FE Power Forums
FE Power Forums => FE Technical Forum => Topic started by: 427HISS on November 05, 2020, 09:11:14 PM
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I know that most guys have a brand of spark plugs and even the types they like best, but have any of you engine builders tested them on the dyno ?
I've either used Denso or NGK, but other than looking very close at issues like oil, white, grey & black colors, electrode problem. I have index sets before, but I don't have the testing ability to gauge various types of plug's and manufacturers.
Does the FE heads have a best type, brand and gap that work better as a ''all-around'' plug ?
Copper/nickel, iridium, single platinum, double platinum, and silver.
Just one list, but I'm really wanting professional testing.
In This Article
The 5 Top-Rated Spark Plugs
Our Top Pick: NGK 6619 Iridium Spark Plugs
Runner-Up: Bosch 4417 Platinum+4 FGR7DQP Spark Plug
Budget Pick: Denso (4503) PK20TT Platinum TT Spark Plug
Best Iridium Spark Plugs: NGK 5464 BKR5EIX-11 Iridium IX Spark Plug
Best Platinum Spark Plugs: NGK (7092) BKR6EGP G-Power Spark Plug
Who Should Buy a Spark Plug?
Important Features to Consider
Frequently Asked Questions
Other Spark Plugs We Reviewed
Iridium Spark Plugs
Platinum Spark Plugs
Copper Spark Plugs
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https://www.thedrive.com/reviews/27526/best-spark-plugs
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Most is just marketing. The best plug is the one that has the right heat range, the right plug tip projection, and most importantly, the right gap. There was a time, long, long ago, where Champion was the plug of choice. Not universally, but widely. The rare earth construction, like iridium and platinum, is a red herring. Those are corrosion-resistant metals so the plugs will go for those 100k+ mile tune up distances. And that was largely an emissions consideration since a plug misfire will quickly kill a catalytic converter. So, the days of 12k mile plugs are gone. That's due to the high energy computer controlled ignitions. You can get a low tech plug to go 40k+ miles these days. Things like coil-on-plug and near plug, distributorless ignitions reduce the failure modes for ignitions.
It's just not practical and in many cases even realistically possible to compare two plugs of different construction and declare a winner. There will be variations in heat range, optimal timing advance for that particular plug, optimal plug gap, and plug position in the chamber. Kind of F1 and NASCAR engine shop levels of testing. And this is worth repeating; You can have the perfect plug for combustion in your engine, but you can easily miss on your ignition tune up and not realize that advantage. I would find it hard to believe that anyone with a street car is running the most perfect ignition timing and getting everything a particular plug can give for all circumstances. A race engine is a different story.
So, screw a plug in those heads. If it doesn't blow out or load up, you're most of the way there. Whatever name is on the porcelain, don't worry, be happy.
Others may have a different opinion.
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I agree, and in some cases, the fancy stuff isn't happy with CD ignition
I run standard Autolite cor Champion copper core, never an issue
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I run Autolite in my street cars. Platinum in the EFI ( factory) and they do go for 100,000 miles. Carbed engines get "regular" Autolites , and my high compression "race only" stuff gets NGKs. Why the switch? I gauge the plug heat by the discoloration of the gold irridite plating on the threads of the NGK. Not because it is a superior plug in any way. Stupid ? No , lazy on my part.
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GerryP speaks wisdom! Fancy metal plugs erode more slowly. That's it. All you need is the right heat range on a good quality name-brand plug and you're set.
If you believe the claims of Splitfire and the like, I've got some Slick50 to sell you. (Man, I'm starting to sound like Royce Peterson!!)
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Those plugs "appear" amazing when ALL EIGHT (coil wire to the plug) cylinders fire through it. looks like an arc welder or Tesla project. Show it firing off of an 8 cylinder distributor cap as it really runs in the engine and it's FAR less dramatic. Same gimmick was used for the MSD multi spark under 3,000 rpm. The multi spark IS functional , don't get me wrong, but when you "show" it on one plug , it's really dramatic. Multi ground strap plugs have been around for 100 years.
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GerryP speaks wisdom! Fancy metal plugs erode more slowly. That's it. All you need is the right heat range on a good quality name-brand plug and you're set.
