Hello and I’m new around here

[Matt C]

Greetings

My name is Matt. I’m from Toronto, Canada.

I attended the Automotive Technician program at a college near my home from 2004 to 2006, and have worked a few jobs as lube tech and apprentice technician. Most of my career has been working at two different Ford dealerships.

I’ve been enjoying EricTheCarGuy’s videos for the last several months. Suffice to say I could have used a *lot* of the advice that ETCG has offered, on both channels, especially when I was just starting out.

Take care
– Matt

Topic

[college man]

Welcome to the forum Matt. 🙂

[Matt]

Trippy. My name is also Matt and recently joined on here after months of watching videos. As you can tell by my signature where I listed my vehicles, I’m into Fords. Not on purpose at first, the Ranger was given to me, and the Expedition was bought after I found out how truly bad the Venture was; an engineer that helped with the engine development of that 3.4 gave me some bad news that they knew about all along.

I found myself doing much more wrenching myself after I’ve had quite the hassle with a shop near here, because it’s hard finding a good Ford mechanic in bow tie land. Got told the Expedition needed a $1,800 timing chain job, when it needed new cats, new ignition coils, and list of little things. That was trippy by itself. One shop told me timing chain, one shop couldn’t find anything because the truck ran perfect every time it went near that shop*, and a third shop didn’t really want to deal with, but told me to take care of the cat code first. Then so on clearing codes after that. The Ranger is amazing. Other than a coolant leak I can’t fix myself, I’ve fixed so much on it. Runs perfect with over 250k miles. I even fixed the ignition problem from the last mechanic putting parts for the regular 3.0, when it’s the vulcan (hybrid). Had to check the VIN for that.

*there were no codes when I first started taking it to the shops. It had a really bad misfire that didn’t code till after I replaced the cats.

[Bob]

[quote=”Flintiron” post=167232]Trippy. My name is also Matt and recently joined on here after months of watching videos. As you can tell by my signature where I listed my vehicles, I’m into Fords. Not on purpose at first, the Ranger was given to me, and the Expedition was bought after I found out how truly bad the Venture was; an engineer that helped with the engine development of that 3.4 gave me some bad news that they knew about all along.

I found myself doing much more wrenching myself after I’ve had quite the hassle with a shop near here, because it’s hard finding a good Ford mechanic in bow tie land. Got told the Expedition needed a $1,800 timing chain job, when it needed new cats, new ignition coils, and list of little things. That was trippy by itself. One shop told me timing chain, one shop couldn’t find anything because the truck ran perfect every time it went near that shop*, and a third shop didn’t really want to deal with, but told me to take care of the cat code first. Then so on clearing codes after that. The Ranger is amazing. Other than a coolant leak I can’t fix myself, I’ve fixed so much on it. Runs perfect with over 250k miles. I even fixed the ignition problem from the last mechanic putting parts for the regular 3.0, when it’s the vulcan (hybrid). Had to check the VIN for that.

*there were no codes when I first started taking it to the shops. It had a really bad misfire that didn’t code till after I replaced the cats.[/quote]

I’ll assume you are young but that is little excuse for running down anything you don’t drive. I have a 3.4 that I only bought because it was sooo cheap I could not resist, it now has almost a half a million Klicks ( yes I’m Canadian but winter in AZ.) and I’m ashamed to admit it has had only barely minimum maintenance . all things have problems, my Lariat had a 5.4 that blew out three plugs, They say that’s common) but after doing the stainless inserts it was a champion for another 200,000K. Remember what you like has no bearing on how good it is.

[Matt C]

Thank you!

Matt, (Flintiron), when you said a Venture with a 3.4 the first thing I thought of were the lower intake manifold gaskets and also head gaskets. You could certainly categorize those under “pattern failures!” I worked at a Chevy dealership for 3½ months, and saw many of those come through. One technician described to me they were doing those jobs, one after another after another, during the years before I started. When I was in college (auto tech. program) I had heard GM was facing a class action lawsuit over those engines. My parents have done very well however with their GMs, they seemed to avoid the problem years. They had a 1995 Chevy Lumina minivan, with a 3.1 (which also became problematic in later years), and now have a 2007 Chevy Uplander with a 3.9L. They’ve done very well with them! It’s neat to meet another Matt who’s also into Fords for sure! 🙂 And I hope you’re able to keep that Ranger in good shape; they’re handly little trucks! And perhaps, learning something from EricTheCarGuy, maybe some day you could fix your coolant leak yourself after all.

sin491, ofcourse everything has problems. Some people go so far as to say to completely avoid anything with the 5.4 engine; I disagree with them, but I do know of some issues. Always remove the spark plugs extremely carefully, as they have a funny design with a ceramic sleeve that likes to get stuck and left behind inside the cylinder head. If this happens (and it sometimes can’t be avoided), the ceramic sleeves need to be extracted using special equipment. I’ve never done one myself though. Also the exhaust manifold gaskets would be a “pattern failure” on the 5.4, apparently the reason some people avoid these trucks entirely. (again I disagree.)

I got into Fords from working at the dealerships. I started in 2007; right before the downturn, and shortly after Ford seriously stepped up their game quality wise. And it did them well! I bought one of my own, a 1997 Ford Escort that I bought in 2007. (LINK) It’s still driving, but it isn’t my daily driver any more. It lives at my parents’ house.

Thanks again for the welcome!

[Matt]

[quote=”sin491″ post=167339]

I’ll assume you are young but that is little excuse for running down anything you don’t drive. I have a 3.4 that I only bought because it was sooo cheap I could not resist, it now has almost a half a million Klicks ( yes I’m Canadian but winter in AZ.) and I’m ashamed to admit it has had only barely minimum maintenance . all things have problems, my Lariat had a 5.4 that blew out three plugs, They say that’s common) but after doing the stainless inserts it was a champion for another 200,000K. Remember what you like has no bearing on how good it is.[/quote]
Thanks for the first part, I’m 40 on Saturday. A little background, I bought a 2003 Venture brand new in August of 2003 with only 10 miles on it. Kept up the maintenance. It ran and sounded perfect till the day the head gasket blew. I ran around getting estimates and seeking help from people I knew. Through the grapevine, a buddy heard a little about my problem and called me. I didn’t even know he worked on cars because he recently retired from electrician work. Turns out he went into electrical work after retiring early from GM, as an engineer. He was on the team that developed that 3.4 LA1 motor. He described the problem to me, over the phone without even looking at it because they had that very failure on every test engine. It was by his recommendation that I get a different vehicle. I went with Ford because their truck drivetrains are dependable. Now as for your 3.4L, it depends on the year as well. If it’s the LQ1, it is nothing for them to go 500k+ miles, but they stopped putting them in cars back in 1997. I’ve also drove a van with one of those. Great motor, but GM wanted to switch over to aluminum heads.

[Author]

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