I have a 1993 f-150 5.0 4x4, today it didn’t want to start at all. It would crank but wouldn’t spark. I cleaned my idle air control valve and that didn’t seem too be the issue. I took off my air filter and realized it could be replaced but wasn’t terrible. When I took out the air filter I realized that my crankcase breather element below it was oily and was actually falling apart, so my question is, why would it be oily and do I have a bigger problem?

 

First, the idle air control has nothing to do with spark.You have to start with ignition system.Power to the coil,coil, pickup coil in the distributor, cap, rotor, wires and plugs. You should actually prove there is no spark and you have proper fuel pressure of 30-45 psi.

You have to have a clear breather and a working PCV valve for the engine to breath properly and prevent excessive crankcase pressure. Both are very important.Replace the breather element and replace the PCV valve with an OEM part. Make sure that the rubber hose for the PCV is in good shape, not hardened up, not plugged up and there is powerful vacuum at the PCV valve. Try that and if oil makes its way back to the air box, there could be some blowby getting past the rings.

I had the same problem with my old F150. As a last resort, I had to go with a new PCV valve having a slightly higher flow rate. That fixed the problem for me as I was not going to rebuild the engine.