Gen 3 Exhaust Manifold Removal Quesiton

[coder]

I am thinking of replacing the exhaust manifold bolts/studs before they break. The shop manual says to remove exhaust manifold you need to lift the engine up.

I would like to remove the old bolts and put in new one without removing the manifold and gasket. Does anyone know if this can be done without lifting the engine up?

[DamageWagon]

My 2011 is probably identical to yours, they didn’t really change much on the engine. I easily did mine without lifting the engine. Some bolts you have to get from underneath but they’re all very accessible. I ordered some new hardware to swap them out at M8x1.25-45mm. That’s the stock length but they have about a 5mm unthreaded lead-in. I have ditched the heat shields so I can use class 10.9 fasteners

[coder]

My 2011 is probably identical to yours, they didn’t really change much on the engine. I easily did mine without lifting the engine. Some bolts you have to get from underneath but they’re all very accessible. I ordered some new hardware to swap them out at M8x1.25-45mm. That’s the stock length but they have about a 5mm unthreaded lead-in. I have ditched the heat shields so I can use class 10.9 fasteners

Hello DamageWagon,

Thanks for your input. Based on all the google searching I've done it seems that the 4th Gen trucks don't require lifting the engine like the 3rd gens do but I am hoping there's a way to not have to lift it.

Anyone with an 05-08 that can chime in?

[DamageWagon]

You should be able to see if the going to work or not. Pull the fender liners and you should have a good view of everything.

[coder]

My 2011 is probably identical to yours, they didn’t really change much on the engine. I easily did mine without lifting the engine. Some bolts you have to get from underneath but they’re all very accessible. I ordered some new hardware to swap them out at M8x1.25-45mm. That’s the stock length but they have about a 5mm unthreaded lead-in. I have ditched the heat shields so I can use class 10.9 fasteners

Did you have to use longer bolts than M8x1.25-45mm where the studs were the bottom looks longer?

[coder]

You should be able to see if the going to work or not. Pull the fender liners and you should have a good view of everything.

I took a look and the passenger side header is very close to the frame the only potential problem I see is not being able to pull the bolts all the way out before they make contact. I may have to just by the hardware and give it a try and return it if they won't come out. Worst case I could pull the cylinder head off but that adds a lot of extra work.

[Colibri]

I’ve done manifolds on my 3rd gen, you can do the bolts without lifting the engine. It’s a little tedious but not terrible. If you do new hardware / SRT bolts etc. then you won’t be able to retain the heat shields, but I don’t think they do much anyway.

Use high temp antisieze
You won’t be able to get a torque wrench on several fasteners
Take the front wheels off and pull the fender liners

[Retired BLM Rig]

I’ve done manifolds on my 3rd gen, you can do the bolts without lifting the engine. It’s a little tedious but not terrible. If you do new hardware / SRT bolts etc. then you won’t be able to retain the heat shields, but I don’t think they do much anyway.

Use high temp antisieze
You won’t be able to get a torque wrench on several fasteners
Take the front wheels off and pull the fender liners

^^^What he said.^^^

Holler if you need a hand, I have lots of tight access specialty tools and I’m only a few miles away.

Personally, I would resist the urge to use special high-strength bolts due to difficulty in drilling and extracting if they break in the future. Back in the 90s Ford used stainless alloy exhaust manifold bolts and they were almost impossible to remove.

I thought they would’ve replace the bolts when they did your engine last year. At least the bolts should come out easier after that.

[stamm20]

If your going that far you should just do headers prolly the same amount of pain in the ass lol. My tip is be very gentle taking the old bolts out I had one break off in the head

[TrueCowboy426]

As stated above, do not need to lift the engine to do either side. I've done both exhaust manifold gaskets and they are not bad. The passenger side is a ton harder than the drivers as the engine is closer to the frame rail on that side but not too bad. I just did the exhaust manifold gasket on the drivers side of my PW 2 weeks ago and it was under 2 hrs from start of jacking the truck up to remove the tire, to torquing the wheel back on. Now the passenger side sucked as it had multiple broken bolts that had to be extracted. That was quite a few more hours to replace the gasket.

Personally I would replace the gaskets because you are already there anyway, so why not? It's not that much harder to remove the down pipe and pull the manifold to clean up the mating surfaces and put in a new gasket, than it is to replace the bolts.

[Rp954]

before you start on it look at your passenger side motor mount. Mine was so bad that the bottom of the manifold was rubbing on the top of the frame from it sagging. I replaced the rubber insert and then ended up with about 1" clearence between bottom of manifold and the top of the frame. You can look thru the passenger side wheel well and see your clearence

It is MUCH easier to do the motor mount with the manifold out of the way.

And if you do have broken studs that are flush with the head, weld a washer on first and then a nut - found that tip online somewhere and it works better than just welding a nut on.

While your there, are your transmission cooler lines leaking yet too up by the radiator?