Both Knock Sensors bad?

[Saulnier]

Howdy from Texas. This is my first post so go easy on me....

I have a 2015 F150 King Ranch with a 3.5 Ecoboost. The truck is in stock form with 93xxx miles.
It does run good but... I recently had to replace the battery. Around that time I got a CEL with two P0325 codes and tow P0330 codes. This indicates a fault with the knock sensor circuit and fault with Knock Sensor itself. I have reset the codes with a scan tool. The P0325 codes comes back within 10 miles of driving. The P0330 codes come back after on start cycle of the engine.

I am going to try and climb over the top of the engine this afternoon and check what I can get to of the wire harness.

It is my under standing that the knock sensors are located in the valley of the engine under the intake manifold. I have not been able to locate a good picture of the knock sensors in the engine.

Have any of y'all had to replace the knock sesnors in an F150 3.6 Ecoboost?

Is there a lower intake manifold that needs to be removed if I have to replace Knock sensors?

Do I have to remove that crossover pipe? I hope not as it looks like I would have to pull the front cover to do that.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Have a fantastic day and weekend.

Saulnier

 

[SHOdded]

Hello and welcome!

The fact that both banks are popping a code indicates we need to look somewhere upstream.  Is the knock genuine or false?  Is there an issue with knock sensor wiring rubbing/fraying?  Maybe a connector is loose, or water/dirt intrusion has occurred.

If it comes to removing the KS, you do have to remove the lower intake manifold for access, and I BELIEVE the crossover pipe to get the lower manifold off.  Doesn't look like the timing cover/front cover has to come off.

 

[glock-coma]

This is the location for the 3.5 transverse engine. Not sure if it’s different for the horizontal.

 

[glock-coma]

 

[Saulnier]

So here is what I have found so far. One of the sensors has wires that are completely severed or chewed through. I could not tell on the second one. Still checking.

 

[SHOdded]

Need pest control!

 

[ToMang07]

So here is what I have found so far. One of the sensors has wires that are completely severed or chewed through. I could not tell on the second one. Still checking.

Well, that's good compared to tearing it all open! As long as you can replace the harness....much better!

Still sucks tho.

 

[Saulnier]

Well.... turns out that the mouse, rat, whatever chewed to wire off of one sensor and partially chewed threw the sires on the other. The best part is the chewing was done right at the sensor, so NO I couldn't just fish out a wire and make a splice....

Here are my late night thoughts:

Knock sensor replacement on a 2015 king ranch 3.5 ecoboost F150 4x4

Tools needed:
10 mm socket
8 mm socket
7 mm socket
17 mm open end wrench, metric cressent wrench
flat blade screw driver
needle nose pliers
some kind of tape ( I used blue painters tape )
Bucket or catch basin ( use one that is clean )
Rags 7-8

Watch the video by "Fordtechmakeuloco" on you tube about 3.5 ecoboost timing set replacement. 4 parts.

I was able to remove the plastic intake manifold, coolant cross over pipe and driver side fuel rail and remove the offending parts. I did NOT remove the passenger side fuel rail. you can do what you need to do without removing it.

To remove the coolant cross over pipe I  first drained coolant by dis connecting the upper heater core hose and sucking some out with a shop vac I had cleaned out. I cleaned it out because I poured the coolant back in to the expansion tank when I was done.

After draining some of the coolant I removed the 3 bolt on the plastic fitting at the rear of the engine and then pulled and twisted the pipe.

*** Pay attention to what bolt go where in the fuel rail. Some of the bolt on the inside of the drivers side fuel rail (toward the middle of the engine) are shorter bolts and need to go back in the same hole they came from.

The nut on the compression fitting for the fuel rail is 17mm. I used a cressant wrench because I dirty like that.

The fuel rail will require some wiggling and finagling to get out. You will have to move the wire harness around a bit but it WILL come out.

*** Pay attention to the fuel rail. My injectors stayed in the block, but the "O" rings came off with the fuel rail. There was a red "O" ring and a black "keeper" in each boss of the fuel rail. I carefully replaced the red "O" ring on each injector and then a black keeper in each injector. If you don't do this you will have fuel leaks when you put the fuel rail back on. Don't ask me how I know that.......

I left the throttle body wires connected and just unbolted it from the manifold.

Cover the intake ports with tape as soon as you remove the intake manifold to lessen the chance of dropping something in one of the cylinders. If that happens you will have to pull a head...

Upon reassembly double check all the connections and hoses.

Start the engine and IMMEDIATELY check for fuel leaks.........

If everything is cool, reset your codes and take it for a spin.
I will know tomorrow after the computer fully resets that it worked.

Now that I have done it..... I could probably do it in about an hour and a half.

 

[SHOdded]

Thank you for taking the time to document this so thoroughly :thumb: :thumb:

The 4-part series referred to on YT from FTM starts here:
! No longer available