Ordered the GM Performance Wires and NGK TR55 copper plugs and they arrived yesterday. Interesting thread!

 

That would be cool, although I have not seen a "lifetime" wire yet, nor do I believe they are designed to be such.

 

You are incorrect. You're comparing apples and oranges...solid wires have VERY low resistance while the spiral wound wires have low resistance. Solid wires provide no RFI reduction and can't be run on the street making any comparisons a moot point...you can't use them to say there is any correlation between wire resistance and RFI. Spiral wound wires provide RFI reduction via inductive reactance. (See post above.)

Any spark plug wire sold for use on the street has to have zero RFI. This is regulated by the FCC. As far as the spiral wound technology being BS...read about inductive reactance. I've been using spiral wound wires for over 20 years and can tell you they are the best design for the street bar none. They will last a very long time versus the typical carbon core wires that begin to deteriorate as soon as you pull them out of the box. The first time you bend a carbon core wire, you make a "break" in the carbon core that just keeps getting larger and larger with every spark until the gap is so large, the spark will travel through the insulation to ground instead of to the spark plug.

 

Depends on what you consider to be a lifetime. If you buy a set and use them for 10 years and 150k miles, they'll still be going strong. How long do you keep a car? (I keep my cars well past 200k.)

When I buy a set of spiral wound wires, I buy them with the confidence that it will be the last set of wires I buy that car and haven't been let down yet. I bought two sets of Magnecores for my twin 467 big blocks in my boat in '95...I haven't bought another set since. I had one car with a set of Magnecores that I gave away but swapped the wires with the car I replaced it with since they had the same engine...8 years/100k miles (cumulative) on those wires, still going strong, and I plan to keep the car another 4-5 years/60K miles and not have to replace the wires. That's the advantage to the spiral wound wires, they last a "lifetime"

 

Yep this guy sums it up well. Wrap a wire around some kind of inductive core (even air in the case of high frequency currents), and the current traveling through the wire will have a bit of inductive reactance, and thus any unwanted high frequency emmissions are reduced or "choked" off. Chokes and inductors are used in just about any electronic device that either deals with RF energy or needs to filter it out. Guess how the inductors are made..... wrapping copper wire around a core.

Also, I'm pretty sure the "skin effect" only applies to alternating currents, particularly those in the RF range.

As far as resistance with high voltages, the difference between 100 ohms and 300 ohms will be practically immeasurable. Resistors in circuits with that high of voltage are measured in megohms (such as those used in high voltage DC power supplies). It doesn't take much voltage to jump across a .050 inch gap either, even under compression with fuel added. The extra voltage from the coil is just there to give a hot spark. I've built many induction coils, transformers, tesla coils, etc from scratch, so I've been around high voltage quite a bit. It's a fairly simple circuit. I think as far as plug wires on an engine go... it's better to have quality and durability more than anything else. I'm going with the MSD wires myself. They're about the same price at the GM wires. I didn't get them because I thought they'd give more performance. I'm sure they'll do just fine.

 

Thunder Volts for me.

Shahram

 

Glass slipper & tvlance

WOW! You guys have have added EXCELLENT info to this SPARK PLUG WIRE post!!!! Its 100% accurate ! WELL DONE! Excellent and very good info!

I agree! Buy wires for Quality rather than HYPE!!!!!!

Bill Curlee

 

i have the gm performaance now, i am going to change to the msd because i will get money from msd at the track if i win, and the msd wires were cheaper than the gmpp, right now i have alot of static in my kenwood stereo, i have sold car stereos for years and have never seen this before so i am curious if the msds fix it

 

I researched the wire question at length before changing plugs and wires on my 02 at 40,000 miles. The OEM wires appeared to be welded or rubber cemented to the plugs. I destroyed a couple getting them off. The OE iridium plugs looked good when they came out. I went with Magncor race wires and NGK tiridium plugs. I immediately noticed quicker starts and a smoother idle. IMHO Magnecors are the top of the heap.

 

are the hotwires the same thing as the GM Performance Parts wire set?

 

This is a good thread. Albeit it is 2 years old. But still some really good info.

 

I prefer the LS2 wires

GMPP are the best <60, the LS2 run about 85

Those are the only 2 I would install