If you believe the claims of Splitfire and the like, I've got some Slick50 to sell you. (Man, I'm starting to sound like Royce Peterson!!)
OMG, Splitfires!! My buddy did a "test" with those many decades ago on his Turbo Coupe T bird(when it was still stock). I even have the video from the track with him changing them from his Autolites. Yup, not a bit of difference. Those commercials where everyone was saying how much of an improvement they were? Ya, they likely had 100K miles on their plugs and ANY new plug would make a big difference.
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Multi-ground strap plugs were designed for aircraft use in the '20s. The only advantage they have is if you lose one strap, which was their only purpose. A big deal when you're 1000-15,000 feet in the air, not so much when driving down the road...lol
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My dad bought some E-3 plugs for me and is dying for me to try them. I just dont see the benifit and Im worried they will hit or something weird
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GerryP speaks wisdom! Fancy metal plugs erode more slowly. That's it. All you need is the right heat range on a good quality name-brand plug and you're set.
If you believe the claims of Splitfire and the like, I've got some Slick50 to sell you. (Man, I'm starting to sound like Royce Peterson!!)
Royce Peterson? recognice that name ??? is it the guy with the bigfoot movie from the 60s?
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I helped take part in a dyno test session where we were trying to find out about indexing plugs, brand of plugs, and after establishing a good repeatable base horsepower and torque, we installed a set of the E-3 spark plugs, and lost 8 horsepower. Tuning did not get it back. Installed the old Autolite spark plugs, and the 8 horsepower came back. I was told by the sales representative of E-3 that we were using the wrong heat range, but they were the ones who donated their plugs for testing. Joe-JDC
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Royce Peterson? recognize that name ??? is it the guy with the bigfoot movie from the 60s?
Royce is a well-known Cougar expert, especially for GTE's and CJ cars. He used to post a lot on the old Forum. Every once in awhile Royce will pop up over there again. He's very knowledgeable, but can be quite prickly when somebody brings up a controversial idea. Royce would famously pop up if someone mentioned a factory W-code Mustang sighting. "There were NO 427 Mustangs factory produced - EVER!!! Only the Cougar GTE got a 427 in 1968!!!"
I could see Royce coming down hard against newfangled spark plugs or miracle oil additives. "It's all bunk! It'll never work!" Makes me chuckle.
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Thanks for the info Joe. Just curious did indexing prove to be fruitful or no.
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Not to open up a can of worms, but indexing on old vintage engines where the sparkplug is not ideally placed, poor combustion chamber design will make a difference. On the newer combustion chambers with the plug placed near center, or aimed toward the exhaust valve, no difference. I did several tests on my EMC engines, and did not find any help with power due to good chamber design. Joe-JDC
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i find myself changing a single plug here and there between tuneups.i get my heat gun out and if any of the cylinders are cooler than the others after a minute or two of running or if i have a slight miss etc. so when i buy a set i usually buy 10 or so plugs for this reason.
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427HISS; There is a lot to consider when talking about this subject. One major thing to keep in mind is the difference between lab findings, and real world engine conditions. First, let us assume all parts of the ignition system are operating properly.
Considering the new rare earth metals used in electrode tips...YES, they do last longer than standard metal tips...but does that matter in an FE powered vehicle? I don't think so.
A few parameters a spark plug must meet are, correct heat range, correct spark gap, the ability to thread in and fit the hole as intended, the ability to arrest the spark energy and channel it to the plug gap only, and the ability to properly hold the spark plug wire...The rest is some sort of add on.
An Autolite 45 is a pretty standard plug for FE engines, and has been around for a long, long time. This plug will function properly if it is the correct heat range for the tune of the engine as well as having the correct gap. In a points style system it will easily go 30,000 miles, and in a more modern system it will easily go 50,000 miles.
But, at less than $30 for a set of 8 plugs it really does not matter because they are cheap to replace if something goes wrong.
The V-plugs, and other poly-electrode styles do offer some benefits, but only in terms of more sharp, conductive areas for the spark to jump across.
The electrical properties of the spark are limited to the physics of electricity.
