dirtySOHC's

i have heard it all about plugs and still am not too sure on how to make a determintaion on how my car is running.

the thing i and most are concerned about is reading them for detonation. Most use the "salt and pepper" = detonation. but i have heard that the white kinda specs = detonation and that the black specs = too rich. can someone confirm?

anyway, my motor has been through the basic bolt-ons, then nitrous, back to N/A and now boosting. ever since i could remember i have always seen specs whether white or black on my plugs. Now if the "salt and pepper" theory is true and i have been detonating then my motor should have been toast a real long time ago. And to add my plugs dont show that i am in a lean condtion, i always have the brownish tan color which indicate a good clean burn. Sometimes it may be a little on the dark side but nothing to get worked up about.

can we discuss?

dirtySOHC's

i gotta keep this up there..........i need answers

Joseph Davis

Here you go.

The first link is junk, the rest appear pretty good.

IMO, specks = detonation. When I run rich, my plugs look sooty, black soot comes off on my fingers, but it is too fine and uniform a coating to be called specks.

Glad to hear you're reading your plugs, most people are too lazy.

dirtySOHC's

Man i pull my plugs almost everytime i shut off the engine. i am so damn paraniod and this was even before i was boosted. i think my spark plug socket gets the most work out every tool i have.

I always thought that specs = detonation but i get so many different veiws from ppl on this board its hard to say.

so wat do you think about wat i said last, about my motor should have been long gone because i have always........always seen specs. am i just experiencing mild detonation? but detonation period is damaging and......so why is it still running strong and compression is ?

*shaking my head*..........this is the only thing about my that bothers me.


oh thanks for the link gave some clarification.

dirtySOHC's

and agian ^^

b16ahybrid

You can detonate for years and not blow your engine. It all depends on the severity of it.
Little specs on the plugs are not good.They should come out clean and grey in color.
Mine used to be black and sooty but that was due to runing extreemly rich, now they are a nice uniform grey color. Btw You can still detonate if your runing extreemly rich, timing plays role

turbod16y8

what kiind of injectors are u running?>

Joseph Davis

bump... want to hear more details.

boosted hybrid

Your probably not detonating, your pre igniting the mixture. Pre ignition can occur over many years and not kill the engine. One bad detonation and the engine is toast. My father used to have an old school ranger truck that would knock like hell, it was pre ignition. It did this for 6 years before he sold the truck, the engine lasted the entire time.

As far as reading your plugs is concerned, you need to pull them after you do a full throttle/boosted run. You need to shut the car down immediately by turning off the key, then keep your foot on the clutch pedal and pull off to the side of the road. The plugs will read exactly how they were burning in WOT/boost mode. If you let the engine run after you boosted, your plugs will show the partial throttle burn on the spark plug. Even if you shut the engine down, but dont keep the clutch in you will be letting the engine cycle and burn off the mixture. With a 12:1 air/fuel mixture my plugs in boost look black, with minimal amount of soot on them. When I am partial throttle 14.5:1 air/fuel mixture my plugs are a nice light brown color.

dirtySOHC's

im running the hack and my fuel pressure is at about 42. i am also running the maxrev kit at 7lbs if that matters.

i have done full throttle runs and shut down immediatly. My plugs are a brownish to black color and i do get some little specs every know and then.

i hope wat you guys are saying about pre ignition is true because i have done everything less than tuning to fix the problem, retard, richin, and lowerd the boost.......but still no luck.

my motor runs strong as hell but sometimes i am just so damn paranoid to run it really hard. Just yesterday i ran it the hardest on the highway doin 3rd, 4th, and partial 5th gear pulls and it held up.


anyone else care to add.

TurbodCX

You should never do 5th gear pulls!!!!!!!!

That is really hard on motor!!!

Brian

dirtySOHC's

i know its rough on it.......which is why i only did partial pulls.....i would only get on fifth for a little bit.

TurboSedan

Just don't do it often, you could cause damage. Good luck.

turbotypeR@SPEC

when i check mine, if the end of it is not blown off, then i'm ok. ha!ha!

dirtySOHC's

i hope to never see that

Joseph Davis

Hrm, AFC hack? What are you using (if anything) to control timing? What engine/car/ECU?

AFC hack throws off ignition timing... you might begetting little specks from passing through the high ignition advance lower boost figures. If you can't hear it, it is a borderline case; retard your ignition 2 to 3 degrees and tell us if it still leaves specks on your plugs?

If you want to upgrade an OBD0 or OBD1 car to run an AFC hack with the ECU chipped for ignition retard, it's pretty simple and affordable at this point.

dirtySOHC's

im running stock motor (d16y8) and stock ECU i have my timing retarded at about 4 degrees being that i know about the ignition advance.

i wanna run the uberchip but i have to save up to convert to obd 1 and get another ecu and blah blah you know.

later on down the road i will have a better fuel set up, this was just the better alternative i had at the time.