Tempest fine wire spark plugs

[keithmiller]

Does anyone have personal reviews on using fine wire spark plugs in a turbo acclaim 

[LANCECASPER]

10 minutes ago, keithmiller said:

Does anyone have personal reviews on using fine wire spark plugs in a turbo acclaim 

All Acclaims that had the Platinum Continental engine upgrade new from Mooney had fine wires from new. I had those but pulled them for Tempest Fine Wire and recouped about half of my money by selling the Champions. I had used Tempest fine wires in the last Bravo I owned. Makes for a much smoother running engine. I highly recommend them.

[Brandt]

I use Tempest fine wires and have been very happy with them. 

[alexz]

They work great on my Bravo. 

[carusoam]

1) All Mooneys report better operations with Tempest fine wires…

2) Many MSers are still annoyed with Champion for poor design quality that lead to varying spark plug resistance with time….

3) Some MSers were disappointed by Tempest because a few center electrodes went missing….

4) MSers are good with reporting what they see in the field….

5) Tempest was good at fixing their welding issue, by bringing it in house…. And replacing plugs for anyone that sent one in.

6) Champion earned a black eye… by ignoring the issue for years….

PP thoughts only, not a mechanic…

Best regards,

-a-

[Guest]

11 hours ago, keithmiller said:

Does anyone have personal reviews on using fine wire spark plugs in a turbo acclaim 

They also crack nose insulators in turbocharged engines just like Champion plugs.

[keithmiller]

11 hours ago, LANCECASPER said:

All Acclaims that had the Platinum Continental engine upgrade new from Mooney had fine wires from new. I had those but pulled them for Tempest Fine Wire and recouped about half of my money by selling the Champions. I had used Tempest fine wires in the last Bravo I owned. Makes for a much smoother running engine. I highly recommend them.

Thanks for the info 

[Dustin Kurath]

On 4/1/2023 at 7:22 PM, keithmiller said:

Does anyone have personal reviews on using fine wire spark plugs in a turbo acclaim 

Fine wires are expensive junk, both Tempest and Champion. At 600 hrs TT on a set of Tempest FW's I had an electrode fall out of one and go out the exhaust valve. The only reason to use fine wires is if your engine burns a considerable amount of oil, otherwise you're better off with massives. The big problem with FW's is that they are extremely fragile and susceptible to damage, particularly from cleaning. Mechanics don't seem to understand that they should be simply left alone, and think they need to be sandblasted. Once a fine wire is sandblasted, its scrap. All in you won't save any money and your engine won't run any better.

[LANCECASPER]

11 hours ago, Dustin Kurath said:

Fine wires are expensive junk, both Tempest and Champion. At 600 hrs TT on a set of Tempest FW's I had an electrode fall out of one and go out the exhaust valve. The only reason to use fine wires is if your engine burns a considerable amount of oil, otherwise you're better off with massives. The big problem with FW's is that they are extremely fragile and susceptible to damage, particularly from cleaning. Mechanics don't seem to understand that they should be simply left alone, and think they need to be sandblasted. Once a fine wire is sandblasted, its scrap. All in you won't save any money and your engine won't run any better.

If your IA is sandblasting fine wire plugs that would be the least of my concerns. What else is he doing (or not doing) that's going to kill you?

Rotating them is OK - but not really necessary, Inspecting them is ok - but so far in three airplanes with them I've never seen anything out of the ordinary on inspection,  gapping them is absolutely not OK, dropping one and then using it is not OK.

Tempest had been sourcing out some of their assembly and after a few issues around 2018-19ish they brought everything back in-house. I would trust them over Champion any day. And the difference in smoothness between massives and fine wire on the Ovation and the Bravo I owned was very noticeable. I've never run massives on the Acclaim.

[exM20K]

On 4/1/2023 at 8:36 PM, LANCECASPER said:

All Acclaims that had the Platinum Continental engine upgrade new from Mooney had fine wires from new. I had those but pulled them for Tempest Fine Wire and recouped about half of my money by selling the Champions. I had used Tempest fine wires in the last Bravo I owned. Makes for a much smoother running engine. I highly recommend them.

Ditto

[Schllc]

7 hours ago, LANCECASPER said:

If your IA is sandblasting fine wire plugs that would be the least of my concerns. What else is he doing (or not doing) that's going to kill you?

Rotating them is OK - but not really necessary, Inspecting them is ok - but so far in three airplanes with them I've never seen anything out of the ordinary on inspection,  gapping them is absolutely not OK, dropping one and then using it is not OK.

Tempest had been sourcing out some of their assembly and after a few issues around 2018-19ish they brought everything back in-house. I would trust them over Champion any day. And the difference in smoothness between massives and fine wire on the Ovation and the Bravo I owned was very noticeable. I've never run massives on the Acclaim.

Absolutely noticeable difference with fine wires. 
easier hot starts, smoother lop, and smoother running. 
I have run massive on an acclaim, they work but as soon as I could replace them with FW, I did so. 

[keithmiller]

On 4/3/2023 at 11:55 AM, LANCECASPER said:

If your IA is sandblasting fine wire plugs that would be the least of my concerns. What else is he doing (or not doing) that's going to kill you?

Rotating them is OK - but not really necessary, Inspecting them is ok - but so far in three airplanes with them I've never seen anything out of the ordinary on inspection,  gapping them is absolutely not OK, dropping one and then using it is not OK.