This means the spark will jump the gap of least resistance.
When the single electrode plug begins to wear, the spark must work a bit harder to jump the growing gap. Until the gap becomes more resistive than other conductive gaps, the spark will continue to jump that gap...right up to misfire conditions.
The poly-electrode plugs do provide multiple areas for the spark to arc across, but they do not provide an "easier" area for the spark to arc across until the easiest area wears to the point the spark arc begins using a different gap area than the now worn and harder to jump gap occurs.
In effect, the poly-electrode plugs provide more wear surfaces as compared to a single electrode plug. All else is equivalent when the system parameters are taken into consideration.
The Autolite 45, when gapped correctly and in good condition, will provide the same spark, across the same .040" gap, as any other quality conductor capable of handling the power of the system.
The poly-electrode plugs do provide a "better" life in systems, or uses, that tend to burn electrodes quickly simply because they literally have more electrodes to burn down before the plug begins to misfire.
This same principle occurs in the rare metal tipped plugs. The tips simply last longer and therefore maintain the proper gap longer...but they do not provide a better spark across a given gap.
The rare earth metal tipped plugs do present a potential to lose the tip...They are affixed in some manner so they will come off at some point. This VERY hard tip now must travel through the system until ejected out the exhaust, or becoming lodged into some portion of the engine where it finally resides.
My findings concerning spark plugs are this.
1) The plug must be constructed properly, Good threads, good seal washer if required, good porcelain (resistor/insulator) good conductor and connection to the plug wire tip, electrodes that maintain the set gap, proper length of plug body into combustion chamber for the application.
The rest, while verifiable in the lab, probably does not result in increased performance with normal engine use.
Last is the general use of most FE engine these days. While many FE's now reside in nice cars and trucks and boats, few of them see daily use and high miles each year...Many don't see 3,000 miles per year.
This means a lowly 30,000 mile lifespan spark plug will probably last 8-10 years in most instances when screwed into an FE engine these days.
Find a spark plug you like, understand, and have verified as a working heat range for your engine tune and let the rest work itself out.
If there is one thing I have verified over the decades in terms of spark plugs it is this.
I have never, ever, had a properly sized, name brand, spark plug NOT work properly without a good reason.
That reason is usually a physical defect in the plug, some issue with the ignition system of the engine, a poor tune, or some variation of all of these...but never has the plug itself been the problem.
Champion, Autolite, Motorcraft, NGK, Bosch, AC Delco, Denso, they all work well when applied, gapped, and installed correctly.
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Not to open up a can of worms, but indexing on old vintage engines where the sparkplug is not ideally placed, poor combustion chamber design will make a difference. On the newer combustion chambers with the plug placed near center, or aimed toward the exhaust valve, no difference. I did several tests on my EMC engines, and did not find any help with power due to good chamber design. Joe-JDC
To expand a bit on plug indexing, in the early/mid 60s it was done only for the ground electrode to clear large dome high compression pistons such as on SBCs. It was one of those "magic speed tricks" where racers saw it done on good running race cars and thought it was new found horsepower because the winners were doing it so they need to as well. Joe, I never heard it even helped lousy combustion chambers. How much hp did you see by indexing plugs with poor combustion chambers?
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Nothing conclusive, but 3-7 hp seems to be about all we could verify. A fresh change of oil, and a fresh set of plugs, and everything was a wash. BTW, oil does degrade with dyno testing very fast. Dyno mules that see over 75 dyno pulls, should change the oil and filter as maintenance. Joe-JDC
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For what it's worth, many moons ago I spent a season 'wrenching' a Thunderbolt with The Corrunker Brothers. At the time we were using Champion plugs and Champion was happy to give us a case of plugs any time we asked. The plugs were good for one pass, and had to be changed every time we got a timing slip. I believe running the engine on the return road was causing the fouling---leading to a slight miss on the next pass.
I was the one who did the changing, and still have marks on my arms and hands from coming in contact with hot headers. (The marks are hard to see after this many years!)
