My 1997 F-150 (5.4L Triton) has 107,xxx miles and as far as I know is on the original set of plugs.

I read that it's a tough job to replace the plugs. If my truck is running fine, should I bother?

 

If you have the time I would if at all posiable. One it will help the dependability and two it might help gain back some unnoticed power loss and fuel mileage. My brother went 137,XXX on factory plugs on a 97 Lariat. But they all looked really bad when I pulled them out and should have been done five or six times before then. Two Of them were shot and was not firing at all and he wondered why it was missing. LOL

PS Before I did his I did a search here and found several tip to get to them "especially the passenger rear" and it still took me a few hours.

 

Do yourself a favor and change them now. They have reached their service life and from now on they can fail when ever.

Preventive maintance

 

I have 90000 miles on my 1997 5.4L and I'm not chnging until about 110000-120000 I'm too worried about blowing a plug after the change. Plug blowouts seem to happen after a change from what I've read about.

 

What's the going rate to have the dealer change the plugs? I may want someone to go after if the plugs start blowing out after they're changed.

 

I've heard alot about that on here too but I'm not sure if the ones that are experiencing this are torquing the plugs to spec or not. They maybe over torquing them too. I have been fortunate enough not to of experienced it. Normally I do not take anything to the stealer I mean dealer. But my wife called our mechanic to see about getting hers done on her Explorer not to long ago as I simply did not have time and he was going to charge $60 for a 6 cyl.

 

[Sarcasm] Hey, my oil has 10k miles on it but the truck still runs great! Should I change it anyway? [/Sarcasm]

It's called PREVENTATIVE maintenance for a reason!

Steve

Couldn't resist......

 

The difference between these two ought to be obvious; I can hear or feel a misfiring plug. I can't see, feel or hear any damage from dirty/non-viscous oil (until the engine seizes).



I am going to pull a plug or two and look at condition.

 

Expect to pay $250 or more for the stealership to do it.

 

The last half of their service life has been degenerative.