Sparks under my hood!!!

[95Vert]

It's nothing really drastic. My plugs are sparking and I can see the sparks at night. Now, I know it's not normal to see sparks but I just got the Livewires and the autolite 25s so they must be good. The sparks only happen at the base of the head and it's very minimal so is that normal??

 

[95Vert]

any kind of boots will do, i assume. where do those go?

 

[94TURBO5 O]

Get some wire separaters and some boots. They are prob arcing off the head.

 

[95Vert]

but the live wires came with that. i thought i knew what you were talking about but wasn't sure.

 

[94TURBO5 O]

The boots cover the end of the wire where the plug attaches.

 

[wytstang]

I have the same problem as you. Every single boot from the spark plugs are arcing off to the heads. I even got arc coming from the coil it self. It arc from the coil to the little box that surrounds it, and these are new msd wires and msd coil. That's the reason I bought new wires and coil my old 9mm ford and stock coil had the same problem and it carried over to my new wire and coil. I grounded the coil and still it's arcing at the boot and coil

 

[95Vert]

shouldn't performancedistributors.com hook me up with the problem. or can they just say its not their crap and send me to hell

 

[Chythar]

I doubt it would be the distributor, it's just transferring the power to the spark plugs. In theory, the power should go straight into the spark plug; it has the least electrical resistance to it. If there's arcing, the resistance in the plug is higher than the resistance going through the plug.

Out of curiosity, what's your spark plug gap? I believe stock is .054in. Perhaps a ground is loose? Or perhaps there's too much voltage in the system; could the alternator or voltage regulator be bad?

Just shooting out ideas, any thoughts?

 

[95Vert]

well, i didn't mean my dizzy, performance was the co that sold my ignition kit. it came with wires, coil, module, cap and rotor. my plugs are gapped at .060, reason being that they said it was capable of being gapped so big cause of the hotter coil. might that be the problem?

 

[go-stang5.0]

I have the same problem...but my wires are a year and a half old. I havent had any drivability issues with this but them again I'm running a hi-6 w/ lx-92 coil so even with the tiny arcing my plugs are still probably getting enough juice. if you figure it out let me know i'm interested in this myself but its just not priority with me.

 

[grrrrrrr]

is it possible that you put a lot of dielectric grease in your plug boots and some is hanging around the outside of your plugs? This would cause a bit of voltage to arc to the heads...

 

[95Vert]

nope, i didn't use any of that grease

 

[grrrrrrr]

I suppose it's possible that the particular plugs you bought had been sitting on the shelf for a while and the rubber is just old and cracked, did you have a carefull look at it? If you didn't try to bend it back and forth gently and see if there a little cracks in the insulation, especially the boot..

 

[95Vert]

thanx man, i'll try that. if that's the case, they should cover it, right? i mean, i've had the wires for about 2 months only.

 

[grrrrrrr]

If you kept the receipt I should think they would exchange it for you... If it's not cracked then you might have a funky bad ground somewhere. If your threads are real rusted and the plug and the block aren't making good contact then you could have this problem. I would definately think you just had cracks in your boots, it's not uncommon and you're not arcing everything. Hell, I don't know, maybe it's residual static electricity that builds up in the dizzy when it's cold outside and just discharges to the block because of the powerful ignition spark. Either way, as long as your engine is firing and you're not having misfires and uncombusted fuel I wouldn't worry about it too much...

 

[95Vert]

thanx, i'm glad it's nothing major but i still don't feel comfortable seein that at night. it's just on cylinder 1 and 2

 

[wytstang]

thanx, i'm glad it's nothing major but i still don't feel comfortable seein that at night. it's just on cylinder 1 and 2

Be glad it's just 2 I have that problem on ALL 8 and the coil arcing off to the square box that attached to it but I have no miss atleast if I don't it's so suttle I can't feel it if you find your problem let me know the only thing let for me to change are the plugs and dizzy.

 

[95Vert]

i'll keep you posted.