We discovered that using Autolite plugs made changes much less necessary. They'd last for a whole day of racing. But in order to be given a case of Autolites, we had to bust the porcelain out of the shell, and turn the shell in. I discovered that putting the plug in a vise and smacking the upper end hard with a hammer would do the trick.
I once tried to wrap wet rags around my arms for protection, but then I got blisters from the suddenly-boiling water in the rags. :o
KS
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Indexing plugs is a time consuming task.
I’m sure JDC know the guys in San Antonio with real BOSS 302’s one of them owned a shop with the nastiest BOSS I’d ever heard,I worked for him, and BTW just saw him at COTA yesterday.
He asked one of the other wrench’s to change the plugs in the car for one reason or another, engine fired then would not idle... the pop up pistons closed the gaps on 5 cylinders.
At the time we didn’t have any index washers on hand and didn’t have time to get them,but we did have about 30 more plugs. I pulled each plug and marked the electrodes then reinstalled the ones that didn’t hit, noted my mark and one by one duplicated the mark location on the holes with bad plug. Ended up with 2 sets marked with which cylinder they fit...not hard just a lot of time.
Meanwhile flash forward 20 or so years,another friend with a BOSS headed R block who vintage races just uses the non projected tip,side gapped off the shelf race Autolites ,we just stick them in and run 7500rpm all day...until the oil pump lockedup. But that’s another story.
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I used an indexing tool to check all new plugs I got. I would note the clocking on the box by letter , A-L . Then I would check each cylinder to see which hole liked what letter. Keeping a log of that made plug changes a snap and "worry free" regardless of who did it. Say one cylinder was "perfect" with a "D" letter plug. In a pinch you could use a C or an E if you were short on Ds. I too did it for dome clearance. Nascar builders always index plugs fro power reasons as they don't have domes to interfere with.
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For what it's worth, many moons ago I spent a season 'wrenching' a Thunderbolt with The Corrunker Brothers. At the time we were using Champion plugs and Champion was happy to give us a case of plugs any time we asked. The plugs were good for one pass, and had to be changed every time we got a timing slip. I believe running the engine on the return road was causing the fouling---leading to a slight miss on the next pass.
I was the one who did the changing, and still have marks on my arms and hands from coming in contact with hot headers. (The marks are hard to see after this many years!)
We discovered that using Autolite plugs made changes much less necessary. They'd last for a whole day of racing. But in order to be given a case of Autolites, we had to bust the porcelain out of the shell, and turn the shell in. I discovered that putting the plug in a vise and smacking the upper end hard with a hammer would do the trick.
I once tried to wrap wet rags around my arms for protection, but then I got blisters from the suddenly-boiling water in the rags. :o
KS
When I started racing with my tunnel port I found the exact same thing. The Champions were only good for about 1 pass, switching to Autolites made a big difference
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I didn't mention it above, but we went to a TP during that year, as well. If I remember correctly, we'd gone to the TP by the time we switched to Autolites. :)
KS
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For what it's worth, many moons ago I spent a season 'wrenching' a Thunderbolt with The Corrunker Brothers. At the time we were using Champion plugs and Champion was happy to give us a case of plugs any time we asked. The plugs were good for one pass, and had to be changed every time we got a timing slip. I believe running the engine on the return road was causing the fouling---leading to a slight miss on the next pass....
Just thinking out loud here, but if the Champion plugs were loading up, was it a heat range issue? Plug tip projection? I have experienced a similar outcome with a Mopar and in this case, the Champion plug was that engine's Huckleberry. This engine would load up on only the front cylinders, which I attributed to those cylinders getting the cooler water. But the head would have been getting the hotter water. So, I reasoned that due to the colder cylinder wall, the fuel vaporization was insufficient for combustion consistency and was wetting the plug. I never experimented to find if I could fix the issue by juggling heat ranges, but I am curious if a different plug in those two cylinders would have worked.
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I use AUtolite or Motorcraft in the door car because of the stock iron heads, NGK in the dragster because they fit the heads with the proper reach/gasket and have the heat range needed. I don't index, ain't nobody got time for that.
