I think one of your problems is trying to climb at 2k rpm in overdrive. That
is bad and I would expect the behavior your getting while trying to do that
with any plug.
Joel
http://www.zracer.com/dakota.htm
-----Original Message-----
From: fawcett@uism.bu.edu [mailto:fawcett@uism.bu.edu]
Sent: Saturday, January 30, 1999 1:59 PM
To: DAKOTA-TRUCK@buffnet.net
Subject: DML: Bad Knock/Bosch +4's/Plug Hype
I finally got a chance to check out my truck today... I took all of your
suggestions and tested the hell out of my engine (Thanks Again!). I
started by ripping everything off --plug wires, distributor, rotor... you
name it I had it off! Rotor and cap looked liked new (cause they are after
only 10k miles ;-) so I reinstalled it and used some dielectric (sp?) goo
on the contacts. Next the wires were put back on in meticulous fashion...
You guys have got me talking to myself with the suggestion that I might
have crossed wires! :-) All wire sockets were liberally coated with the
dielectric grease before being reinstalled. Next I fired up the engine
(smooth as silk) and tested each wire one by one... All of the Magnecor
8.5mm wires are perfect. Finally I pulled the plugs in cylinders 3 & 5
(you may recall that 3 showed some carbon fouling, while 5 was crystal
clean) and switched them... In classic dealer speak, I got a big ol' NTF
report on the static test of the engine. Sooooo, on to the road test.
Things seemed better on the "mild" highway grade so onto the big rauncher
grade. Up I went with the cruise pegged at ~70 mph and the tach reading
~2K rpm... Just about 1/2 to 3/4 up the hill all hell starts to break
loose. I start getting the knock maybe even some detonation, the engine
starts to surge then stumble, surge, stumble, surge, stumble... OH SH*T!,
there goes the MIL (check engine light)... fast blink... real trouble...
must eject... Major Tom to Earth!, Major Tom to Earth... mayday, mayday,
mayday... I'm going down fast!! Must, act, quickly,... not much time
left... everything is growing dim... I kick off the cruise, shut down the
O/D and get over to the slow lane as fast as I can... Like the eye of a
storm everything works fine once I slow it down and take out the O/D. The
MIL stops and never comes back on again...
To make a long story longer, the Bosch Platinum +4's suck under heavy load.
I would not recommend them to anyone that has to do *any* heavy towing or
lives in a mountainous region. I've driven this highway grade 100 times
with the stock plugs (cheap Champions) under the same conditions without
any problem whatsoever. It's too early to tell if there is any advantage
to these plugs as I just put them in about two weeks ago so I can't comment
about their longevity. Moreover, I can't tell if they have done anything
for fuel economy either as I have spent so much time idling the engine to
test it and gunning it on the street to see if/where it starts to knock.
Anyway, that's my story! If you read this far, I'd like to say THANKS! to
those that sent suggestions or condolences on my plug problems... Your
comments really helped!
Tom
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Fri Jun 20 2003 - 12:12:20 EDT