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Are these spark plugs looking right?/Compression Test
samwilliams - 31/1/06 at 05:05 PM

I'm gradually going through, doing different things that people suggest to fix/check everything's working. One thing that has been suggested before as a generally sensible thing to do was a compression test. So, I did one of them this evening. It was originally meant to be done warm, but I wasn't exactly quickest at it, so it ended up being in the middle!

All of them came out around 145-170psi (the first one was the 170 one, and it was cooling down, so think that might have had an effect on that being slightly higher. the rest were pretty much on the 150). Does that sound about right? My understanding is that the main thing to check is that they're all similar.

At the same time, I decided to take photos of the spark plugs to ask you lot if they look right. There is a diagram in the haynes manual, but I thought I'd open it up to the experts for your opinion (mainly because I couldn't decide which picture they corresponded to. I also took pictures of the holes they go in to, as they looked a bit full of crap compared to what I'd have expected, and wondered whether that was normal. The pictures are now in my photo archive (they're not great, as it was with my phone. If it matters, hole 1 goes with plug 1, etc.)

Anyway, that was my little play for this evening. I'm getting there and, somehow, it was running quite well when I went out to fill up with petrol, so we shall see!

Thanks
Sam

graememk - 31/1/06 at 05:10 PM

do you have any bigger photos ?

Peteff - 31/1/06 at 06:05 PM

Shrink them to a quarter size and they look alright, good mixture. You always get gunge accumulating round the plugs when they aren't changed or checked often. Stick the plugs back in and blow the crap out with an airline or something and don't let it go down the bores.

samwilliams - 31/1/06 at 06:21 PM

quote:
Originally posted by graememk
do you have any bigger photos ?


Sorry. Remembered to change the quality down a bit, but forgot to change the size as well!

quote:
Originally posted by Peteff
Shrink them to a quarter size and they look alright, good mixture. You always get gunge accumulating round the plugs when they aren't changed or checked often. Stick the plugs back in and blow the crap out with an airline or something and don't let it go down the bores.


Thanks for that. So, on that basis, no fundamental problems with the running (going to get it set up properly soon, but want it to be at least vaguely right until then.

Sam

Chippy - 31/1/06 at 11:31 PM

Difficult to say with those pictures, but the mixture looks to be a bit on the weak side, electrodes appear to be very white.
Nice looking motor, by the way.

[Edited on 31-1-06 by Chippy]