Yesterday, morning I stopped at a store and got some coffee. I got back in the truck and started my 99' F-150 supercab 4.6 with 54,000 miles (I bought it used 4 months ago). As I was backing out of the parking lot the truck just died.
I put it in park and turned the key and it started back up and I went on my way.

I know these seems stupid to post this at this time, but I do not want my family to get stranded this summer when we take the truck to CA. on vacation (about 1400 miles one way).

Is there anything I should check or replace? Is some preventive maintenance needed? (I have had it for 4 months and have only changed the oil/filter, airfilter, cutt hole in airintake housing, Superchip and FullBoar muffler). The only other problem I have experienced in 15,000 miles of use since I bought it , is the wiper with a mind of its own (I have not replaced the multi-function switch yet-still trying to find aftermarket supplier). The only thing that has happened differently lately, is that my wife recently drove it...ha!
She said she put premium unleaded in it.

Any advice would be nice. Thanks.

 

Here's a few possibilities.

1) The idle control valve may be sticking. You can remove it and clean w/ brake cleaner

2) Super chip acting up. Happens quite often.

3) The transmission filter may have come loose. Causes tranny to suck air- makes engine stall.

4) Check wiring harness at A/C accumulator. Harness will short out here killing engine.

Good luck.

 

Home Skillet,

Thanks. I guess I know what I will be doing Saturday morning.

 

I'm putting my money on the tranny filter. Especially since the problem occured in reverse.

Take care,
-Chris

 

If that's the only time it has ever done this, then it seems hardly worth worrying about as long as it is running good. It may have had some air in the fuel line or picked up a small particle of dirt that caused it to stall, but to all of a suden start pulling pans off to check tranny filters seems a little over kill. Just make sure your vehicle is up on it's routine maintenance service and just monitor it for the next few weeks. I wouldn't panic over one instance though.

 

At 54,000 miles on a used truck I would change the trans filter and fluid. Clean the magnet also!

 

Home Skillet, care to elaborate on this: 2) Super chip acting up. Happens quite often. ?

Iron Horse, I think I would start by checking the connection of the Superchip (I would assume that's what Home Skillet is referring to when he says "acting up"). I know you've heard it over and over (I know because you seem as addicted to this site as me), make sure you remove all the coating. Also, did you cut or bend the bracket that holds the pcm? I took mine off and cut it. If the chip is even slightly loose it could cause this condition. Checking the chip connection is easy, and I think a good place to start. You want to at least eliminate the Superchip as a cause.
I think that you have got enough information here to solve this one. You want to have all that stuff in order for the next mod!

Good luck!

 

Taking a break from mowing the lawn. Thought I would check the boards. Even the old rear engine Snapper that I rebuilt is giving me some trouble, but I like if for ease of maintaining it, plus it only has one belt. Anyway.........

Thanks to everyone for your assistance. Yesterday (Saturday) I had no time to check everything out. I will check the items mentioned so far throught the week at night.

Since my last post it has not "died" on me at all. The only thing I noticed is that for the first time since my 15,000 miles of ownership, on my first trying to start the truck, it did not start (it turned over, just did not start. I had to turn if over again and it started. That occurred a day after it died while backing up. Nothing eles has happed yet.

I got to get out the Haynes Repair manual and find out the what and where of some of the things mentioned such as:

idle control valve
a/c accumulator
"magnet" referred to in context of trans. filter/fluid

I know this is going to sound odd to some of you. But, "small" mechanical clitches like this forces me to get familar with my vehicle so that if something major happens or begins to happen I will not feel so helpless. I like it.

I almost forgot about routine maintenance. Lately, I have been obsessed with determining, finding, buying aftermarket stuff. Some of this stuff I planned to do, but wanted to wait until my supercharger kit gets here and I inventory what is in it. I know I need to change the inline fuel filter, but was going to see if the Magnacharger kit had one in it.

Thanks for taking the time and effort to help. I will report what I find out.

Yes, Wittom, I think I am getting addicted to this site. I read/"watch" this site more than the truck mags. or T.V. ha!

 

My 2000 5.4L with 40K miles recently acted like it was possessed by the devil.

