Plug Reading: Should I add more timing/fuel?

ninezeroteg · Post by **ninezeroteg** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 6:56 am

Yep, got a few sets of 7's last night, but I wanted to get my AFR's richened up a little bit before I went to a hotter plug. I'll be putting them in and checking them out later today when I get off work.

98vtec · Post by **98vtec** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 12:45 pm

Bugermass wrote:^^ correct.. and those are still too cold.. Not likely to get acurate indications with that heat range.

a good bit cold as well.

ninezeroteg · Post by **ninezeroteg** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 7:02 pm

Logged with new plugs in today to and from work, approx. 35 miles each way. Richened AFR's up to about 12.5 at WOT. After getting home, went out and while the car was still hot and ran 3 WOT pulls. Ran through the first 3 gears in all 3. The last time, shut the car off at about 7100 RPM and pulled the plugs. Here are the pics. 1. A little more color on the threads 2. Still no fuel ring. 3. 2 marks seem to be showing on the ground strap now. (marked with arrows in the pics) 4. Higher RPM's (from about 4k up) weren't nearly as strong as before. Seemed like it took forever to pull all the way through 2nd gear, and 3rd gear seemed a bit sluggish too. Not sure if it's the added fuel, or the hotter plugs. Let me know what you guys think.

98vtec · Post by **98vtec** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 7:23 pm

the first mark on the top of the ground strap is the initial spark. The second mark is the actual color change from the heat exchange. The straps look good from my point of view so keep your timing where its at until you can hit a dyno. again, the fuel ring you are looking for is hard to see without a trained eye, a good magnifying glass and in good lighting. The only other way to see the ring is the cut the threads off the plug to expose the porcelain.

ninezeroteg · Post by **ninezeroteg** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 9:01 pm

Any idea why the power loss with the new plugs? Here's a little info on them in specific: NGK R5671A-7 stock no. 4091 Gap: .032 Also, remember that this is just the low cam that I'm running right now, vtec is disabled til I can get the low cam perfect. You sure I don't need more timing?

98vtec · Post by **98vtec** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 10:12 pm

you are running too cold of a plug man. my 12.2:1 comp h23vtec didnt want those 4091's. i stuck with the zfr7. if that second set of arrows is indicating where the beginning of the color change is, then that is where the timing needs to be. do you have the honda ignition advance turned off?

ninezeroteg · Post by **ninezeroteg** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 10:59 pm

Honda ignition advance turned off? I'm not familiar with that. The only thing I've seen that even slightly resembles that is Ignition Corrections? Disable ignition correction above 1031mbar? I don't have that checked if that's what you're talking about. The second arrow is where I can very first see a slight color change, and I do mean very slight. Also to be noted is that the color change there is really only noticeable on the sides of the ground strap, and doesn't have a \"defined\" line. It's more of a gradient than a line. The first arrow is a very defined line, as you can see.

98vtec · Post by **98vtec** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 11:30 pm

the ignition advance check box will either enable or disable the ignition correction in the background which is a ghost you cannot control. You can either turn it on, turn it off, or limit it to a certain pressure. When you turn the ignition advance off, it gives you more control over the ignition timing. The logged actual IGN will be closer to the MAP IGN with the advance turned off. So in your maps, especially in WOT, you are running a good bit more timing that what you are seeing in the map in the high load areas.

98vtec · Post by **98vtec** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 11:40 pm

with the amount of compression you are running, you should disable it above 550mbar or so. The high load, low RPM areas are very very sensitive to timing and will detonate very very easily. However, with this ignition turned off, you open yourself up to have a bigger window for error and you can experiment with the timing a little more. Turn it off and play with the timing some more until you get the ground strap the way it is now. Then advance the timing until you start to see ANY sign of black shiny specs on the porcelain or until the porcelain looks \"glazed\". This will give you an idea of how far you can go with the timing and you can see on the plug what that looks like. Then retard the timing and watch the ground strap. Takes a lot of time, but its a learning experience. NOTE: ADVANCE THE TIMING SLOWLY and leave the low rpm, high load timing LOW. once you have an eye for this, you can change each cylinders ignition trim and thats another learning experience by itself and really needs to be done on a dyno to understand the whole process.

ninezeroteg · Post by **ninezeroteg** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 9:00 am

I'll try that out. I was noticing in my logs that my actual ignition was never actually what the ignition table was calling for. As far as the plugs you ended up using, NGK zfr7f (5913) right? Isn't the only difference between those and the plugs I went to on this last reading that the zfr7f's are resistor type, and the ones I'm running are not? They are both v-power and heat range 7. Did you mean that I should go to the zfr6f's?

thething96 · Post by **thething96** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 9:18 am

Not trying to threadjack, but: 98vtec, what do you mean by honda ignition advanced? Are you talking about the IAT and ECT ignition compensations, or is there something I'm missing?

98vtec · Post by **98vtec** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 2:28 pm

no. This is something separate from any of the corrections that we have control over. With this option enabled, there is a constant ignition advance/retard being added on top of everything after the final corrections are done. This is control by the ecu. I am not quite sure the algorithm of how it is added, but i know it ranges from 0* and upwards of a 15* advance. This option is under sensor/hardware options in the parameters window. You can leave it on, turn it off, or limit it to a certain load. Turning it off will severely drop the ignition timing going to the engine so you must add timing back to the map in order to get it to run like it should. for instance, with this advance on, running 30* of timing at 7000rpm in the map is closer to 40*+ of timing going to the engine pending on what your other ignition corrections are. When you turn this advance off, the only other corrections that will change the map timing are in fact the corrections that we have control over. so technically, you could zero out all your corrections and your map timing would be your actual timing so long as your base timing was set correctly. this gives you the ignition control that you are realy looking for and is especially helpful in situations where ignition timing are very critical. this is an option that really sets eCtune and Neptune apart from Crome and S300.

ninezeroteg · Post by **ninezeroteg** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 5:32 pm

98vtec, you missed my question above. As far as the plugs you ended up using, NGK zfr7f (5913) right? Isn't the only difference between those and the plugs I went to on this last reading that the zfr7f's are resistor type, and the ones I'm running are not? They are both v-power and heat range 7. Did you mean that I should go to the zfr6f's? Also, can I reuse plugs that have been pulled for reading? Like these last ones for instance... If I pull 3 degrees timing, and put them in again and do some pulls for reading.. Will the line move closer to the end of the ground strap? Or once they're color is changed they won't change again unless the line moves further up the strap? Hope that all makes sense. One more thing.. Do you guys use a wire brush to clean your plugs with or what? It seems when I do it makes the color change pretty unable to see.

thething96 · Post by **thething96** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 2:57 pm

98vtec, thank you very much for answering my question................

ninezeroteg · Post by **ninezeroteg** » Tue Sep 15, 2009 9:20 pm

Finally got a fuel ring! A few posts back I ended up going to 7's, and it seemed like the car lost power upwards of 4500 rpm. On top of that, there still wasn't too much color on the threads, and still bright white porcelain with no fuel ring. Taking this into consideration, I went and got a set of 9's today. After going through the process of getting the plugs plenty hot and doing about 8 WOT pulls... I can finally see a fuel ring.

I also noticed that there was no power loss in the top end like there was with the 7's. I'll post up pics tomorrow when I can get them in some good light. I guess this means I need to run 9's?