100,000km I think, look good...

100,000km I think, look good? I suspect I'm a little rich due to bad air intake and thus I'm replacing the air filter with something that has better flow and cleaning the MAF this weekend. Probably had cheap gas as well from previous owner, I got the car at 193,000.

One on the left is darker than the rest. Something to file away in your brain in case a problem comes up later on.

Other than that they look pretty decent.

ya, they are not in order but the far left one i distinctly remember came out of cylinder 2 (second from the right on on the engine)

I wouldn't give it any worry, really. I mean we could sit all day and nitpick about other things, too, you don't really know if any of it means anything or if it's just normal / coincidence. They all look pretty decent is the bottom line.

If it's a consistent trend then maybe that one has injector splatter or the intake manifold flows unevenly or the compression or seal or gunk on the valves is a little different from the others. No biggie.

excellent, thanks for the advice!

Bad intake? Leaks mean lean.

White tips on plug is also lean. All fuel injected cars with non-copper style plugs will end up with a white ground strap. Don't look into reading plugs - everyone claims to be an expert from reading the back page on a haynes manual.

I was getting kind of a lean vibe, but would you really call those white tips? It's so uniform that it looks like just the kind of alloy they used for the tips.

Or maybe this particular engine is meant to run lean most of the time and that's how the plugs normally look. That's what I was saying about it not looking like any kind of a warning sign, but if you disagree I'm down to learn.

>Bad intake? Leaks mean lean.

not leaks, just not getting enough air (or thinks its not getting enough air) so the ECU is compensating by adding more fuel. At least, that's my hypothesis and my less than stellar MPG would seem to back that up. Good to know about the white tips though.

its a 1NZ-FE 1.5 liter Gasoline and the plugs are irridium.

Dangerously white - not at all. It's not sooty or oil soaked, it's a normal 14.7 sometimes a hair leaner fuel injection white tip. FWIW: basically any fuel injected car (copper plugs excluded) is going to have plugs essentially identical to those. Modern cars (2000-ish plus) can't do any of the lean burn trickery due to emissions standards. High heat helps the white ground strap effect to, and modern cars have high combustion temps and fewer irregularities within the camber.

I'll use plug color as a super general spec on my carbed bike. (after 250 miles or so, any diagnosis is hearsay, gotta frequently have fresh plugs unless something is blatantly wrong.). On cars, oil consumption is sometimes visible, but modern stuff rarely uses that much oil. A computer feed back control car? With 02 sensors and electronic ignition? Unless the CEL is on, fuel numbers are off, or there's a driveability issue, the engine is being run exactly as intended.

I use fuel trim to determine rich/lean. Plugs aren't going to tell you anything significant, unless it's REALLY out of wack. And I've seen plugs that look like shit, with zero misfire counts and clean-ish scope traces (clean enough I wouldn't raise an eyebrow). My experiences anyways.
Do you have fuel trim data, or are you just feeling like it's air starved? Unless the filter is caked, or the exhaust is severely restricted, the engine is getting all the air it needs.

My point is explained right here - Guy claims he has no spark. Look at all the different opinions on the plugs, and running conditions.

No spark at only 1 coil. Bad ECU driver, bad coil, wiring (unlikely).


Swap coil, or use a scope to see the KV ramp. Diag done.

Awesome. Thanks for the breakdown, and good to know we're basically on the same page despite whatever variations.

Also you just made me think about how dusty my scope is sitting all those years in the back corner of my storage room :(

Always cool to get more high-quality discourse coming around.

Where are the other 4?

>Do you have fuel trim data, or are you just feeling like it's air starved?

its just a feeling, no data other than a slightly higher than spec MPG and some slight hesitation that was helped by new plugs but not entirely fixed.

nonexistant, like my willingness to pay for v8 gasprices

Does it do anything unseemly, or does it just feel like a modern ECU hunting around as best it can to make the right numbers based on the latest tank of gas, sensor readings, operating conditions etc?

For instance, "slight hesitation" might mean "it always seems to hesitate when I do this" or it might mean "dammit I wish it would stop pulling a bit of timing now and again"

>Does it do anything unseemly, or does it just feel like a modern ECU hunting around as best it can to make the right numbers based on the latest tank of gas, sensor readings, operating conditions etc?

I don't have a lot of experience with modern ECU's and how they feel vs. how they should feel.

However what you say could explain what I'm feeling and that the ECU is just taking its sweet time to gather and implement data. It usually pops up when I have to hit the throttle a little quicker than normal (i.e. to quickly pass someone or to merge onto freeway)

Like it bogs and then picks up again? It makes noises? Or you're just putting your foot further into it and tonight is erectile dysfunction night so you say, "it's ok honey" and maybe another night will be like you remember.

>Like it bogs and then picks up again? It makes noises?

like, it starts going then all the sudden its like "oh, you have your foot that far down" and drops power then surges. It could be the VVT-i but the rpm threshold isn't that high.

