Ok, just wondering if this is normal. I'm still getting a bad stutter and stupidness from my hatch, and I'm almost at wit's end...

So I experimented a little last night.

On 3 of my cylinders, while at idle, pulling one of the spark plug wires from the spark plug hole in the head just caused the idle to drop slightly because the car was running on 3. Duh.

Ok, on the #2 spark plug wire, when I pulled it off the spark plug, the spark was arcing to the spark plug "tunnel" from the side of the spark plug wire's rod thing...

Besides a cool light show, I don't THINK this is normal, there should be better insulation around this, right?

Anyone else know for sure, or have similar experiences? I'm thinking this could be greounding out instead of sparking the spark plug, causing my car to run like *** once the resistence int he combustion chamber builds up.

What brand spark plug wires do you guys suggest, I'm using NGK's blue ones now. I've had em for four years

 

If you pull your spark plug boot off while the car is running, that plug wire should spark to the nearest ground. My friend had a problem with his car studdering, similar to what you described. It ended up that he had moisture down in his plug tubes, but he could never see it because when he pulled the wire off he didn't see anything. This was because when the car was warm it would evaporate inside of the wire. The way he found it was he plulled the wires off when the motor was cool. I would suggest you pull the wires out of the spark plug tubes and let them air out. Hope this helps. BTW whats your plug gap?

 

.033... and I'm still wondering why only one would do this, cause the car does it ALL the time, not just when hot, cold, etc. ALWAYS.