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380 hours on iridium-s plugs

turbo

turbo

Well Known Member
1,100 hours on iridium-s plugs

bought these plugs in hope of reaching tbo with them. there dosent seem to be any wear yet. no maintenance done. a few lead balls on the lower plugs. easy to clean. i rotate them at the annual inspection.
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Which ones do you have? I have 700 hours on a set of the Auto Light Iridium plugs; I only clean them at annual, about 250 hours each year.
 
Look good

Out of interest, what do you clean them with?..I see harbor freight have spark plug cleaning shot blaster thing but I have no idea if it works as it should?

Frank
 
plugs

these are champions which only need the lead balls scrapped out with a dentist pick. usually on the bottom plugs.
 
No sand blasters

frankh said:
Out of interest, what do you clean them with?..I see harbor freight have spark plug cleaning shot blaster thing but I have no idea if it works as it should?

Frank
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I is not recommended to use abasives such as this; too harsh.
 
i did a plug check and rotation. these iridiums have 800 hrs on them and still look like new. had a little stuff on the lower #3 and#4. all others were free of lead buildup.
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one-wire vs two-wire???

amazing...little appearance of any effect at that many hours!

...gee I thought they all had 2 wires!....I guess the wear would be half as much on a 2-wire? Mine are Autolite I think?..but only 50 hrs. or so on them, so nothing to report.
 
I just checked mine today. 200 hours and they look perfect. A small mount of lead but they look like new. NO deterioration of the electrodes at all. I cleaned mine with some PRC brake cleaner and shop air. A small pick to get the lead out. I really didn't need to do anything to them.
 
That is a good effort their, not many lead balls at all. :)

Check that your massives are gapped between 16 and 18 thou before you reinstall them. Check their resistance is not over 4K ohms and they are good to go again!

DB
 
v, nice to see you are getting the lead out!

you are flying the wings off of that thing. i like it.

see you soon in FLORIDA.
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Anyone check plug resistence?

I too have been using Champion Iridium fine wire plugs for 750 hours and 10 years of flying with no problems. However, having said that, I am curious as to whether the Tempest plug "gouge" about competitor plugs not perfoming to spec once the resistence goes above 5K ohms has any merit. I checked my plugs at the last oil change and found some up them higher than my ohm meter's scale. The lowest reading I got was 14K and the highest was 125K. The plugs "seem" to perform well - but I am wondering if I bought a new set of Tempest's if the engine would run better. OBTW - I did check a new Tempest plug the other day, and it's initial resistence was 1.4K ohms, well within their "new" resistence allowance of 1.5 - 3 K ohms.

Anybody have any thoughts or history?

Thx
 
i have never heard of doing this test except on VAF. as long as the mag check is good and the plugs look like they are burning correctly i feel i am good to go. these plugs save me time on maintenance and hopefully $ at the end. we will see. they cost 3 times as much but hope to last 4 times as long.
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400 hours on stock Lycoming plugs. I clean and rotate them every 50 hours and every time there are considerable lead deposits on bottom ones.


leaddepositsonsparkplugs.jpg
 
Hey Vlad, it's time for a PMag...

Vlad said:
400 hours on stock Lycoming plugs. I clean and rotate them every 50 hours and every time there are considerable lead deposits on bottom ones.


leaddepositsonsparkplugs.jpg
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Vlad, you are coming up on a good time to consider replacing a mag with a PMag. I did this before Sun-n-fun and it has been great... pretty much eliminated lead build up on my mag plugs. This year on the trip I burned 31 gallons less than last year on similar 6,800 mile trips.
 
[email protected] said:
Vlad, you are coming up on a good time to consider replacing a mag with a PMag. I did this before Sun-n-fun and it has been great... pretty much eliminated lead build up on my mag plugs. This year on the trip I burned 31 gallons less than last year on similar 6,800 mile trips.
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Thanks for advice Steven. I would probably run mags to 500 hours then will see. Honestly don't want to do any mods. As soon as I get to the airport I am up to a destination. So little time...
 
HFS said:
I too have been using Champion Iridium fine wire plugs for 750 hours and 10 years of flying with no problems. However, having said that, I am curious as to whether the Tempest plug "gouge" about competitor plugs not perfoming to spec once the resistence goes above 5K ohms has any merit. I checked my plugs at the last oil change and found some up them higher than my ohm meter's scale. The lowest reading I got was 14K and the highest was 125K. The plugs "seem" to perform well - but I am wondering if I bought a new set of Tempest's if the engine would run better. OBTW - I did check a new Tempest plug the other day, and it's initial resistence was 1.4K ohms, well within their "new" resistence allowance of 1.5 - 3 K ohms.

Anybody have any thoughts or history?

Thx
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Yes I check and you should be! Just because there running fine today does not mean they will in the near future, not to mention the high resistance could be hard on the coil.

My plane had 900 hours on a set of Champion fine wire plugs when I bought it, shortly after it would drop a cylinder in flight once and a while, I started looking for the problem and found those plugs had 20 to 30 million ohms of resistance, I can?t hardly believe it even ran at all!!! My new AutoLight (now Tempest or whatever) have 1200 hours and have about 1500 ohms and running strong.
 
Try cleaning your plugs with some Hopps #9 gun solvent and a stiff bristle tooth brush and a dentist's pick....works well for me.


Glenn Wilkinson
 
I too have been using Champion Iridium fine wire plugs for 750 hours and 10 years of flying with no problems. However, having said that, I am curious as to whether the Tempest plug "gouge" about competitor plugs not perfoming to spec once the resistence goes above 5K ohms has any merit. I checked my plugs at the last oil change and found some up them higher than my ohm meter's scale. The lowest reading I got was 14K and the highest was 125K. The plugs "seem" to perform well - but I am wondering if I bought a new set of Tempest's if the engine would run better. OBTW - I did check a new Tempest plug the other day, and it's initial resistence was 1.4K ohms, well within their "new" resistence allowance of 1.5 - 3 K ohms.

Anybody have any thoughts or history?
Click to expand...

Ohhh yes!

Get rid of those plugs, or at least have Champion refurb them for you. Nothing wrong with an in spec Champion, but they get past 5K and the stress on your ignition system is severe.

Performance is much better when they are in spec too, problem is as they decay over time you do not notice.

Vlad

Are you gapping those plugs? :eek: Set to 0.016 - 0.018" carefully using the right tools. trust me you will notice an improvement. I can pick them on the EMS when they have gaps like that! :(

By the way our -10 is now a Tempest only machine!

Turbo
That plug looks to have wear, but what concernes me far more is it looks to have a crack in the ceramic.

Any chance you can post me a better photo?

You do not want any cracked ceramics. They can be fatal. If this is cracked I insist you keep that plug and any others, I know someone who will be very keen to see it. ;)
 
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