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For what it's worth, many moons ago I spent a season 'wrenching' a Thunderbolt with The Corrunker Brothers. At the time we were using Champion plugs and Champion was happy to give us a case of plugs any time we asked. The plugs were good for one pass, and had to be changed every time we got a timing slip. I believe running the engine on the return road was causing the fouling---leading to a slight miss on the next pass....
Just thinking out loud here, but if the Champion plugs were loading up, was it a heat range issue? Plug tip projection? I have experienced a similar outcome with a Mopar and in this case, the Champion plug was that engine's Huckleberry. This engine would load up on only the front cylinders, which I attributed to those cylinders getting the cooler water. But the head would have been getting the hotter water. So, I reasoned that due to the colder cylinder wall, the fuel vaporization was insufficient for combustion consistency and was wetting the plug. I never experimented to find if I could fix the issue by juggling heat ranges, but I am curious if a different plug in those two cylinders would have worked.
I had the same kind of question- how can I tell if it's a tuning issue or a heat range change that's needed? Also, would running mixed heat ranges be a problem over time?
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We never questioned the 'why'. The Autolite guy was nearby at about the time we were getting to the bottom of a case of Champions and he was happy to give us a box of his---with the proviso that to get more we'd have to save the shells instead of simply throwing them away. I'm sure we tried both BF22s and BTF1s at one time or another, but the memory is hazy as to what worked best. At a guess they were likely BF22s.
KS
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Royce Peterson? recognize that name ??? is it the guy with the bigfoot movie from the 60s?
Royce is a well-known Cougar expert, especially for GTE's and CJ cars. He used to post a lot on the old Forum. Every once in awhile Royce will pop up over there again. He's very knowledgeable, but can be quite prickly when somebody brings up a controversial idea. Royce would famously pop up if someone mentioned a factory W-code Mustang sighting. "There were NO 427 Mustangs factory produced - EVER!!! Only the Cougar GTE got a 427 in 1968!!!"I could see Royce coming down hard against newfangled spark plugs or miracle oil additives. "It's all bunk! It'll never work!" Makes me chuckle.
Peter.. Good name for the self-proclaimed know-it-all. He gets really nasty when you prove him wrong. There are no W code mustangs, period. Many discussions over the years. Kevin Marti also confirmed. Until the Ford records became available there were a few faked W codes. We even had a M code fake Fairlane show up. No cammers in any street car from Ford either.
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We never questioned the 'why'. The Autolite guy was nearby at about the time we were getting to the bottom of a case of Champions and he was happy to give us a box of his---with the proviso that to get more we'd have to save the shells instead of simply throwing them away. I'm sure we tried both BF22s and BTF1s at one time or another, but the memory is hazy as to what worked best. At a guess they were likely BF22s.
KS
BF22 is what I used that worked best
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For what it's worth, many moons ago I spent a season 'wrenching' a Thunderbolt with The Corrunker Brothers. At the time we were using Champion plugs and Champion was happy to give us a case of plugs any time we asked. The plugs were good for one pass, and had to be changed every time we got a timing slip. I believe running the engine on the return road was causing the fouling---leading to a slight miss on the next pass....
Just thinking out loud here, but if the Champion plugs were loading up, was it a heat range issue? Plug tip projection? I have experienced a similar outcome with a Mopar and in this case, the Champion plug was that engine's Huckleberry. This engine would load up on only the front cylinders, which I attributed to those cylinders getting the cooler water. But the head would have been getting the hotter water. So, I reasoned that due to the colder cylinder wall, the fuel vaporization was insufficient for combustion consistency and was wetting the plug. I never experimented to find if I could fix the issue by juggling heat ranges, but I am curious if a different plug in those two cylinders would have worked.
I had the same kind of question- how can I tell if it's a tuning issue or a heat range change that's needed? Also, would running mixed heat ranges be a problem over time?
Too much heat or not enough heat will show up on the plug's threads.
Also, if you have way too much heat, it will show up on the insulator and can turn it colors (i.e. green).
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Brent:
Not all of us "read" how something is running because the information is often sketchy. I would love a photographic lesson based on markings and plug colors and selection of ranges. That would be a great post for the forum.
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http://wallaceracing.com/plug-reading-lm.html
A good read and a few pictures. Larry Meaux article.