Advice for upgrade

[96&99GT's]

I have a 99 GT with a possible head, cylinder, or valve problem(I have been told by freinds). Basically when the car is running it is making a small back-fire noise coming from two middle cylinders or the intake manifold. Not sure yet. I will be having an estimate done this weekend to see what is actually wrong with it.

Knowing that bad things only equal better upgrades my question is what type of upgrades are suggested? Is there a popular head swap like there is for the 96-98's? Any other suggestions are welcome, i'm already beginning to face the fact that this is going to cost a good amount of money to fix either way. I have a mechanic(Friend who is also a professional) willing to help me so I figured I'd try and spend just as much money and end up with mods instead of another stock engine.

So far there are no mods to this car, this would be the first - more will come though.

Thanks

 

[Scorcher2005]

how do you have a backfire coming from the intake?

Heads = port/polish & bigger valves (might as well upgrade springs cam while your at it).
Bullit intake

If thats your problem and your looking to upgrade, ^thats your best route while your at it ^.

After that, some longtubes, mid, catback, fuel sys, & tune will make you some awesome gains to go along w/ your heads.

 

[96&99GT's]

It's not actually a back fire - it sounds like a backfire. Thats the only way to describe it. I'm getting the car towed tommorow evening.

 

[Mustang5L5]

Bad COP??


Don't write this off to head failure just yet. There are tons of little things that would be more probable

 

[steveb24]

loose plug or two. probably 90% sure

 

[96&99GT's]

It was a "blown spark plug". The plug actually blew out. Took the thread's with it. Looks like i'm getting ported heads! I'm going for the new heads instead of the helicoil.

Thanks for the advice.

 

[BurningRubber]

Another one falls victim to Fords worst design ever. Sorry to hear man. Ford should give the SOB's for as many people theyve screwed over.

But, if you dont want to spend the money for new heads, you can re-thread the one with the blown plug. There are several companies that sell kits that many of us guys (unfortunatly) are running. Most can be done with the head still on the car.

EDIT: Nevermind, I missed that you said you allready knew about the helicoil.

 

[PowerSplash93]

Check out MPH, get a set of heads, cams and a Bullitt intake and you should see some nice gains. Oh yea and get a tune also.
Matt

 

[the98stang]

I'm sick of Ford and their POS spark plugs!!!

Please people, check your plugs AT LEAST once a month and torque them to 13lbs with very very little antiseize!

As for your heads: stay away from Patriot heads (tons of people are complaining) as well as Sean Hyland products. I would order from VT or MPH