Spark plugs- Is there REALLY a difference??

[HookWorse]

I'm also a "whatever the manufacturer put in" kinda guy. Switching brands is strictly a crapshoot.

I also have noted some confusion in the general public between Autolite and Motorcraft. Some seem to think Autolites are a Ford OEM plug. Hardly.

If you've ever put plugs in a 5.4L Ford pickup, van, etc, you want to be DAMN sure you don't have to go back and do it again any sooner than you possibly have to!

 

[HTGTS350]

I use Bosch in ANYTHING with more than 2 wheels, NGK for 2 wheelers, no exceptions now that Delcos are made in china. Ive got a set of Bosch plugs in a high comp, avgas fueled 350 that have been in there for 8 years without so much as a miss or fouled plug.

 

[Daniel Dudley]

Bosch or NGK for older foreign cars, OEM for newer cars is all I run.

 

[shoot summ]

i played the "this plug is better than that plug" a long time ago.

i run OEM plugs in everything. even my harley.

+1

I've played the plug game, unless you have modified the motor significantly you can't go wrong with OEM.

I think some of the reason folks have issues with other types of plugs are a variance in the heat range, improper gapping, and in some instances it is very easy to crack an insulator and not know it which causes a miss.

 

[Lotek]

After the Bosche plugs fouled out in my freshly built 912 motor, changed to NGK's as I had been advised to do when I set it up. I hate having someone tell me "I told you so" I won't put anything but AC in GM. Funny story, way back when I worked on Mazdas, a certain number of 323s came from the factory with Champions to qualify for some racing series... guess which ones came back within the first 5000 miles with misfires under load, and what the fix was.

 

[mrchuck]

I have a 2000 Nissan Frontier Desert Runner pick-up with the 3.3 V-6.
75 thousand miles on it. The official Nissan manual says "change the platinum plugs after 100,000k.
As it is 11 years old, and not sure the "k" after the 100,000 means kilometers or miles, I changed all 6 plugs.
I had bought a set of Auto-lites platinum for it, at Wal-Mart several years ago, in case I needed them.
I just changed them and it was an ALL DAY job!!!
All came out hard, squeaking metal against metal. Never have I had such a hard job as this! The back plug took the longest to get out!
I put "never-seize on the new plugs threads.
Starts and runs perfect. The old plugs were still white and only the gap was wider than original specs.
I'm happy with the Auto-lites.

 

[Patrick Boyle]

I go with whatever the factory plug is/was. Same with most other parts I put on my cars.

I own a Saab that absolutely has to have a specific model NGK plug. The car uses a capacitive ignition cassette that allows the engine management system to use the spark plugs as a sensor to detect knocks and measure ionization in each cylinder. The wrong plug either won't run, or will throw MILs.

 

[djd99]

I'm going to respectfully disagree with you on this. My truck is a 97 S10 4.3/5-speed with 145K on it. Currently has Autolite plugs and Summit's house brand cap/rotor/wires (I think they're OEM'd by Accel) in it, and runs beautifully. I usually run .99 cent copper Autolites in everything I own. My 2000 Saturn has them and can easily knock out 42 MPG on the highway with the a/c blowing ice cold. Not bad for a 10 year old car with 128K miles on it

Your one of the lucky ones I guess If you hang out over at automotive forums.com There have been many instances when peeps would put aftermarket plugs,cap and rotor and have had nothing but problems on 4.3's.
Whenever this problem comes up they tell you to replace everything you just replaced with acdelco and there problem would disappear. I have experiance this first hand also. Now I only use acdelco on my 4.3.

 

[Patrick Boyle]

When I bought my Blazer with the 4.3 it had Autolites and I ran them for years with no problems. Changed them over to the OEM ACDelcos recently with no noticeable change in performance.

I've heard a lot from very knowledgeable people that the 4.3 will act funny with non-stock plugs though. I know I feel better with the correct plugs in it. Cheap peace of mind.

 

[cheap bastard]

I've never liked Champion's plugs due to the chrome plating. Run a new set for a few minutes with a load and remove the plugs. Clean them with your favorite chemical and look at the chrome. Most of it that extends into the chamber will be gone. That can't possibly be good for the valves, seats or the area between the top ring and its upper groove surface. Unfortunately, Champion is the brand most of the local parts sources carry. I have used their platinum plugs with good results in newer Chrysler products. Bikes get NGK and everything else gets O.E if available or I experiment if something is old. Pre E15 engines may need a slightly hotter plug to stay clean.

 

[1redTA]

I'm going to respectfully disagree with you on this. My truck is a 97 S10 4.3/5-speed with 145K on it. Currently has Autolite plugs and Summit's house brand cap/rotor/wires (I think they're OEM'd by Accel) in it, and runs beautifully. I usually run .99 cent copper Autolites in everything I own. My 2000 Saturn has them and can easily knock out 42 MPG on the highway with the a/c blowing ice cold. Not bad for a 10 year old car with 128K miles on it

I put a summit brand cap and rotor on my 98 350 silverado and the spring on the cap that contacts the rotor button melted leaving me and my two young kids on the side of the road 300 miles from home. The tow bill was $480!!! summit told me if I sent it back they would send me another after a colorful explanation of my thoughts I opted out.

I tend to agree with the following
Chevy= AC Delco
Ford= Motorcraft
Dodge= why would I own that?
NGK = great plugs

 

[red baron]

Some cars ,the plugs make a big difference others not at all.

