thedrod

After much stress and patience my spark plug removal and replacement was completed without any breaks.

I replaced the plugs with the Brisk variants and they work wonderfully so far.

I have to stress to anybody that attempts this that the single most important factor in doing this is PATIENCE.

PATIENCE

PATIENCE

Car had been sitting for 24 hours to cool down...based on the characteristics of aluminum and how it expands I would not listen to the people that say "warm the car up first." Maybe on cast iron heads.....not these.

I removed all coil packs and squirted PB blaster in the holes enough to where they submerged the base.

FYI you will need a 9/16s deep socket for this and a 7mm socket for the coil packs.

I waited an hour and came back and broke each plug loose about 1/4 turn.

Some plugs were creaking badly...and this is very scary.

I waited another hour and came back and worked them all back and forth a few times.

Then it started raining and I went to a friends house for the rest of the night.

I came back about midnight...yes....midnight and tried to move them some more.

This means they were soaking for about 10 hours.

All the plugs except two on the passenger side middle started to come out very easily...the other two were creaking like crazy.

I worked them back and forth a bit more...sprayed some more PB Blaster in there and went to bed.

Around lunch time I got out there again and one of the creakers came out very easily...the last one I had to gently push through the creaks until it started turning easily.

Very VERY SCARY....but I really think the secret was letting those things soak for 24 hours.

This is probably the longest spark plug change in history, but I can GUARANTEE YOU ALL that a dealership will not spend that time on your car. So I highly recommend you try this yourself because its YOUR car and you can be patient.

I have attached some photos of the greatest engineering blunder of all time....or Ford OEM 3V spark plugs as some call them.

Wally39

I just changed mine too. I put antiseize on the spark plug threads so I know I can get them out next time too.

americaniron

Congrats on the successful operation. I haven't had to face this yet, but will in the not to distant future. Not looking forwards to it though.

Art161

Good job!

I can't tell from your photos just how bad the old plugs were. What is your assessment of their condition?

hammeron

very glad it went well thedrod

thedrod

I'll take better photos. I had to use my phone for those.

They were very gummed up...but the electrodes were in decent shape.

I'll get better photos and add them this evening.

Riptide

The threads? I hope you put some on the ground shield too because that is what gets stuck.

thedrod

+1000

Yeah the threads really don't need any anti-sieze...its the ground shield 100%

The threads on my plugs were spotless.

Archer1

My car has almost 80k on it without a plug change... I would have already done it but the process is really scary. Ford put out a service bulletin on how to do it and how to remove the broken ones. What a process that is! Anyway, I saw in the newest Moss Mustang catalog a listing for Champion plugs that don't break off in the heads. They have the traditional J shaped electrode. When I do change them I will use those. That style of plug works in my Yamaha R1 and it turns in excess of 14,000 rpms! Why reinvent the freakin' wheel Ford?

Riptide

It's not just the plug. The head design is also another reason this happens from what I've read.