>Or you're just putting your foot further into it and tonight is erectile dysfunction night so you say, "it's ok honey" and maybe another night will be like you remember.

whats wrong with wanting to make my car feel potent again? lul

How long have you had it. You seem to be saying that it can't get it up the way it used to, which would be a point of concern.

Now, the first thing that springs to my mind when you say it regularly changes character when you put your foot down far enough is that it could be the change from open-loop to closed-loop operation. Guy above would be quite right in suggesting that looking at the fuel trims could be a sign that the the engine or the sensors are putting the ECU a little too far off of its pre-programmed maps.

That doesn't sound like a problem in the ignition system, or a problem that would be immediately obvious from looking at the plugs.

>How long have you had it. You seem to be saying that it can't get it up the way it used to, which would be a point of concern.

I've had it about 3 months. Its been doing this since I got it so its not me comparing this car to its old self, just me comparing this car to what I think it SHOULD be like. Granted most of my experience is with cars that have Throttle cable and this car has ETC so that might account for the lag I'm feeling?


>could be a sign that the the engine or the sensors are putting the ECU a little too far off of its pre-programmed maps.

Would this be considered bad then? I get no over heating, no knocking, no misfires or detonation. Only the lag.

I'm not a valet or a professional mechanic, so I don't have the breadth of experience to say.

What I will intuit for you is that the more modern the car then the more it doesn't feel the way cars used to because they're playing 20d chess chasing 5 different models and trying to ride various lines between reliability complaints, to mom feeling happy, to dad not killing himself. My opinion is that you'd want to watch for a trend of degradation to suspect a growing problem, and to get the inside scoop from a laptop program that can watch the sensors or whatever - watching how the short and long term fuel trims change is one insight into how why it might be reacting the way it does when it does. And the lag might be intentional, or at least something they figured would be about as good as the lag you usually get when you put your foot down in a auto and then it just sits there and decides what to do for a while and maybe makes noises before anything actually happens.

If nothing gets noticeably worse or better, then maybe that's just how the car is. Or how the car is when it's not fresh off the factory floor.

Excellent insight, thanks!

Heres mine from a 150k shitbox i bought, thoughts? Its pictured 4-1

Nvm it flipped the picture, its 1-4

OP here, now im no expert but #1 looks like you have a leaking valve cover gasket as that bitch is covered in oil.

your firing end looks just like mine tho

Decidedly worse, but basically just more like an averagebox enduring its daily helping of grim life.

Nobody even bothered to set the gap.

Take a closer look at #3 and #4 as well. Reminds me of back when you'd hit the electrodes with some sand paper before putting them back in.

not seeing that, but the electrode on 3 does definitely look shorter than the others. someone probably thought it was good enough for another 100,000km lul

Yup, #3 looks like somebody tried to build a snowman on it. But the others aren't exactly what you'd put a big color picture of for what sparkplugs should look like.

Also notice the gap between #3 and #4. Is it a clue? Is it a clue that #1 and #2 don't look so caked up?

Have to work backward to wonder if there could be an obvious reason for the differences.

is it just me or does #4 look like its got some burning from the coil pack at the top?

well I could guess 2 things

1) the gap being larger on 3 and 4 was probably making the combustion incomplete and also not getting the tip hot enough to burn the shit off.

2) the lack of crap on 1 and 2 could mean that the injectors are leaner or that the fuel pressure is lower when it gets to 1 and 2?

just guessing

Yeah, loose connection, water, dirt, who knows. That's high voltage, though. If it jumps the spark plug gap then you're not loosing much from carbon buildup at the tip.

More like a sign to make a better, cleaner connection next time. Hell, for coil packs and distributors you could smear grease all over to keep the water and shit out of there and not even make a direct metal-metal contact but it would still be good enough and not corrode or build carbon or galvanize or whatever.

>Hell, for coil packs and distributors you could smear grease all over to keep the water and shit out of there and not even make a direct metal-metal contact

thats actually a good question: Dielectric grease needed on the coil pack tip, yes or no?

does your car have efi? just get a scan tool at a shop to check AFR

Well they sell stuff you can use to prevent dimetalic corrosion at the hardware store that works just fine at household voltages, and is enough of a grease to keep the shit out.

My evidence might be anecdotal, but I bet HV goes right through and all you need to wonder about is if it's going to break down in some way we're not thinking about. I don't think heat.

...

From a 4age with 250k miles

Are those spark plugs?

Oof. I'd be curious to see what everything else inside that cylinder looks like

Glad that never happened to any of my engines before I learned that water seeping in to the plug socket can do that.

clean it up and its good for another 250,000km

These were after 35,000 miles.

how do i take a spark plug out without getting any shit in the engine? there is always fucking dirt and shit there, no way i want that going inside the engine.