 

[dr john]

Agree with the above poster. I have used various [quality] plugs in the same engines [both car and motorcycle] with no noticeable difference. However, I decided to "upgrade' the Autolites in a twin cam Lotus once ... my friend the Lotus expert [from whom I had purchased the car} said "dont do it..." I didnt listen. I quickly put the Autolites back in!
Some engines are apparently just finicky!

 

[alberto]

Yes, sparkplugs make a huge difference. I've had very good luck with NGK's.

 

[zmotorsports]

I insist on installing the OEM plugs. I put the plug that the engine was designed to run with and have not had a problem with any in over 20 years. Prior to that I had some issues with certain plugs in certain engines.

On small lawn and garden equipment I have had the best results with Champion plugs.

In motorcycles and especially snowmobiles it is only NGK's. I could not get the snowmobile engines to run consistant as well as the fact that I had a hard time reading the plugs when I was running Champions in them. Mike.

 

[ngk22r]

Champion is OEM plug for Chryslers, they run great...

Maybe in the past, but the plugs that come inside the MOPAR box are now NGK

 

[d33pt]

i only run NGK or Denso on my toyota engines. The crazy thing is..from the factory, my 3.4 V6 tacoma engine came with NGK on one side, and Denso on the other.

 

[dirttracker18]

Since the quote at the beginning of this thread is a response to my post in another thread I though it needed a response over here (follow that?)

I STAND CORRECTED

After chasing a intermitent miss in my 02 Silverado for months now I finally broke down and brought it to a trusted friend who was a GM mechanic for over 25 years. He spent some time chasing a very minor miss that he could see in the graph that was not native to any particular cylinder but random and very minor.
His first question to me was "When did you put those Bosch plugs in." I tell him about a year ago. His response is "That sounds about right." Seems those Bosch plugs in that GM engine begine to fail and cause a miss after about a year. The theory is that they cannot literally stand the heat that these engines produce within the cylinder.

His recommendation, get a set of Iridium plugs and preferably the AC Delcos.
I will change my new plug wires with them as well as a bad wire can take out a new plug in a hurry.

I have a found a good deal on EBay for these normally expensive plugs from the dealer.

So I stand corrected and give the new plugs a try when they come in.

Now if we could only figure out why the evap valve keeps setting up a code life would be good. Checks out fine with the scanner, clear code, no issues for a while then up it comes again. Once again checks out with no issues.

 

[tdkkart]

After reading this for several days, the more I think about it the only plugs I've never had problems with one way or another have been NGK's. I prefer to run them in everything when possible, other than 2 cycle go-kart engines, which of all things seem to run very well on various versions of Autolites.

Had a Toyota that hated Champions
Had a Dodge Neon that hated AC Delco's
Had a Volkswagen that hated Autolites

BTW, the silver/chrome looking coating on Champion's plugs is their version of antisieze.
A buddy that runs a shop put a set of Champions in a GM product ran like **** till he pulled them out and put NGK's in. He sent the Chamions in with a letter asking why the plugs ran like ****. He got a note back that said the primary reason for them not working was that the non-metallic based antisieze he put on the threads was interupting the ground connection to the engine. They stated that antisieze WAS NOT needed on Champion plugs. I have seen this mentioned in their documentation recently also.

 

[ngk22r]

i only run NGK or Denso on my toyota engines. The crazy thing is..from the factory, my 3.4 V6 tacoma engine came with NGK on one side, and Denso on the other.

Toyota did that as a test for which plug runs better in the trucks. I ran into countless amounts like that.

 

[tw33k2514]

Every Chrysler 4.7 gets the champions thrown out, and a set of NGK's put in. I don't know why it is, but it smooths the idle, and runs brilliantly after the switch. On the other hand the 5.7's run like **** on anything ive tried other than OEM champions.

 

[wafrederick]

Lot of the aftermarket High performance heads,have to use the recomended plugs.Have a set of offshore heads on a 1966 Nova with a 327 and the paper which came with the heads said to use Champion plugs.If it is the 3 valve triton engines in the Fords,use the Champions part #7989 and are better than the factory plugs.The Champions are a one piece design and the factory is a 2 piece design.Ford recently came out with a revise on the 3 valve tritons on the recomended spark plug changes,change them every 30,000 miles to prevent them from breaking off.TSB does not work and the plugs still break off.Bosch plugs are not good for GMs and Chryslers and I wonder why they run like **** sometimes.I see Bosch plugs in these,they go right in the garbage can after being removed.

 

[mustangmccance]

I guess I am doing it all wrong. I have run champions in my mustang for years. runs great. I put champion iridiums in my supercharged f150 4 years ago and it is still running great. never changed the plugs in the lincoln yet it has 110000 miles on it ( I probably ought to do that soon but its the wifes car and if she's not complaining I tend to forget about it). and I just bought e-3's for my sons jeep. haven't installed them yet. I will have to see how they work. if they don't work well I guess I will go get some champions.

replaced the starter, cap rotor, plugs and wires on the jeep. the thing would not start. finally after multiple attempts put a set of accel plugs in and it starts. apparently old jeeps with 200,000 miles don't like high dollar high tech plugs lol. anyway so much for the latest and greatest tech. at least they have a warranty so I will send them back.... actually I probably will just take the beating rather than try to send them back but I did learn something. and after this escapade I decided to put motorcraft plugs in the 67 that I am building.

 

[Shocker]

In my 240z I ran NGK's and they were great. In my 911 I run Bosch copper core. My Mustang GT gets Autolites. My 5.4 Expedition gets Motorcraft.

I have run the NGK in my 911 and it just doesn't run quite as well as with the Bosch. My Stang runs best on the Autolites.