Exactly one month ago, it took about three or four "cranks" to start and I noticed a very strong gas odor in the exhaust (like it had been flooded and was running really rich). Since the engine had never missed a beat and always started with the slightest bump of the ignition, I shrugged it off and thought nothing about it. Then last week I got in at lunch time and it would not start for anything. Finally I pumped the accelerator pedal a couple times and held it half way in. It finally started, but would not idle on its own until about a minute or so of my coaxing.

The very next day (Friday) was the worst. After work, I got in and tried to start it up. It would try to start, but instantly died...and when I finally got it cranked over I had to really feather the accelerator pedal to keep it running. While giving it a little gas, I heard a very pronounced hissing or really a sucking sound...like a serious vacuum leak. This time however, it seemed like it would not correct itself. I tried to drive it by "powerbraking" to keep the RPM's up and putting it into gear, but it would die as soon as I started driving. By now I was really pretty miffed at the whole thing so I revved the engine to 4,000 RPM for about 30 seconds, let off the gas and it ran fine the entire trip home. Before trying to start it the next morning, I took my K&N filter out (a little dirty but not bad at all), reinstalled a relatively new stock air filter, disconnected the battery for about 20 minutes, then fired it up...the thing has not missed a beat since with 20 or so starts. It seems to run better than it ever did before and starts (hot or cold) with the slightest bump of the ignition.

My point, check your air filter and reset the computer unless someone can explain what's going on with my engine.

What the hell's up with these things??? I had an Explorer with 120K miles on the little 4.0L and it never gave me one single ounce of trouble with nothing more than the most basic routine maintenance.

 

Jimmsimm,

Thanks. Maybe, too much dirt is collecting on my K&N airfilter since I .......cut a big hole in my stock airfilter housing!?! It got about 10,000 miles on it, maybe its time to re-oil it? I will check it out and report back.

 

Hey IronHorse, this past weekend I cleaned my IAC valve and my throttle body...both were fairly dirty with accumulations. Let me tell you how much this improved starting, idle, throttle response, etc. I'm replacing the fuel filter next weekend.

 

jimmsimm,

Thanks for the tip. Just finished major project at work. Now, I can concentrate on some of these maintenance items mentioned.

IAC Valve? I need to pull out the repair manual.

Clean throttle body? Do you mean just pull the air intake tube off and clean it or do you mean you unbolted it and soaked it in some kind of solvent?

I need to change the fuel filter too. As well as the trans fluid/filter and the other maintenance "stuff". Just changed my oil and oil filter.

Thanks.

 

The IAC (idle air control) valve is located on the back-side of the throttle body. It's held on by two little 8mm bolts and has a wire harness attached. I just cleaned it with carb cleaner.

I didn't fully remove the throttle body even though that is the best way to completely clean it. Once again, I just shot some gumout down though the throttle plate and scrubbed around the inside with the wife's...errrr I mean an old toothbrush. I was very limited on time and wasn't able to take the thing apart. If I experience any more idle problems, then I'll dig deeper.

 

jimmsimm,

Thanks for the detail. When it comes to mechanical items, details are a good thing. I will be doing the IAC and throttle body cleaning by next weekend. Thanks again.

 

Well, I just took my TB off yesterday and let me tell you what a job it was and how dirty it can be.
I was having a EGR insufficent flow problem and one of the fixes is to remove the TB elbow and clean the two 5/16 EGR passages. Just looking into the TB mounted on the truck it didn't look to bad. A little accumalation but when you take it off is when you see all the details.
Here's small step-to-step
1. disconnect battery 2.label all hoses and wires to TB 3.pull all reachable hoses and wires off (some on the back I had to pull off after the TB was unbolted) 4. disconnect throttle linkage 5. Remove connections to EGR valve (takes 1 1/8 wrench for tube nut) 6. unbolt the 4 8mm bolts holding TB elbow to lower intake 7.unplug any remaining lines. Installation is reverse of removal.

The mounting gasket on all of these should be a graphite coated gasket and 90% of the time can be reused. I did reuse mine (140 miles on it) but a new one is 4 bucks from Ford, so I might pick one up for a spare.

The TB is supposed ot be coated with a specail coating to resist sludge and warnings appear on the TB aand in the service books not to clean it. I said the hell with that and did it anyways using Gunk TB cleaner which said coating safe, a screwdriver, pipe cleaners, and some rags. I left the TPS and the IAC on mine but you could take them off.

I did notice a little better throttle response was back butnothing major. Wish I had a port/polish kit while it was off.

Let me know if there's anything else I can try to answer.