spark plug advice

[Christopher Hoffman <imperial67@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Michael, I'm not sure what I said that made you take such apparent personal
offense at my trying to help out a new member by recommending a product that
works well, but nothing so evidently irritating was intended. Just a hearty
endorsement.

My personal experience, and that of numerous others on this list and
elsewhere, is that Mopars (especially of this vintage) do not like
Champions, and that switching to Autolites in itself helps cure pinging,
fouling and numerous other unpleasantries of poorly running older cars.

The original owner of my '67 ran Champions religiously, and when I bought
the car it had anti-foulers on five of the plugs! Since this seemed like
wearing a suit made entirely of BandAids, I sought a real solution to this
and the car's seemingly uncurable pinging. A dear friend introduced me to
his honest, old-timer mechanic, a man named Gene who passed away at 84
several years ago. When my friend asked Gene if he knew anything about '67
Imperials, Gene said "Sure, a little. Bought one new and still have it!"
Gene got me hooked on the Autolites. In one service visit, that change alone
contributed so much to the car running well that I never looked at a
Champion again, and have endorsed them to friends and acquaintances without
a single instance of anything less than happiness with the result.

I run Autolites on every pre-2000 Mopar I own (I have yet to pull a
factory-installed plug on my new cars, but my '93 Jeep loved 'em too), from
a '63 Dart to a '78 NYB. Every one of these runs well, there is no pinging,
the plugs never foul, and the NYB just passed CA's Smog Check with flying
colors (and with an engine that was not even available in CA when new).
Combined with the support of all the other IMLers who have had similar good
experiences with Autolites, I felt confident in recommending them.

And since I didn't originally interpret the new member's comment that his
car was using fuel faster than he could put it in as meaning a carb leak (I
read it as a hyperbole for poor as mileage), I thought I'd try to offer the
most overlooked low-cost things to get out of the way first.

By the way, I run NGKs and NDs in my Japanese cars, since that's what works
best for me in those. I'm not a mouthpiece for Autolites, just happy to
share good experiences with others.

Cheers indeed,
Chris in LA

> <<<<<<<<<<<<<
> Christopher Hoffman wrote:
> Replace all the plugs with
> Autolites (#89, I think, is the correct model number) and never, ever, ever
> use Champions in a Mopar again.
>>>>>>>>>>>>> 
> Roger and Michael in San Diego responded:
> Bah humbug. If you're going to make sweeping statements like that, give us
> some credible reasons. Does Champion
> not make an appropriate heat range? Are the threads cut wrong? What?
> For ANY given brand of spark plug (or
> oil, or filters, etc) you will find someone to say to never use that brand,
> always use this other brand. I don't have any particular ax to grind, the
> majority of my cars and motorcycles are running NGK, but we do have
> Champions in the '73, which starts
> instantly and returns 18-19 mpg on the highway, with 89k on the odometer.
> It's a moot point in this case, as the original poster clearly had a
> carburetor
> which was dumping fuel down one primary bore.
> Cheers
> Michael
> 
> Roger and Michael in San Diego
> 67 Crown Convertible  "Moby"
> 73 LeBaron Coupe  "La Bomba Negra"
> 56 Sedan