Ford triton engine rebuild question

A question for any one working at a ford dealer or that has had a triton replaced recently. I am trying to find out a ball park cost to do a long block on my 2004 F150 with 5.4 triton. it's a nice super crew 4 door cab FX4 and everything is in good shape except that awesome engine that knocks. I bought it used and i am still paying on it but I am afraid to drive it very far so I am trying to decide if I should spend the money on replacing the engine or just park it out back until it's paid off and sell it for parts. It runs good and has no loss of power or check engine light but it makes a lot of noise.

I haven't worked for Ford for a few years now, so my info is fairly out of date. But the last one i remember doing at the dealer ended up in the $5200 range for customer cost. Can be done cheaper if you go for a rebuilt long block rather than new.

The BIL went through this dilemma with his work van. He priced out rebuilding and in the long run considering downtime, parts cost etc it was cheaper to go to Ford and get a "crate" 5.4.
He ordered it on a Thursday and had it by Tuesday. We had his van up and running by 4 pm Wednesday.
I think it was just shy of $5k.

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2004 and newer 24 valve engines start @ 2750.00

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It's about $5k to replace with a long block.
Better off doing a long block instead of a rebuild. A rebuild might sound better but will cost more labor in the long.

I've been around in circles with mine. Started as timing noise, but by the time I got into it, I had a cooked thrust bearing, worn thrust surface on the crank, and cooked a head. I was quoted around $3200 at a local shop to get close to a rebuild.
Found reman long blocks in the $3300 neighborhood.

I'm ordering a short block from Ford for around $1100, and reman heads for around a grand. I have new timing shit, cam phasers, and oil pump from when I was trying to salvage it.

I wanted to rebuild it myself and throw some forged goodies at it, but after Mr Buzzkill appeared in the form of bad heads, I gave up.

I could probably do it a bit cheaper rebuilding, but what's left of my sanity is worth a few hundred bucks.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by zteknik

It's about $5k to replace with a long block.
Better off doing a long block instead of a rebuild. A rebuild might sound better but will cost more labor in the long.

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I am leaning towards a crate motor for the warranty, but on the other hand I am an ASE/GM master tech and one of the best engine machinists around is a ford guy and a good friend of mine. It's do for plugs, I may just do plugs, and timing chains and the cam phasers for now and see how long it lasts. I get a discount at Ford but not as much as GM, of course I would rather have a sister in a whore house then to drive a GM.

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Originally Posted by trlcavscout

I am leaning towards a crate motor for the warranty, but on the other hand I am an ASE/GM master tech and one of the best engine machinists around is a ford guy and a good friend of mine. It's do for plugs, I may just do plugs, and timing chains and the cam phasers for now and see how long it lasts. I get a discount at Ford but not as much as GM, of course I would rather have a sister in a whore house then to drive a GM.

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Yea crate motor for the wty for sure.
For a tech it would be cheaper to do the build as long as it's not the low end. But yea 5.4's are famous for the chains, guides, phasers and syncros.
I'm sure you have the tool for the plugs if they break - if you need a good Ford parts guy give me a pm, I'll give you a line to my buddy in our parts dept ;)

I sure miss the days when I could do a SBC for less then 1k and a Ford for a little more. These prices are crazy!

You might want to check salvage yards and see if you can do better on a used engine.

Easy, drive to nearest Chevy dealer, get a Duramax. Problem solved.

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Originally Posted by MED

I sure miss the days when I could do a SBC for less then 1k and a Ford for a little more. These prices are crazy!

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I'm with you. Parts are getting expensive, and complicated.

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Originally Posted by Mtn.man

Easy, drive to nearest Chevy dealer, get a Duramax. Problem solved.

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Do they come standard with the bag to put over your head?

http://www.jasperengines.com/ford-triton-engines.php

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Originally Posted by BushMasterBoy

http://www.jasperengines.com/ford-triton-engines.php

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Not only no, but fug no. They don't have a good track record.
Envision the "puppy mill" of internal combustion engines.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by BPTactical

Not only no, but fug no. They don't have a good track record.
Envision the "puppy mill" of internal combustion engines.

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Yea I have to echo what Bert said, when I worked at a private shop I spent more time working on wty Jaspers more then I did with OEM wtys.

Maybe Mtn man was right.

http://www.consumeraffairs.com/autom...ord_spark.html

Quote:

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Originally Posted by BushMasterBoy

Maybe Mtn man was right.

http://www.consumeraffairs.com/autom...ord_spark.html

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They all have their common problems, the triton engine is a POS I will be happy to get rid of but I worked at GM dealers for 10 years before and after the army, I started as a transmission guy just rebuilding transmissions which GM does not make a good one unless you get the Allison. I did heavy line, bumper to bumper and driveability at a few different dealers. I could make a list of common problems with almost every year and style of GM vehicles. From the Cadillac/Oldsmobile block halves, to the chevy/GMC truck transmissions, 5.7 intake gaskets, brake problems on the late 90's trucks/blazers/suburbans, they ends up buying back a lot of those vehicles. they all throw shit out to see what sticks, half the time the engineers know it's not going to work.


i am just going to pay mine off this summer and trade it in. I went to two different ford dealers Friday and both said they would give me half of NADA because of the triton hahahaha I bought it from one of those dealers and they didn't have a problem selling me the POS then with the same noise but they don't want it back now. I had 2K cash in my pocket, the trade which is mint other then the phaser noise and I owe book "trade in" on it but we couldn't make a deal. So I will go to Denver this fall to another dealer. I will never go to spradley Barr ford again.

I have personally seen triton engines go up to 800,000 miles with virtually no problems. Timing chain guides and tensioners wear out, or pumps wear out, valve train wears out. Those engines are built tough. You just CANNOT run them low on oil. The spark plug issue was a flaw, easily remedied by replacing the spark plugs with the correct updated ones. But other than that, a great engine.

The folks at Spradley Barr are a bunch of lying assholes. And Loveland Ford isn't any better.