69MOPE
Well-Known Member
A lot of old timer's in the sport claim that equal length spark plug wires do make a difference in performance. I can't see it. Opinions? Any dyno tuners out there ever test this?
Your opinion on equal length spark plug wires?
- Thread starter 69MOPE
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How fast does electricity travel?
The timing difference between wires spanning an additional foot, short to long is insignificant.
The timing difference between wires spanning an additional foot, short to long is insignificant.
TrailBeast
AKA Mopars4us on Youtube
About 300,000 kilometers per second. (or 671 million MPH)
I'm not going to even bother to figure out how long it takes to travel a foot.
Ok, it's 1.1 nanoseconds (called a "Lightfoot") and is how fast light travels one foot of distance. (electricity and light travel at real close to the same speed.)
Just think, if it was a car you were driving and you held the gas on for one second to long you would overshoot your destination by 300,000 km.
fratzog lover
Well-Known Member
With so little resistance in quality wires, I imagine it matters little at all.
67Dart273
Well-Known Member
DAMN!!! Ron you are right on this, LOL
Hell, I've even forgotten how long a "RADAR mile" is
ir3333
Well-Known Member
...so are expensive 8 or 8.5 mm wires necessary or are standard auto parts store 7 mm adequate as long as they are in good shape with no leaks?
That's a different question.
Insulation helps to keep the energy contained.
To put the answer of time difference in traveling an extra foot assuming 186,000miles/sec
.000000001 seconds.
If someone can tune an engine to factor in the travel timechange on a set of plug wires, they are building the wrong stuff!
Zero gain/loss and a waste of time and effort exercises.
boosted
Life Needs Air
This will also depend on the ignition system being used. A stock 12v coil vs a MSD setup is a different conversation.
Also what the car is being used for? Is a Super Stock car that you need every .10th out of or is it a bracket car or just a street car. A well tuned carb will also change the efficenacy of the ignition system.
Also what the car is being used for? Is a Super Stock car that you need every .10th out of or is it a bracket car or just a street car. A well tuned carb will also change the efficenacy of the ignition system.
Dartnut
Don't hate me because i'm beautiful
Maybe everyone should rethink this.
A billionth of a second means a billionth of a horsepower lost.
A billionth of a second means a billionth of a horsepower lost.
This stirs up a question in my mind.....How long is a short circut?
ir3333
Well-Known Member
oops...should have been a new thread
turbofreek
batcrap crazy racing team
What is a spark plug wire.
moparlover
Well-Known Member
the main thing is that all the connectors are good, not loose making good connections etc and none of your wires are against headers/manifolds getting hot melting holes in them
the difference between the insulation helps prevent voltage crossover between the wires. if you are using those super high voltage coils or something it could make a difference. but increasing the voltage dont make power anyways. of course they will try to sell you those with all kinds of lingo on their websites. same with the sparkplug companies.
the main thing is stable, well timed power. a bad part, coil, ecu, plug wire, cap, rotor etc can cause loss of power.
the difference between the insulation helps prevent voltage crossover between the wires. if you are using those super high voltage coils or something it could make a difference. but increasing the voltage dont make power anyways. of course they will try to sell you those with all kinds of lingo on their websites. same with the sparkplug companies.
the main thing is stable, well timed power. a bad part, coil, ecu, plug wire, cap, rotor etc can cause loss of power.
Me either, essentially you would just be making six wires longer. Sounds like a mess more than anything.
Equal length, i thing you get now, wasted effort HOW EVER A CHEAP SET OF IGN WIRE WILL HAUNT YOU FOR THE LIVE OF THE WIRE!
I bought a set of those cheap wires, had to keep spare wires and a volt/ohm meter in the car so when it would start back fire at the top end of the track i could ohm the wires and find the on the was bad and replaced it!
Finally bought some Taylor (brand name) spark plug wires.
Just installed them on my third eng and my last eng lived for over 20 years!
When these wire give me some problems, Bet your bottom dollar I will own another set!
look for wire that have a high Silicone content. if it said Silicone wires and don't tell you how much........there probably the same P.O.S. wire i bought to begin with.
