In my years of experience as a single guy, I found out that most women don't have any interest in cars, as long as they are clean. The ones that do care, all turned out too matererialistic for my temperament
Your praise of the Bisch Platinum Plus 4 spark plugs caught my attention... I put a set into my Mercedes 400E. It's old, but still a great car. I put in new distributor caps and rotors and some good spark plug wires while I was at it... Figured I was done with that for quite a while.
Less than 6 months after I had done the tune-up, it started missing. The car is a 1993, so the computer is not as sophisticated as some newer models. I do have a special code reader for the Mercedes, but it showed no faults in any of the systems.
About 6 months before I had done the tune up, I had to replace the engine wiring harness. This is a common problem with Mercedes of a certain vintage; the German government dictated that everything plastic in the car had to biodegrade in a landfill, and the engine wiring typically disintegrated at some point... I looked into a new electronic throttle actuator, but at $1000 I thought i would wait until it was really bad.
So, I assumed that it now needed the electronic throttle replaced. So I bit the bullet, bought the $1000 part and spent about three hours cussing at the guys that designed the thing. And when it was all back together, it still had the miss.
Searching online, I ran across a lot of complaints about Bosch getting really cheap with the Platinum plugs; they were now junk. So I decided to pull the plugs and see for myself. They were terrible! Almost all the ground electrodes had all but dissapeared! Those Bosch Platinuim Plus 4's sucked!
I replaced them with Nippondenso Platinum's, and the car has been perfect since...
I will never buy Bosch spark plugs or oil filters again... They are crap!
Too bad about the spark plug thingy on that doowackus under the hood in the front of the car.
Maybe a special fuel additive that cleans the threads prior to the tuneup. Or we could just remove the heads, send them out to get them bead blasted and reassemble. Along with simple instructions to perform this operation for the avarage motorist...
But we have to admit - that is a cool flame paint job on the valve cover and headers.
While other manufacturers spend their time and money to redesign the wheel, FORD apparently is way above that, and just redesigns the Spark Plugs each and every year as well as each and every model.
In well designed and matched ignition system (coil, plug, and the electronic ignitor) with modern fuel, the Spark Plug life is almost unlimited.
And if you have BOSCH Platinum 4 (with 4 ground electrodes) then they will outlive the rest of the vehicle.
The longest running car I have with same plugs is 1980 FIAT X1/9 that now has over 300,000 miles - same plugs, but 3 timing belts; 4 water pumps and 2 alternators and one clutch.
Each time I take them out (about every 2 to 3 years) they look just fine and are ready for more, they replaced the OEM plugs at 7,500 miles.
On 350 GM engine in a van I now have 230,000 on same plugs, the OEM plugs misfired at about 30,000 miles and were replaeds with the BOSCH Platinum 4 - and not a problem since.
Any engine that does not run at optimum Air-fuel ratio can ruin spark plugs in just few hundred miles, but ODB II cars if they do that the MIL check light will be on, and even as few as 3 misfires in just few engine revolutions will set the "engine misfire" code.
So absolutely no need to even remove and "check" sparkplugs in any vehicle made since 1996 !!!
That is unless you want to improve on the Monkey Design.....
I too had a 1970 MUSTANG MACH I w/ a 351 CLEVELAND engine & 4-speed standard transmission (delivered Oct 1969 - $4,000!). Drove that vehicle for several years until the first oil embargo (1973), and traded it on a DATSUN. In the 4 years and close to 100K miles, I never had any problems removing the 14mm, tapered seat spark plugs. After the original AUTOLITE plugs were removed, I ONLY used CHAMPION plugs (RBL-9Y) in that vehicle until the day it was traded. Of course, that Mustang was designed as a "go-fast", so it wasn't encumbered w/ modern accessories like A/c and P/S. Only factory accessory was an AM/FM radio. The HURST shifter was part of the MACH I package. Wish I still had it ........
I see people talking about never needing to change their spark plugs or waiting until 150K miles. Well, I have a 2004 Mustang GT and recently put a supercharger on it. To do so, I had to replace my platinum plugs with standard plugs. My car has 50K miles on it and I figure the platinum plugs were good for at least 100K.....WRONG. When I removed the plugs from engine, not only were 2 of them extremely loose but each one had a very different gap set on it. I don't know if it simply changed over time or what. But the 2 that were loose I could take out with my hand easily. And all of them had such different variation in gap Im surprised the car ran as well as it did. Some gaps were double others, it was terrible and I'm glad I switched over to standards and will be checking/replacing them frequently now. At least I'll know they are correct. I've had many other quality issues with Ford, too many to go into now, but in summary....this is my very last Ford car EVER.
What is it with Ford and sparkplugs. They also have a problem with one of the SUV's where the amount of thread engagement is so small that the plugs tear out at a relatively young age. The fix is an expensive helicoil job. This shouldn't be happening in this day of age.
Using almost 200 light-emitting diodes in the front and back of the new 2014 CTS, Cadillac designers are showing how LEDs can change the character of a vehicle.
We looked at a number of sources to determine this year's greenest cars, from KBB to automotive trade magazines to environmental organizations. These 14 cars emerged as being great at either stretching fuel or reducing carbon footprint.
From Dell / Intel® New Paradigms in Design Work Scott Hamilton, vertical market strategist for Dell Precision workstations, 5/2/2013 3
Early in my career, I worked as a draftsman and remember the days of drawing on vellum with numbered pencils and Mylar with plastic lead. This was a fun experience in the sense that I ...
I've been using workstations for more than 10 years and love finding ways to get more performance from my system. With demanding professional applications that require more power each ...
A lasting memory from my first job as an engineer in an auto assembly plant is standing on hard concrete at six in the morning, vending-machine coffee clutched in hand, listening to ...
A quick look into the merger of two powerhouse 3D printing OEMs and the new leader in rapid prototyping solutions, Stratasys. The industrial revolution is now led by 3D printing and engineers are given the opportunity to fully maximize their design capabilities, reduce their time-to-market and functionally test prototypes cheaper, faster and easier. Bruce Bradshaw, Director of Marketing in North America, will explore the large product offering and variety of materials that will help CAD designers articulate their product design with actual, physical prototypes. This broadcast will dive deep into technical information including application specific stories from real world customers and their experiences with 3D printing. 3D Printing is
To save this item to your list of favorite Design News content so you can find it later in your Profile page, click the "Save It" button next to the item.
If you found this interesting or useful, please use the links to the services below to share it with other readers. You will need a free account with each service to share an item via that service.
Tweet This
1 
