Tempest Vs Champion

[rbridges]

To be fair, I never had a problem with my champion massives. They came with the plane and seemed to be fine. When my IA said I needed new plugs, I went with tempest massives. The bad press from champion never affected me, but it did influence my decision to change because I know it aggravated others, and champion seemed to turn a blind eye. 

[Northern Mooniac]

Ok, i'm sold. So what plugs should I order? Same top and bottom?

[Cyril Gibb]

1 hour ago, Bob_Belville said:

Yetti, what's your logic? Normally folks would put the fine wires on the bottom where fouling is more likely...

BY (projected nose) plugs were developed specifically to reduce fouling.  I have BYs top and bottom with no problems and at 1/3 the cost of fine wires.  However I'm always open to new data so I'd be interested to hear of any comparative performance or fouling experience between BYs and fine wires, other than fine wires apparently lasting longer.

[kevinw]

Ok, i'm sold. So what plugs should I order? Same top and bottom?

Personally I would get both top and bottom. Just be sure you order the correct barrel size. That can be an expensive mistake.


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[Yetti]

3 hours ago, Bob_Belville said:

Yetti, what's your logic? Normally folks would put the fine wires on the bottom where fouling is more likely...

There is not logic....  It is at recommendation by the professional mechanic that has been doing this a long time. We swapped the regular massives with the REM37BY that has a more automotive type electrode but two grounds. The #4 is passing a bit more oil than it should so on start up there is a bit of cleansing that needs to occur.  The compression is still high 70s.  We may swap it out next Annual.  I have a new cylinder in the box ready to go. The professional is not a big fan of Tempest fine wires

[Bob_Belville]

Following Tempest's recommendation, I rotate the plugs at each annual to balance out the anode/cathode wear effect. E.g. #1 top goes to #4 bottom and vice versa. Having 2 different type plugs might make this practice "interesting".  

See page 4-11 of this link:

https://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/pdf/tempestplugmaint.pdf

[Bob_Belville]

1 hour ago, kevinw said:

Personally I would get both top and bottom. Just be sure you order the correct barrel size. That can be an expensive mistake.


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My IO360A1A uses UREM 38S.

https://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/pdf/tempestplugmaint.pdf

TEMPEST® Part Number             Reach Connector Thread               Electrode Type

URHB32S 13/16” ¾” - 20 Fine Wire

UREB36S 13/16” 5/8” - 24 Fine Wire

URHB36S 13/16” ¾” - 20 Fine Wire

UREM38S ½” 5/8” - 24 Fine Wire

URHM38S ½” ¾” - 20 Fine Wire

 

[carusoam]

That's an interesting read, Bob.

Who knew there was so much info about spark plugs..?

They even have a page on painting the plugs for aesthetic purposes...

 

the cut cut and paste didn't work so well....  three pages from the end of the document covers the rotation of plugs....

****************************************************

After placing spark plugs in the spark plug tray (TEMPEST® part number AA- 446TM), exchange the long-lead plugs with the short-lead plugs as in Figure 4-15. This should be done at each inspection, cleaning, and gap setting interval to even out the wear caused by constant polarity and high lead capacitance.

Figure 4-15

NOTE: It is not necessary to rotate plugs from cylinder to cylinder in a four cylinder engine equipped with single drive dual magneto or any engine equipped with the LASAR® system. However to minimize deposit buildup, rotate the plugs from top to bottom and from bottom to top. 

**************************************************

Best regards,

-a-

Edited March 26, 2017 by carusoam

[Hector]

BY (projected nose) plugs were developed specifically to reduce fouling.  I have BYs top and bottom with no problems and at 1/3 the cost of fine wires.  However I'm always open to new data so I'd be interested to hear of any comparative performance or fouling experience between BYs and fine wires, other than fine wires apparently lasting longer.

Same here (tempest). I have 300 hours on them and never any issues with fouling


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[Yetti]

knowing a little about lectricity I am not sure what constant polarity is... constant polarity would impact all the plugs no matter which cylinder they were in.

and high lead capacitance - this could be accomplished by moving 2-4 and 1-3  since the leads are longer and shorter.

[carusoam]

1) Constant polarity...  DC vs. AC...?

Or somehow reversing the direction that the DC flows through a plug...?

I don't see changing the polarity as an option.

 

2) The longer leads seem to slow the passage of electrons, making a difference at the tip of the plug.

 

Best regards,

-a-

Edited March 26, 2017 by carusoam

[Cyril Gibb]

2 hours ago, carusoam said:

2) The longer leads seem to slow the passage of electrons, making a difference at the tip of the plug.

Electrical propagation is roughly 987,000,000 feet per second.  You'd have to have pretty lazy electrons to make a difference.

[ArtVandelay]

Electrical propagation is roughly 987,000,000 feet per second.  You'd have to have pretty lazy electrons to make a difference.

