thinking it may be something more.

I thought maybe it was the coil but I tried an old trick of hooking up a timing light to each wire and seeing if I got the same response you know flash flash flash, and I did on every wire so ?

Should I just change the plugs now or ? what do you think

 

How many miles do you have and has the check engine light come on? Odds are you're right on track assuming it's ignition related, but it could just as easily be a bad wire or coil as it could be a plug. (May even be more likely since it started missing so suddenly instead of your problem developing slowly.)

 

I have approx 30,000 on the new autolight plugs

It happened when I went to pass a slow poke...lol
it just started running like ****, yes the CEL came on
but I reset the Computer at the NAPA store and its still running bad but the CEL light has not come back on.......yet

Im getting ready to drive itinto work I'll let you know in a hour if it comes back on.

 

My truck did that around 30,000 miles and it turned out to be a bad coil on one of the sparkplugs.I came to a stop light,turned green,hit the gas and the engine started missing.Just like that.See if autozone or someone can pull a code for you.hope this helps.

 

Okay I just deove into work and it mostly ran like crap
still missing it feels like it is missing on more than one cyl.
But a few times it cleared up and ws banging on all eight.......

Still in a quandry because the Check Engine Light never came back on??? WTF is that,,..........help please

 

2cs,

I think you read my mind. My truck started doing the same thing yesterday. On saturday I reinstalled the passenger head and buttoned everything up. (Had the intake valves, etc replaced.) It ran great on Sunday and Monday and even yesterday morning. As I was driving around my site it started running rough. You could hear it knocking, sputtering, wouldn't idle. Halfway through the day it gave me the "cel". On the way home last night, it cleared up and as I pulled into my development it came back. So last night I looked at all of my vacuum hoses on the intake and all looked good. I reset the computer and pulled the passenger side plugs. They all looked good. I thought I had found the problem when I pulled #4 and the coil had a little anti-freeze on it and in the connection. I dried it all out and reinstalled everything. I tightened the hose clamp on the heater line that is over #4. It was not tight-tight, but it was tight. This morning it idled fine and I pulled out of my sub and it started missing. You could almost feeling it come and go. THere would be power and then I'd lose it. I don't know where to go next. The CEL never came back on. Would a scanner be able to diagnose if a coil was bad? Would the antifreeze have fried the coil?

D

 

Try replacing the plug that had coolant on it somtimes coolant wil crack the plug and its hard to see. If you have a dead miss it should set a miss-fire code which would tell you exactly what cyl is the problem.

 

mx,

No cel yet today. Still have the miss though. It's on and off though. I have another coil pack and a spare plug. I'll swap them out and put a clamp on the other end of that hose if I can get to it. Just have to make this truck last another 100,000.....

 

I dont think my plug wires have the coils in them just really long boots.....
Mine all plug into two gizmos one on each side of the engine
kinda of looks like a distributer cap

Am I right? or are the "coils" in the boots what kinda cluster f89k
is this

 

2cs,

From what I understand the 4.6's before 2000 had the 2 coils and plug wires. The 5.4's have the coil over ignition coil packs that put an individual coil over each plug. There is no distributor on the 5.4.

Doug

 

thanks for clarifying that for me I was getting confused.......

uhhh
so what do you think coil packs or plugs?

 

I'm not sure. However, I have a spare of each so I'm swapping them out tonight if I can and putting another clamp on that hose.

for you.... I don't know. I could see where coolant was on the coil pack. Did you have coolant on the coil pack or only down next to the plug?

 

I dont have coolant anywhere, I did power wash the engine a few days ago but this started like two days later.
So I dont think its a water problem

 

Did your CEL come back on? If it did, try to have it scanned.

 

nope it hasnt come back on yet.........but its still running like a chevy