Gremlin engine miss

OK, heres the deal. this is concerning my 2000 crown vic p/i. it has the 4.6 with coil on plug ignition. When i bought the car, the check engine light was on. i read the codes. its was engine miss in cylinder 4 detected. and it felt like cylinder 4 wasnt even working as far as power goes. so i changed all the plugs and the coil on cylinder 4. the problem went away and the check engine light went off. then 2 weeks later (NOW) the car starts missing again and the computer says cylinder no. 2 miss detected. i tested the coil and it was a little out of spec, so i replaced it (this is getting expensive). the problem seems so have went away, but what would be causing this? i cant tell if its really the coils or the plugs. i used bosch platinum plugs for replacements. also, i originally though that i had a small coolant leak from the radiator hose that goes into the intake from the firewall because there was a little coolant there. i figured that would explain why cylinder 4 was fouled up. so i replaced it and used new clamps and all seems well there. this is my first 4.6, so im not too familiar with common problems, etc. any help would be appreciated.

well all the plugs looked bad. but this was a former police car and had been run rough for its 92000 miles. The plug looked like it still could have fired though. this may not be the best idea, but i did replace the number 2 cylinder plug with a autolite platinum instead of a bosch. i figure mis matching one plug as a control wont hurt anything. and it doesnt matter if its cold or hot, same deal. is there anyway a cracked intake(water wise) could cause this. i know the 4.6's had some issued with water leaks but i figure that would be apparent i.e. water running out of the back etc.

ok, heres the deal with fluids. there was aliitle antifreeze on the number 4 cylinder plug, but i believe it was from the leaky heater hose i had running down the hole from the top. that has since disapeared after replacing the heater hose and plug. the oil is clean, no milkyness at all and smells like oil. the antifreeze is kinda dirty, but not bad. it still looks green, definately doesnt look like a head gasket type thing or anything. thats why this is so confusing. im hoping its something simple, would multiple coils tend to fail at the same time and only around 100 miles or less? theres not much else besides the coil and pcm to control spark. no ignition box on these cars. any more idears!

totally unrelated, but ive been putting off changing the fuel filter, that could cause a miss maybe, or not? i dont know the last time it was changed.

84convertablegt said:

totally unrelated, but ive been putting off changing the fuel filter, that could cause a miss maybe, or not? i dont know the last time it was changed.

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anyone?

Superhereaux said:

i'd get those bosches out of there, copper plugs aren't too expensive

and if you get anymore misfires, swap the coil and see if the misfire follows.
same with the plugs

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Well the reason i bought the platinum plugs was because o.e. was platinum. but the bosch's are obviously a little different. like i said i replaced the one with a autolite platinum which is the same thing as a motorcraft o.e. platinum, so i will probably end up going with those before too long. but what is everyone else using. will a straight copper plug work ok?