Tempest had been sourcing out some of their assembly and after a few issues around 2018-19ish they brought everything back in-house. I would trust them over Champion any day. And the difference in smoothness between massives and fine wire on the Ovation and the Bravo I owned was very noticeable. I've never run massives on the Acclaim.

Had mine installed on my Acclaim a couple of weeks ago plus 2 new mags ( seems like the rebuild are no holding up). Just back from an 11 hr trip up thru upper Wisconsin and back . My 2009 never ran so good.

[redbaron1982]

Not the same questions as the OP asked, but related, from the benefits of a fine wire (less fouling and better ignition), how much you can get by going with a much cheaper long reach spark plug? I'm talking about the BY series.

I'm planning on replacing my regular massive electrodes with something better, BY's are cheap (similar to regular ones) but I'm not sure how much better they are. Fine wires at this point seems way to expensive for my current situation.

[Ragsf15e]

1 hour ago, redbaron1982 said:

Not the same questions as the OP asked, but related, from the benefits of a fine wire (less fouling and better ignition), how much you can get by going with a much cheaper long reach spark plug? I'm talking about the BY series.

I'm planning on replacing my regular massive electrodes with something better, BY's are cheap (similar to regular ones) but I'm not sure how much better they are. Fine wires at this point seems way to expensive for my current situation.

The thing with fine wires is they last much longer than massives.  They cost more up front, but I’ve just started replacing a few at annual that were showing high (or low) resistance.  They were still running well.  They all made it 800 hours, and some are still going!  You’re gonna buy a couple sets of massive at least in that time.

[redbaron1982]

5 minutes ago, Ragsf15e said:

The thing with fine wires is they last much longer than massives.  They cost more up front, but I’ve just started replacing a few at annual that were showing high (or low) resistance.  They were still running well.  They all made it 800 hours, and some are still going!  You’re gonna buy a couple sets of massive at least in that time.

500 hours for massive is not realistic? Mines are about 300 hours now and the electrodes looks good and resistance is between 600ohms and 2k, which is within specs AFAIK.

[Ragsf15e]

3 minutes ago, redbaron1982 said:

500 hours for massive is not realistic? Mines are about 300 hours now and the electrodes looks good and resistance is between 600ohms and 2k, which is within specs AFAIK.

Dunno. My fine wires came with the airplane 9 years ago.  From what I’ve heard/read, you’re at the end of service with massive by 300 hours, but maybe not?

[Ragsf15e]

11 minutes ago, redbaron1982 said:

500 hours for massive is not realistic? Mines are about 300 hours now and the electrodes looks good and resistance is between 600ohms and 2k, which is within specs AFAIK.

We have an old thread on this. After reading through it, you might be right. Lots of different disagreements on the plugs. If your engine runs fine with massives, there’s probably no reason to use anything else.

[redbaron1982]

2 minutes ago, Ragsf15e said:

We have an old thread on this. After reading through it, you might be right. Lots of different disagreements on the plugs. If your engine runs fine with massives, there’s probably no reason to use anything else.

Mine doesn't! Lol... it's not running smooth when idle and is fouling quite quickly the spark plugs. So that's why I'm looking into either BY or fine wires.

[201Mooniac]

56 minutes ago, redbaron1982 said:

500 hours for massive is not realistic? Mines are about 300 hours now and the electrodes looks good and resistance is between 600ohms and 2k, which is within specs AFAIK.

My first set of massive's in my factory reman engine went almost 1000 hours and still tested fine but I replaced them anyway as I was having an ignition related issue I was debugging.  I've heard of a lot of people changing them out early though so I'm not sure what the difference is.  My current set has about 250 hours and still look and test as new.

[EricJ]

It used to be pretty normal to run fine wires on the bottom and massives on top.    This is what I've done for a long time, and it has worked pretty well.   The fine wires on the bottom resist lead fouling, which I had trouble with with the bottom massives.    I've had zero fouling issues since putting the fine wires in the bottom.    In my experience they do seem to last longer than the massives in the top spots.

[PT20J]

Fine wires have gotten pretty pricey. The maintenance advantage is that the electrodes last much longer and don’t need gapping. The operational advantage derives from the electrode arrangement that places the spark deeper in the combustion chamber. I am trying out the BY plugs which should provide the operational advantage but not the maintenance advantage. I’ve got about 100 hours on them and they run great LOP and are also very clean when I rotated them twice so far.

[redbaron1982]

1 hour ago, PT20J said:

Fine wires have gotten pretty pricey. The maintenance advantage is that the electrodes last much longer and don’t need gapping. The operational advantage derives from the electrode arrangement that places the spark deeper in the combustion chamber. I am trying out the BY plugs which should provide the operational advantage but not the maintenance advantage. I’ve got about 100 hours on them and they run great LOP and are also very clean when I rotated them twice so far.

Do you use URHB37E?

[PT20J]

20 minutes ago, redbaron1982 said:

Do you use URHB37E?

UREM37BY

[Guest]

6 hours ago, redbaron1982 said:

Do you use URHB37E?

You’ll need this plug if the wire nut is 7/8”, and the one Skip uses if the plug wire is 3/4”

[exM20K]

16 hours ago, keithmiller said:

Had mine installed on my Acclaim a couple of weeks ago plus 2 new mags ( seems like the rebuild are no holding up). Just back from an 11 hr trip up thru upper Wisconsin and back . My 2009 never ran so good.

My last mag rebuild lasted between 0 and 4 hours this year.  Big fan of the fine wire plugs.

-dan