'97 Ford F-150 misfires on 3 cylinders

Tiny
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  • 1997 FORD F-150
I have a '97 Ford F-150, 4.6l V-8, automatic, with 180,000 miles. My truck ran fine, until a week ago. I filled the tank with gas and drove about a mile and it started lurching and shaking and chugging. I though I had got some bad fuel. I dumped in some Justice Bros. Injector Cleaner, and continued driving. It never got any better. I stopped at a service station, and had it diagnosed. The codes came back as the EGR vavle was open, and misfire on 2, 3, &7 cylinders. The check engine light has been on for a long time. And now it is flashing. (I had it to my local Ford Dealer, a year ago. And it cost me $800 to get the check engine light off. They replaced one spark plug and one wire, and cleaned the carbon out of the EGR Port, The whole while I never noticed any misfire problems until now.) The check engine light stayed off for about 1 week. Back to the facts, I changed the fuel filter, and checked the fuel pressure, 32psi, and 40psi with the vacuum line off the regulator. No change in the problem. I installed new plugs and wires. Gapped the plugs at.062". Still no change. Listened to the injectors with a stethoscope, and all seem to be cycling. Pulled the injectors and cleaned them, still no change. Pulled the #2 plug and it was black and wet. Put it in the plug wire and grounded to the block and it sparked as it should. I haven't checked to see if the ground strap from motor to frame is not making contact. Don't know if that could have any effect but I have run out of ideas. Anyone have any clues? I have run 1 and 1/2 tanks of gas with no results. I also made sure I didn't have any crossed plug wires. And it backfires at about 30mph if you step on it.
Friday, November 23rd, 2007 AT 7:51 AM

3 Replies

Tiny
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Misfires can be caused by worn or fouled spark plugs, a weak spark (weak coil, bad spark plug wire), loss of compression, vacuum leaks, anything that causes an unusually lean fuel mixture (lean misfire), an EGR valve that is stuck open, dirty fuel injectors, low fuel pressure, or even bad fuel.
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Friday, November 23rd, 2007 AT 8:08 AM
Tiny
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Thanks, I am going to check out the EGR, I am kind of suspect of a fuel pump, it is at the low end of pressure specs. What voltage should be used to test fire an injector? What are the chances of brand new plugs being bad?
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Friday, November 23rd, 2007 AT 2:01 PM
Tiny
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You need a digital storage oscilloscope to view the injectors waveform to actually identify a problem.

Measure the injectors resistance it should be 11-18 ohms not within specs replace it.
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Friday, November 23rd, 2007 AT 2:53 PM

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