Electronic ignition

Which plugs to use with and electronic ignition, aviation or automotive???

Any suggestions will be appreciated

What system??

My Slick LASAR electronic ignition uses standard aviation plugs.

Other electronic ignitions use auto plugs.

Most of the electronic ignitions I know of use a plug gap of .035" or so, and thus auto plugs work well.

Automotive NGK Uridium Plugs, gap will depend on compression ratio.

From light speed

http://www.lightspeedengineering.com/Products/Sparkplugs.htm

4 for 6 bucks!

I have been using a single EI and Mag setup on my RV's since Jeff Rose built the first true system back in the 90's. My current RVX has a Jeff Rose Electroair system and I chose to use Automotive plugs, no adapters and Accel plug wires. Adapting the EI automotive plug wires to aircraft plugs can present some challenges. For me though, it boiled down to cost. I have been running them nearly 3000 hours in previous and current airplanes, no worries.
I replace the auto plugs every inspection, $6.95 at Napa. I use either Autolite 386's or Denso L-14U plugs(18MM). Worked in my IO-540 powered Rocket and my 0-320 powered X, the same. Clean, plentiful, easily accessible and cheap.

Smokey

Automotive plugs and no adaptors?

smokyray said:

I have been using a single EI and Mag setup on my RV's since Jeff Rose built the first true system back in the 90's. My current RVX has a Jeff Rose Electroair system and I chose to use Automotive plugs, no adapters and Accel plug wires. Adapting the EI automotive plug wires to aircraft plugs can present some challenges. For me though, it boiled down to cost. I have been running them nearly 3000 hours in previous and current airplanes, no worries.
I replace the auto plugs every inspection, $6.95 at Napa. I use either Autolite 386's or Denso L-14U plugs(18MM). Worked in my IO-540 powered Rocket and my 0-320 powered X, the same. Clean, plentiful, easily accessible and cheap.

Smokey

Click to expand...

Can this be true??

Frank

smokyray said:

I have been using a single EI and Mag setup on my RV's since Jeff Rose built the first true system back in the 90's. My current RVX has a Jeff Rose Electroair system and I chose to use Automotive plugs, no adapters and Accel plug wires. Adapting the EI automotive plug wires to aircraft plugs can present some challenges. For me though, it boiled down to cost. I have been running them nearly 3000 hours in previous and current airplanes, no worries.
I replace the auto plugs every inspection, $6.95 at Napa. I use either Autolite 386's or Denso L-14U plugs(18MM). Worked in my IO-540 powered Rocket and my 0-320 powered X, the same. Clean, plentiful, easily accessible and cheap.

Smokey

Click to expand...

The "new" Jeff Rose ignition systems - aka Electroair - recommend using REM37BY aircraft plugs, even for their experimental systems.

http://www.electroair.net/pdf/Installation-Manual.pdf

I agree with Gil. I run the 37BY plugs using a standard .016 gap with great success.

When I replaced my previous EI with an ElectroAir EI a couple years ago, Mike at EA asked if I wanted to go with auto or aircraft plugs. I asked what he recommended, and he said Aircraft. He said he likes REM37BY because they are easy to gap (due to the electrode design)...so I went with his recommendation. As Gil mentioned, that is reflected in their install manual as well.

Not sure if the aircraft plug recommendation is related to their efforts to get the system certificated (which it may now be...haven't kept up with that), but Mike did say either (auto or aircraft) works great.

I started with REM37BY on the EI and REM38E on the mag, then just went all REM37BY, for commonality of spare parts, etc. I gap the mag plugs to .016 and the EI plugs to .030-.035. Seems to be working quite well!

Smokey's system works great, and ya can't argue with the costs! I've been happy with the performance and reliability of my EA system as well, so looks like we have a nice set of options!!

Cheers,
Bob

I have a Plasma III and a mag and I use Denso IK27's on the elecronic side and have had excellent service from them. They cost less than 6 bucks each and I replace them at every annual. My mag side uses UREM40E's and they look good too, but cost a lot more. I tried some iridium plugs one year and they worked fine, but cost 3X as much. They are made to last a long time, and I don't need that. The standard Denso's will easily last a year, even if you fly 200 hours, and then you throw them away. My Unisom plugs last a long time and I clean and gap them every year, but installing new plugs on the electronic side is sure quick and easy.

I have been running the Jeff Rose (ElectroAir) system for over 1600 hours on and O-320.
Started with REM37BY's on the one mag and on the EI (gapped around .035).

I asked Jeff about automotive plugs (around 2002) and suggested the 386's with the expectation of some performance loss. I tried them and I fact could tell a slight difference. They otherwise performed just fine. I think I gapped these at around .035 as well.

Went back to the REM37BY's for a thousand hours or so.

Recently have been trying the NGK BR8EIX's (Iridium). They seem to work fine. I have used them for a few hundred hours. I did NOT change the gap on these.

I have two P-Mags, 114 models, that use NGK8BR-EIX or ES Plugs with thread size adapters. The EIX is iridium and cost $7.08 online, the ES plug is in the $2-3 range. I installed the EIS plugs. Emagair recommends using either one, no preference, just replace every 100-125 hours. I have 150 hours on my set and seem to be doing fine igniting premium mogas. Dan

One consideration should be how the different manufacturers deal with connecting the wire to the plug. On the LASAR they use a standard two nut system where you hold the wire stationary with one nut while twisting the other onto the threads. If this is the case with your electronic ignition then aviation plugs would work fine, or auto plugs, depending on your preferences.

The one place where I tried aviaiton plugs and was not happy was with the Emags. The issue isn't the plugs it's that EMag uses a single nut to connect the wire to the plug and the nut has to slide/rotate on the wire exterior if it isn't going to wind the wire up while turning onto the plug threads. Even lubing it with silicone grease and pre-winding it the other way doesn't prevent localized twisting that, in my case, was enough to shear the inside insulation. This resulted in arcing internally and the plug didn't fire.

I have since switched to the EMag auto plug harness and couldn't be happier.

Just my experience FWIW...

All Best

Jeremy