There are plenty of good brands out there, these are the only one i have personal experience with.
http://www.jegs.com/p/Taylor/Taylor...g-Wires/2431109/10002/-1?itemPerPage=90&pno=1
I bought a set of those cheap wires, had to keep spare wires and a volt/ohm meter in the car so when it would start back fire at the top end of the track i could ohm the wires and find the on the was bad and replaced it!
Finally bought some Taylor (brand name) spark plug wires.
Just installed them on my third eng and my last eng lived for over 20 years!
When these wire give me some problems, Bet your bottom dollar I will own another set!
look for wire that have a high Silicone content. if it said Silicone wires and don't tell you how much........there probably the same P.O.S. wire i bought to begin with.
There are plenty of good brands out there, these are the only one i have personal experience with.
http://www.jegs.com/p/Taylor/Taylor...g-Wires/2431109/10002/-1?itemPerPage=90&pno=1
From my experience the cheap wires would not last as long or the ends may come off if you pull them off alot. But I did not see any performance gain from running $16.00 Auto Zone wires and changing to MSD 8.5 wires. I ran the same ET. I am running a MSD Digital 6 box and MSD coil.
I agree. But the question is a good one and remains IMO.
"How fast is electricity?"
About 300,000 kilometers per second. (or 671 million MPH)
I'm not going to even bother to figure out how long it takes to travel a foot.
Ok, it's 1.1 nanoseconds (called a "Lightfoot") and is how fast light travels one foot of distance. (electricity and light travel at real close to the same speed.)
Sorry, I have a problem believing this. Even more so in the last line.
But WTF do I know?
Isn't tha light speed?
Besides, how fast is it when you turn plaid?
(Space Balls)
BigBlockMopar
BigBlockMember
It's about resistance, not traveled distance.
It takes time to send electrons through a wire and build enough current to jump a spark at the plug. It takes (a fraction) more time to build more current to push electrons through a wire with resistance.
Longer wires have more resistance. So the equal length wires could have some merit in perhaps all out race-engines where high compressions call for high spark currents.
tubtar
Well-Known Member
If you worried about this any longer than it takes the current to travel that extra length of conductor , here' something else to worry about.
You will NEVER get that time back.
Fortunately , we'd need a nuclear accelerator to calculate the amount of time lost.
You will NEVER get that time back.
Fortunately , we'd need a nuclear accelerator to calculate the amount of time lost.
moparlover
Well-Known Member
it's not fully light speed . about 80%
electrons travel in the wire at a quite slow speed opposite the direction of the current. the speed of electricity however is very fast it's actually the speed of the propagation of the electric field
electrons travel in the wire at a quite slow speed opposite the direction of the current. the speed of electricity however is very fast it's actually the speed of the propagation of the electric field
So making all the wires longer, inducing more system resistance is going to be better... got it. IMO, That additional resistance in a good set of wires over that extra foot will be insignificant as well.
I haven't been around a nitro car in a long time. I wonder if they run equi-length wires. Maybe a call to Rick at firecore might answer some of that as I believe he supplies wires for some of them. If they don't do it, it's not a concern.
The time factor is definitely not an issue.
I haven't been around a nitro car in a long time. I wonder if they run equi-length wires. Maybe a call to Rick at firecore might answer some of that as I believe he supplies wires for some of them. If they don't do it, it's not a concern.
The time factor is definitely not an issue.
dragondan64
Banned
My dad raced for Grand Spaualding Dodge outa Detroit back in the 60's n 70's and the old school race days they even tried to keep the plug wires same length for that reason but my dad always thought it was a waste of time so he tune and tested his drag car with 3 different length wires and the car didn't miss a beat or more importantly it didn't suffer with his ET's, now I am not a scientist of any sort but like I read earlier electricity moves so fast in that short of a distance I couldn't imagine it would be beneficial to have same length wires. I have learned that keeping your wires separated and not tangled together can help prevent spark traveling to other wires which can cause weird stuff to happen, but with hi-tech wires they make today I have never had troubles with that. I use Taylor wires because they seem to never get hard after being exposed to heat/headers and never spark travel.
The value of the "speed of light" that everyone is kicking around is for the speed of light in a vacuum -- that is not the same thing as the speed of an electron in a metal wire. But the point is the same -- it's way too fast to worry about the differential lengths of spark plug wires.
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