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SafariGoneWrong

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I noticed you installed the Melling HV oil pump. I did that in the spring along with lash adjusters (one was noisy, did the entire job you did in 2017) and wow, it was a disaster. Driving away on a cool (not cold engine), both phasers went max retard, 53 degrees, engine would barely run. I disconnected the solenoids and no change. The first test drive after the HV pump install was on a warm engine and no issues. I figured the oil bypass feature of the pump was max'd out and unregulated oil pressure got to the solenoids. Funny, I installed the M360--a high pressure pump in 2017--and didn't have an issue. At that time in 2017, the 340HV wasn't out yet and FTM was saying to use the M360. Anyway, I went back in and installled the M340, throwing the 340HV in the trash. I should have known better with Melling HV pumps--put one in my Bronco a few years ago and it blew out the oil filter. What a mess.
 

purevw

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I noticed you installed the Melling HV oil pump. I did that in the spring along with lash adjusters (one was noisy, did the entire job you did in 2017) and wow, it was a disaster. Driving away on a cool (not cold engine), both phasers went max retard, 53 degrees, engine would barely run. I disconnected the solenoids and no change. The first test drive after the HV pump install was on a warm engine and no issues. I figured the oil bypass feature of the pump was max'd out and unregulated oil pressure got to the solenoids. Funny, I installed the M360--a high pressure pump in 2017--and didn't have an issue. At that time in 2017, the 340HV wasn't out yet and FTM was saying to use the M360. Anyway, I went back in and installled the M340, throwing the 340HV in the trash. I should have known better with Melling HV pumps--put one in my Bronco a few years ago and it blew out the oil filter. What a mess.
Do Fords not have oil pressure relief valves in the oil galleys?? Just curious. I've used Melling pumps in Volkswagen air cooled engines for years. Even most of those old engines had two relief valves; one to prevent over pressure and one to maintain minimum pressure. They were called dual relief cases. Also, were you running the oil weight specified for the engine? Far too many people assume that thinker is better. I tossed out a roller rocker in my 2011 Expy because of that (assumption). It appeared that the thicker oil failed to "squirt" far enough to lubricate the roller during pre-warmup minutes. I replaced the rocker and went back to 5w-20 and have added 80,000 miles to the vehicle. Still original phasers as far as I know.
 

eddytheexpy

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Thanks Eddy

1. I did find a FTM video on how to get air out of the system and also found an old F150 forum thread on parking at an incline to also help with getting the air out of the system. I’m not too worried about this now.

2. I did find an old video of my startup from a few months ago and my oil gauge was actually in the same place as now so you were right. So everything should be fine with the oil system now and I don’t need to worry about that initial air pocket in the pump?

3. When I was tightening the caps there was no upward pressure from the cam. So it wasn’t a fight for me. There was upward pressure when I initially laid the cam down but then removing and rotating the cam helped me find a more “neutral” position. As for rechecking the torque, I locked the cam with the locker tool and went at it with the torque wrench. I didn’t actually loosen the bolts at all because my torque wrench clicked right away without turning the bolt.
Is there any way to tell if I’ve bent a valve? Also what does non-zero phaser actuation mean?



Conclusion for anyone else is to do things the right way and take your time. If only just for peace of mind.
Also turn the crank by hand to check everything is operating properly. FTM does not mention that in his vids from what I remember.
for non-zero phaser actuation:

I just did a whole write up explaining what I meant but I realized it would amount to a non-issue so I deleted it.

What I was thinking would effectively turn into a super transient issue that would immediately correct itself as soon as you turned the crank. My thought was that the correlation of the phaser to cam position would be off permanently but the phaser’s spring would return that correlation back to zero degrees offset. Also, it wouldn't have the ability to produce any ill-effects even if you timed it with the phaser was at full actuation because the engine is designed to allow full actuation within the vvt scheme.

