The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area The Electrical Bay Another spark plug wire question

Hello List,

I have to believe this issue has been discussed to death but the search engine didn’t quite find what I was looking for. I must replace the plug wires on my 55 first series (stock 235 engine and still 6 volts) . The plug wires that Jim Carter sells are carbon core instead of metal core, same with Autozone. I know from working on antique motorcycles that carbon core wires have much higher impedance than metal core and the spark you get is much less robust. So, is it ok to use carbon core wires on these old engines or is it best to look for the old style metal core? Thank you!

Joe

Personally I think the carbon wires are an improvement and I would go with them.

Joe,
I used wire core on my 216. No problems.
Spark Plug Wire Set (Belden Premium) 7MM LIFETIME WARRANTY P/N Bel 700173 I got them from NAPA.
Harold

I ended up ordering some solid core wires and ends from O'Reily. I did some more research and it looks like the solid cores give a hotter spark. The motorcycle I was working on was a 47 indian which has the same ignition set up as the stovebolts. It made a big difference when I chucked the carbon core wires. Also I did find this post

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Fla54Chevy3100 Offline
Shop Shark Registered: 04/10/05
Posts: 1411
Loc: Central Florida



I think every Stovebolter wants to get the most out of our little 6 cylinder engines! Not necessarily trying to make them fast, or faster...just trying to get them to be dependable and trouble free. Dress'um up a little and add our own personal touch to these "gems in the rough".

I've been tinkering with a pass. side sparkplug wire loom....3/8 tubing....running the 7mm wires through the loom to clean up the "look". I'd removed the ends from a set of relatively new carbon core wires, but found they were still just too short. I needed some longer wires and I used to use the solid core prior to all the "electronics" stuff.

None from Az or Adv..."nobody uses solid core anymore!" So it was off to NAPA.....who had it in the bulk...12' plus the ends....$8.00 plus change!!!!

Finished up the loom, plugged in the new wires and off to our Wednesday night truck gathering.
Right away I noticed a different tone to my tired ole 56-235 exhaust. Crisper!!! Hummm, had to set the idle down a bit...amazing, smoother, and quicker.

Is there a point to my story? Instead of replacing your carbon core with more carbon core, you might try making up a set, using the steel core. Of course, an HEI and steel core wires don't mix or if have a radio you will have RFI interference. But if you get your jollies listening to a split exhaust sing through a couple cherry bombs, running a set of solid steel core wires might just be your cup of tea!

Solid core wires don't produce a hotter spark. They do allow much higher current flow in the plug wires, which does nothing to ignite the fuel better, but it does drastically reduce the life of distributor caps and rotors due to the intensity of the arc that jumps around inside the cap. Solid core wires also produce a huge amount of radio frequency interference with electronic devices, particularly AM and CB radios and VHF television signals. FM and UHF isn't affected as badly, so unless your neighbor is into CB, he's not likely to take a Louisville Slugger to your headlights for messing up his conversations. I'm not sure what RF interference does for cell phone signals and other personal electronics.
Jerry