This is driving me crazy. While idling with the hood up I can hear snapping in the engine compartment. Turn off the lights in the garage and all 8 plugs are lighting up.

I just put new Accel wires and AC Delco plugs in last week and while it made a huge difference in performance it didn't completely cure the arcing.
When I replaced the wires I did coat the boots with dialectric tune up grease.

I've never had this problem with any of my other cars.
Any suggestions? Possibly a bad ground somewhere?

btw, this is a '75 with the stock HEI ignition.

George

 

Yes, I've been there and done that. After a short while the arcing will have cut your boot insulation making the problem even worse. Your post is validating my painful (read expensive) choice for the Jacobs plug wires with ceramic boots.

Chuck

 

I raised my hood a few nights back to look for the same thing on my '80.
I'm running AC plugs and wires. I could see just a little blue glow around 3 or 4 of the plugs right at the edge of the boot and a couple of other places in the middle of the plug wires if they were touching metal.
These plugs and wires only have about 1700 miles on them. I don't like it but I'm not too concerned about it. I'm by no means an authority on ignition systems or anything else for that matter but I'm guessing that even if I were to spend the money on TOP DOLLAR wires that I wouldn't be able to detect any significant performance gains. But then again mine aren't making a "POPPIN' and SNAPPIN'" sound, just a faint glow.
I could be wrong though.

Last year I installed new plugs and wires on my Dodge truck (V-10) and I could see faint blue arching in various places along the plug wires with "0" miles on them. I didn't like it but I just didn't have it in me to pull 'em all out to return them to the store.

Granted, I live out in the country. When it is dark outside it is VERY dark as I do not even have a yard light so that makes it much easier to see the faint blue flashes.
This probably happens with most ignition systems, its just that most people never look and if they do it may not be dark enough to see. It takes my eyes several seconds of darkness to finally be able to see it.

 

With my new Accel wires, I get faint arcing at the boots for all plugs. I was thinking that my .055" plug gap was the cause. You guys running large gaps too?

 

.045

But your right, the larger the gap the higher the potential thus more visible arching outside of the system.

 

Better to do some calculating before opening the gap that much.