Speed of electricity is slower than the speed of light, but you're not going to notice it, for those who design computers it matters. Back in the good old days, we fixed prototype computers by adding lengths of wire to slow signals.

[carusoam]

I think using speed of light, or electrons flowing under ideal conditions may be the challenge Tempest is referring to.  

The capacitance of the longer leads seems to make a difference.

certainly the resistance of a longer wire would make a difference over a long distance.  A couple of inches of large diameter, copper wire, would have a tough to measure change in resistance...

Electrons flowing at the speed of light would require things that include temperatures near °K.  Or did they just say that because I will never have a lab that cold to prove them wrong? 

Back to what Tempest was saying...

How does capacitance of a wire change the electron flow?

So many questions...

This is probably why Bob includes the additional swap between cylinders.  Just to balance the unknowns...

Since we discussed it...  They are now known unknowns...

Best regards,

-a-

Edited March 27, 2017 by carusoam

[EricJ]

14 minutes ago, carusoam said:

Electrons flowing at the speed of light would require things that include temperatures near °K.  Or did they just say that because I will never have a lab that cold to prove them wrong? 

 

You'd also need a massless electron, which don't really exist.  

Electric signals propagate at the speed of light in whatever the medium is that they're travelling in, but the electrons themselves don't move very fast.   It's kind of like water pressure showing up at the far end of a pipe even though the water didn't move.

Capacitors (or the stray capacity caused by long wires or whatever) delay the increase/decrease of voltage by absorbing charge.

I'm still not sure how all that was intended to be relevant to the spark plug issue, but thought I'd throw it out there.  

 

[StevenL757]

12 hours ago, INA201 said:

+1 for the switch from Champion to Tempest massives.  What are the merits of fine wire Tempests vs massive? Thanks

Broadly, fine wires will last roughly two to three times longer than massive, allow the engine to run more smoothly, and are resistant to fouling.

[carusoam]

Thanks Eric, I did drop out some thoughts along the way...

There are two issues...

1) Dirtiness of the plug.  

The lower plugs see a lot of oil and lead bead build up compared to the top plugs.  Hence it is easy to see swapping the top and bottom ones.  A good cleaning also helps here...

2) erosion of the plug anode tip. Cylinder location (longer plug wire, shorter plug wire) 

The wear appears to be erosion related to the strength of the spark.   apparently the shorter wire moves more electrons..?

 

its kind of surprising how well the plugs stand up to the constant electron barrage...

Why are we not seeing platinum and iridium tips?

Best regards,

-a-

[Bob_Belville]

6 hours ago, carusoam said:

1) Constant polarity...  DC vs. AC...?

Or somehow reversing the direction that the DC flows through a plug...?

I don't see changing the polarity as an option.

Anthony,

Here's probably more than you want to know about plugs. Jump to about minute 33:40 for Mike's explanation of polarity and the reason to rotate plugs for longer life.

 

 

[Yetti]

so nobody talks about wires as capacitance.   It's all about resistance.  bigger wires have less resistance, Connectors have resistance.  Does anyone have some spark plug wires laying around and can measure the resistance of a long and short lead.  I think the marketing people have got ahold of the why we do things.

. 

[carusoam]

Bob,

That is a great explanation.  I learned or re-learned something new tonight...

Flat cylinder engines run the electrons differently from center to the outside, or the outside to the center, depending on their location...

The most of the erosion occurs depending on the direction of the electrons flow...

Go EAA for explaining real life plugs and magnetos for me..!

Best regards,

-a-

Edited March 27, 2017 by carusoam

[kpaul]

On ‎3‎/‎25‎/‎2017 at 11:31 PM, Deb said:

Tempest generously donated a set (12) of fine wire spark plugs to the Mooney Summit and the Bob Gilliland foundation in October for the silent auction. (Full disclosure, I am a board member.) This alone would make us choose Tempest. We have Tempest plugs and oil filter.

I happen to know the proud owner of said plugs

[Guest]

Electrons traveling down the ingnition wires is the easy part, before that they have to jump an air gap within the magneto.

Clarence

[Bob_Belville]

6 hours ago, carusoam said:

Bob,

That is a great explanation.  I learned or re-learned something new tonight...

Flat cylinder engines run the electrons differently from center to the outside, or the outside to the center, depending on their location...

The most of the erosion occurs depending on the direction of the electrons flow...

Go EAA for explaining real life plugs and magnetos for me..!

Best regards,

-a-

Yup. We should rotate plugs odd/even to balance wear and top/bottom to balance lead fouling and the other crap bottom plugs suffer. 

[Yetti]

I am still knid of not buy this theory.   Generally speaking in a DC system electrons flow from Negative to Positive.  Now we are saying the magnetos can create a negative spark and a Positive spark?

[carusoam]

Back to the EAA for the magneto video to determine how the electricity is delivered to the plugs or removed from the plugs...

Best regards,

-a-