Bumpin' Yota

About 1 month ago my gas milage went to CRAP and I lost power....

I changed spark plug wires, rotor, and distro cap. (All were stock OEM when it rolled off the floor 251k miles ago!!)

Minimal change. Still NO torque or HP...

Pull plug...OMFG!!!





Since then I've installed DENSO double platinums and my HP and Torque are back in force!! (My 3.slow can peel out now on wet pavement...YAAAAAY!)

ChickenLover

Whoa!! Glad to hear the double plats are working well. I am running champion double plats and they seem to be working just fine. I thought I read something somewhere that seemed to imply that double platinums were not the way to go. I can't remember why though. Maybe someone will chime in.

NX Tacoma

To peel out on wet pavement..........NICE!!!

denverbikeguy

WTF?!

I thought those Bosch plugs were supposed to be ok stuff... wow.

keisur

we'll have to see if your new plugs don't do the same thing. I ran 1 set of +4's for almost 2 years in my '98 and not one of them turned out like that. I would vote that something else is the culprit. in other words, I don't think it's the plugs fault.

Adam F

I changed the plugs in my mom's Accord that was throwing a check engine light due to cylinder missfire and it had a rough idle...pulled out the BOSCH spark plugs and one of them was looking like that and the tip of the plug was broken off. And the rest were rather dirty.

oly884

That looks like some serious corrosion going on there!

jimbo74

that doesnt look like corrosion, but rather detonation/serious carbon depositing/bulidup

gwhayduke

I agree. I ran Bosche Platinum +4's (p/n R3 966) for about 5 years...approx. 100K miles, and they don't look that bad. I did swap them out for single electrode BP and gained some power...I also did the cap, rotor and wires at the same time.

I can think of a couple of things that might be wrong...You might have had a cooler plug than I did. My dealer told me that the BP plugs were too hot, but I told them they ran great and I was getting about 19 mpg...Cooler plugs don't burn off carbon deposits as well.

Or...

Your Oxygen sensor might be dying...and if they're like many electronic engine components, they might be failing "soft". That means that they fail slowly or fail in such a way that they do no harm to the engine. In this case, your computer may be making the mixture too rich...and fouling the plugs.

I think you ought to replace the O2 sensors.

lee

so.. what is the best spark plug for 3rd gen runners? im gonna take mine in for the 60K service soon, and i'd like to bring my own plugs.

waskillywabbit

iTrader: (-1)

I'm doing almost all of my 60K here in the next month or so and I'm going with the OEM plugs, as I've heard they are the best bang for the buck and work the best. You can do almost all the 60K service yourself if you look at the list...

http://www.toyotapartsandservice.com/smg/main.php

SLC Punk

Factory Denso's or NGK's if your engine is N/A
NGK's if you have a S/C


There was a guy in Utah dcrim1-here but doesn't post. Who blew out his motor, he blames it on his Bosch 4+ plugs

gwhayduke

Others here will disagree with me, but I think most of the plugs out there are pretty good. I do think that anything with more than 1 electrode is useless overkill if you change your plugs regularly. The reason I used +4's is because on the 3.0, changing the plugs is a PIA and I like a longer change interval.

lee

yea, well im basically getting it for free, so i'd rather just take it in. besides i live in the city in an apt, so i have no garage to be doing such things

i'll stick with OEM for the time being. thanks.

keisur

I changed back to the stock ones from the toyota parts counter just because I didn't notice any difference with the +4's and I would rather use what toyota suggests for their engine.

keisur

you don't really need a garage to do the 60k maintenance. nothing on the list is really space consuming or very difficult.

grams72

You might want to research why this happened to your plugs, It just doesn't happen and its not a problem with the plugs.
You Will have the same problem again if you dont figure out the problem.

Most mechanics can tell you or direct you to the problem just by looking at the plugs. (within reason of course)

grams72

This should help.

http://www.densoiridium.com/howtoreadusedplugs.php


Or

http://www.nightrider.com/biketech/s...book.htm#Light

gtm130

anyone have the densoiridium ik16's?

radrex

I spent around 60 bucks putting NGK Iridiums in my Runner - ran like crap. Went back to the stock NGK's the next week. All is well.

I use to think there wasn't much difference - but now I know.