Sorry for worrying you :p

And as for knowing whether you bent a valve, I would wager a bet that you’re out of the woods on that front. You’d know about it. It would run like dogshit had you done it so if it’s running as good or better than before, that means you didn’t bend a valve in the process. If you really really wanted evidence that the valves are good you could run a compression test. BUT if you get a bad reading it just means you’ve got bad compression. You’d have to further diagnose the issue as a bent valve or something else.

As for air in the oil pump, once you got it to the point that the vehicle was reading oil pressure, youre home free after that. Definitely not advisable to do the full start up as there were definitely parts of your engine getting to know each other better than they ever should but if it came up shortly after startup you probably just donated a few atoms engine material. The reason you don’t want to start it without knowing that the oil pressure will be there is because of the speed and force from combustion on the components and the time delta it takes to get oil through all the passages and splashing around on the cams. Let’s say that the pressure never actually came up, then you’d be in a totally different situation.
 

eddytheexpy

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Do Fords not have oil pressure relief valves in the oil galleys?? Just curious. I've used Melling pumps in Volkswagen air cooled engines for years. Even most of those old engines had two relief valves; one to prevent over pressure and one to maintain minimum pressure. They were called dual relief cases. Also, were you running the oil weight specified for the engine? Far too many people assume that thinker is better. I tossed out a roller rocker in my 2011 Expy because of that (assumption). It appeared that the thicker oil failed to "squirt" far enough to lubricate the roller during pre-warmup minutes. I replaced the rocker and went back to 5w-20 and have added 80,000 miles to the vehicle. Still original phasers as far as I know.
Great writeup! What I learned is that I will NEVER attempt to do this job!
ExpyEL, go out there and get it! The most involved thing I’ve done before this is replacing my expy’s radiator. I’ve done LOTS of other stuff to it but nothing major like this timing job. Take your time, do your research and go for it! If you hit a spot where you have an “uh-oh” moment just use your brain. I actually had an uh-oh moment where I thought I had totally boned all my valves when putting the roller followers back in (I thought I had the cam in the wrong orientation when doing them). So I took some measurements of the right side cam’s position and lobes, stepped out of the garage and sat down with a paper, pencil and calculator for an hour. I reverse engineered the left side cam based off the design of the right side. I used that outcome to determine what the firing order should be as my verification that my math was right and totally nailed it when I checked it against the correct firing order. That gave me the confidence to continue, I thought I screwed something up that correlated the cams between banks so if I could calculate the firing order correctly based off the cams I knew they were where they were supposed to be. I went back to FTM’s video later to figure out what happened and it turns out I remembered something backwards hahaha. Plus if you’re doing the work, you know it was done with care and precision and it wasn’t just another job to some unscrupulous shop that’s just hoping enough time will pass before you come back that they can blame the outcome of their shoddy work on something else.

Purevw: idk about the oil galleys but the oil pump itself has a pressure relief valve. When I was having zero oil pressure before I found out about priming the pump through the outlet to the oil filter I stumbled across a horror story of somebody that had a Melling pump with the relief valve stuck open from factory. I was almost throwing up at the prospect of needing to tear it all back down hahaha
 
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FordMafia

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I noticed you installed the Melling HV oil pump. I did that in the spring along with lash adjusters (one was noisy, did the entire job you did in 2017) and wow, it was a disaster. Driving away on a cool (not cold engine), both phasers went max retard, 53 degrees, engine would barely run. I disconnected the solenoids and no change. The first test drive after the HV pump install was on a warm engine and no issues. I figured the oil bypass feature of the pump was max'd out and unregulated oil pressure got to the solenoids. Funny, I installed the M360--a high pressure pump in 2017--and didn't have an issue. At that time in 2017, the 340HV wasn't out yet and FTM was saying to use the M360. Anyway, I went back in and installled the M340, throwing the 340HV in the trash. I should have known better with Melling HV pumps--put one in my Bronco a few years ago and it blew out the oil filter. What a mess.
My understanding of all these things is quite limited. But I never saw a reason to go for the M360. My car worked great for 257k miles at stock PSI so why do I need all that extra PSI now. And the updated rocker arms would already increase some oil pressure (or no?) and that's why I got the M340HV to make sure I have oil ready to feed the demand of some of the updated parts. I'm really not sure though and don't have full understanding of how all the systems interact and what their needs may be. Maybe M340HV is a bit of a gimmic and the M340 should be fine? I guess I'm lucky I did this after the new Melling pumps came out. Also my old pump was totally fine and I only switched it out because I was already in there and after 257k miles of service seemed like a good time to retire it.

