True and I agree with you and Les: throwing in a hodgepodge of smoke and
mirrors may do a lot more harm than good. OTOH, like Chris Kotting, if I
can avoid gapping points by using a Hall cell, I'll use it if I can afford
it. Having sold a couple of parts lately, I could afford it. A higher
voltage coil allows one to increase spark plug gap, but as Chris points
out, the coil and other downstream components (be they Hall cells or
points) must operate at higher temps and so could fail, or rather, have a
lower mean time between failures. The issue of whether increased spark plug
gap does _anything_ beneficial or harmful appears to be the largest point
of discussion.
>From a practical standpoint, if 0.025 plug gap ignites a real-world range
of mixtures that vary with winter/summer grade fuel or other fuel quality
issues, density altitude variations, and acceleration demands, then there
is little reason to go to a larger gap. But two questions remain: (1) does
a 0.025 gap always ignite real-world ranges of mixtures? and (2) can
further performance (whether economy or power) be realized with an
increased gap leading to a shorter lag time between spark and bang (to
quote Chris). Would this allow for more of the mixture to be burned before
the exhaust port is opened? Is a faster burn better inherently, or must
many other variables (mixture quality, cylinder and piston design, timing,
etc) be matched?
Finally, let's face it, the 500 lb gorilla here is that those gold Sport
coils look really cool...:)
At 9:00 AM -0500 6/25/98, Shawn J. Tobin wrote:
> I used to think that throwing a kluge of performance parts together would
> result in a really wicked ride. This kind of thinking was due to a vivid
> imagination and the naive assumption that advertising claims were
> guaranteed to be true because the government kept them to their word.
>
...
Jeffrey H. Boatright, PhD
Senior Editor, Molecular Vision
http://www.molvis.org/molvis
Mailto:jboatri@emory.edu
404-778-4113
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