Also I read somewhere that some HV pumps have drained peoples oil pans due to increased volume demand. Do y'all think maybe adding 7.5 quarts instead of the 7 quarts FTM recommends is a good idea? I currently have the recommended 7.
 
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FordMafia

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Great writeup! What I learned is that I will NEVER attempt to do this job!
Before this the most technical stuff I'd ever done on a car (all on this one) was changing the blend doors and blower motor and then adding the oem remote start. In fact, on my blend doors post I said I wasn't comfortable messing with engine internals. And look at me now. If you have patience, the ability to follow instructions, and a little bit of creativity then you can 10000% do this.
 
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FordMafia

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for non-zero phaser actuation:

I just did a whole write up explaining what I meant but I realized it would amount to a non-issue so I deleted it.

What I was thinking would effectively turn into a super transient issue that would immediately correct itself as soon as you turned the crank. My thought was that the correlation of the phaser to cam position would be off permanently but the phaser’s spring would return that correlation back to zero degrees offset. Also, it wouldn't have the ability to produce any ill-effects even if you timed it with the phaser was at full actuation because the engine is designed to allow full actuation within the vvt scheme.

Sorry for worrying you :p

And as for knowing whether you bent a valve, I would wager a bet that you’re out of the woods on that front. You’d know about it. It would run like dogshit had you done it so if it’s running as good or better than before, that means you didn’t bend a valve in the process. If you really really wanted evidence that the valves are good you could run a compression test. BUT if you get a bad reading it just means you’ve got bad compression. You’d have to further diagnose the issue as a bent valve or something else.

As for air in the oil pump, once you got it to the point that the vehicle was reading oil pressure, youre home free after that. Definitely not advisable to do the full start up as there were definitely parts of your engine getting to know each other better than they ever should but if it came up shortly after startup you probably just donated a few atoms engine material. The reason you don’t want to start it without knowing that the oil pressure will be there is because of the speed and force from combustion on the components and the time delta it takes to get oil through all the passages and splashing around on the cams. Let’s say that the pressure never actually came up, then you’d be in a totally different situation.
Nah you were right to worry me. Looking back, I feel really dumb. I spent all that time and money just to get lazy at the very end (and I did everything else to the T or even more carefully) and save only like an hour or two of time. Really shows the importance of taking a break because what was I thinking. I wasn't even gonna startup on that day anyways because I wanted to give the gaskets 24 hours to harden.

As best as I can tell I have no bent valves because the drive is great and also Forscan isn't showing faults or wacky readings.

As for the oil pump, I went and watched that melling vid you linked on priming one and the guy said priming the pump is different than priming the system. I figure the 3 separate 10-15 second bursts of crank I did to prime the system are good enough. Thankfully the oil pressure came up instantly with/after start. I wish I knew beforehand about pump priming or I wouldn't have done it the way I did. I honestly figured Ford turned off the feature to show oil pressure before start or something like that when changing from FTM 2nd gen Expedition to the 3rd gen and that's why my switch never came up.
- I also edited my original post to add the vid you linked
 
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FordMafia

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AFTERTHOUGHTS OF THE JOB:

- DO THINGS THE RIGHT WAY! and don't take the rocker arm shortcut I did. The risk/reward is not in our favor
- did we even need to take the fan shroud out? I get why on the 2nd gen but we have electric and it wouldn't be in the way of anything from what I remember
- you could always remove it later if really needed but why mess with it or any of the harnesses or connections in the area when removing if there's no need
- might still be beneficial to unbolt the power steering reservoir for power steering pump mobility
- MAINTENANCE IS KEY! 257k miles and my truck was cleaner inside than the one FTM was working on
- sure there was some varnish but absolutely no sludge and all of my timing components were intact
- my timing cover was so clean that it looked closer to the FTM one after he cleaned it and was ready to put it on
- I was hearing a high pitched whine almost like a turbo from the pulleys area in the week preceding me starting the timing (I'd already commited to starting and had ordered all the parts and pulleys) but couldn't diagnose which pulley was messed up
- there was some friction going on between my crankshaft position trigger wheel and my timing cover because I saw signs of rubbing so idk if that was the cause of the whine or if it was my tensioner pulley that also showed signs of rubbing into the timing cover
- regardless I'm doubling down on the idea that it's good to change all your pulleys for new if they're coming off anyways after enough miles to warrant a timing job and I have no whine now
- no part of doing this job requires a crazy amount of force
- if you find youself getting frustrated and trying to really push or pull on something, then you're doing it wrong
- no shame in taking a 2 min break and trying to think about what you're doing wrong and how to fix it because you will be the one to pay the price for mistakes in the end
- my driver's side cam caps were all numbered with arrows pointing to the front but there was no labelling on the passenger ones... why? Has anyone else noticed that?


UPDATE 110 MILES IN:

- Drives better than before! And feels very smooth
- I've been checking ForScan for codes and also checking live readings as I go and see nothing out of place
- Gas mileage is bad right now but I figure that's from the battery being unplugged and all the systems being reset and now having to relearn (e.g. transmission)
- Honestly feels faster/ more powerful than before as well but that could just be in my head
- Got lucky I didn't mess anything up with the valves or rocker arms
- Does increased oil pressure from rocker arms increase performance? Or is it just that I had a gradual decline in performance from my older parts and now it's operating as it should? Or some combo of both?
- coolant air has been succesfully drained and all of my remaining coolant has been added with no overheating issues
- My mom uses this truck a lot and, when I first sat her in there, she asked me "Is it on?" because of the noise difference from before. I used to be able to hear the truck from inside after remote starting but now I only hear the startup and then no more noise.
 
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SafariGoneWrong

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Do Fords not have oil pressure relief valves in the oil galleys?? Just curious. I've used Melling pumps in Volkswagen air cooled engines for years. Even most of those old engines had two relief valves; one to prevent over pressure and one to maintain minimum pressure. They were called dual relief cases. Also, were you running the oil weight specified for the engine? Far too many people assume that thinker is better. I tossed out a roller rocker in my 2011 Expy because of that (assumption). It appeared that the thicker oil failed to "squirt" far enough to lubricate the roller during pre-warmup minutes. I replaced the rocker and went back to 5w-20 and have added 80,000 miles to the vehicle. Still original phasers as far as I know.
Good questions. Looking at the oiling diagram for the 5.4 in the Ford shop manual, there is a restriction in each cylinder head for oil flow to the camshafts, lash adjusters and roller followers. The VVT system does not get this restriction. I haven't gone crazy with viscosity--using Mobil 1 5W-30. For whatever reason, my 5.4 is a bit of an oil burner, using a quart in about 1300 miles. Got it with 70K miles in 2012 and it has 124K now. Very nice looking engine inside with minimal varnish so I've always wondered why so much oil use. I've bounced back and forth between 5W-20 and 5W-30 over the years. Being in the Atlanta area, I lean 5W-30. The most impressive failure was the Bronco's oil filter separating from its base after installing the Melling HV pump. It was Motorcraft filter, FL1A.
 
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