Anyone else tried Pulse Plugs yet?

[BAD63R]

I came across these a while back due to Graham at my local tuning place (X-Spec) as he was working with the company by testing the plugs to see what they can do.

Well first off i thought, blah! these are just another cheap "great" perfromance upgrade that wont do a thing, probably kill my engine faster. But a few weeks later Graham told me about the testing and was extremly pleased with the results. So I booked my Vectra GSi in for a set of 6 and a session on the rolling road.

So test 1 was to see what the car was running and produced 172bhp at the wheels so was running about 10bhp more than standard with the mods i had.

So we fitted a set of Pulse Plugs and gave it another go. We hit some problems as at first we didn't realise one of the plugs was faulty but we ran it again anyway and actually made 3bhp and 4lb of torque just running on 5 pots lmao.

So out they came and another set fitted and test 3 commenced. All of a sudden I see the difference when the car was tested. The total BHP gain at the wheels was 5bhp and 12lb of torque, but when I started looking at the results of the "average power through the range" this is where I saw the difference the most. The average bhp went up by 12bhp through the range and 28lb or toque through the rev range. Also the inherent flat spot that Vauxhall V6's suffer at 3500rpms was almost totally gone and the peak torque came down by 580-600rpms

So I was well chuffed as I didn't beleive for second that these would work so well. The only down side is that they are £25 each but the money is well worth it. I'll try and get my video of my DVD camcorder so you can all see the results yourselves

But here some links about them :-

http://www.pulstar.com/

http://www.demon-tweeks.co.uk/products/ProductDetail.asp?cls=ROAD&pcode=PULAD-1

http://chris.pirillo.com/spark-plugs-vs-pulse-plugs/

 

[marti5]

Sounds impressive...might give them a go x8 for me, £200, just bit cocncerned that the 1st set they fitted in yours one was bad ??, does make you think..

 

[BAD63R]

It was only because if it being knocked during shipping. The spacer at the end was bent in, they bent it out to the right gapping and it split the metal slightly. But the others were fine and they stayed in it when i sold it. The chappy who bought it was impressed aswell.

 

[marti5]

Ah,right...thought is was bad manufacturing, so do you have them in your new car? or were you not that over impressed ? as for me spending just over £200 on plugs is something I have to be sure with..if you know what I mean.

 

[obi_waynne]

I'm always skeptical of these types of products but a dyno result really does prove it!

I don't suppose you have print outs of the rolling road runs - I think this is article worthy!

 

[BAD63R]

I dont have a print out. I could probably get one cuz Graham saves the RR results on file so possibly. But i've got 3 videos on the 1st run, then the 2nd with the first of plugs, then also a vid with the 3rd and 4th runs showing the results. You could do a print screen from it i suppose. I'm just having a job getting the files off the dvd onto my computer. My camcorder records very strangly lol.

 

[obi_waynne]

I guess we could youtube them? Can you rip them to Divx format?

 

[HDi fun]

Good quality ignition is obviously worth its weight. Sometimes we overlook this relatively simple part of the Otto cycle with all the attention that's poured onto fuel injection systems.

Either that or was your previous set of plugs 190,000 miles old and knackered?

 

[pikey motorsports]

i'd be more inclined to believe the difference was in the fact that the 1st test was on standard and used plugs, then brand new uprated plugs.

Unless im mistaken, max power or redline or fast car did an article on them, and they used a brand new set of oem plugs, a brand new set of denso iridium plugs, and these pulse plugs. the iridiums came out on top. the pulses were only slightly better than oem.

The way i look at it, unless you upgrade your ENTIRE ignition system, Battery, Coil, Distributor, HT leads and all wiring, how is a spark plug going to draw a bigger better spark when its working with the same amount of electricity?? The standard system can only pass whatever current through it as left the factory with, uprated plugs dont magically create more electricity.

And another point worth remembering is that rolling road printouts can vary due to air temp differences between runs, so even that isnt concrete proof they are all they are cracked up to be unless were seeing 20bhp increases!

JM2PW!

 

[BAD63R]

The plugs that were in it were only 4000 miles old according to it's service history, and the RR at this place is done in a controled enviorment. The only difference in temp that happens is a max of only a couple of degrees.

 

[pikey motorsports]

meh, i still dont believe spark plugs can magic their own electricity. and quite how they store electricity that should be going into your engine is beyond me.

 

[HDi fun]

meh, i still dont believe spark plugs can magic their own electricity. and quite how they store electricity that should be going into your engine is beyond me.

It depends, I suppose, upon the rise time of the votage spike that has to traverse the spark gap.

 

[BAD63R]

They are gonna get fitted in the 3.0ltr but i'll take pics this time instead of videos that way I can upload them a hell of alot easier lol. There is too much proof from Graham place for me not think otherwise i'm affraid. Every car Graham has fitted these things have gained from them. The only thing that was on the veccy as far as ignition upgrades was the Magnacor HT leads. The coil was OE but brand new when the previous plugs were changed.

 

[MasterAuron]

How many runs did you do with it on the standard plugs and then these new unbroken plugs? More than one needs to be done of each and an average taken imo. Also, as said need to be compared with brand new standard plugs to be valid.

 

[BAD63R]

The car had 2 runs in total, one on the first time we set it up, when the faulty one was found I had to wait 3 hours before having them fitted again due to a scooby being services. Then it was again.

 

[billyo]

It sounds tempting. Does the gap really matter much, the site suggests reducing the gap for lots of cars.

 

[pgarner]

sure its not increase the gap slightly ? though that would give you a longer arc.

i make sure they are set correctly - most arnt

 

[HDi fun]

Spark plug gaps used to be crucial when we had mechanically timed ignition that was actuated by a set of contact breaker points driven by a 4 lobe (4 cylinder car) cam inside the distributor.

Too small and the arc (spark) would be too small to really get the fuel mixture burning in a timely fashion.

too large and starting was difficult as there wasn't enough PD to jump the larger gap.

With transistorised ignition and other more recent developments like coil per plug ignition the gap is not that critical. 1mm (.040") should suffice in most situations as a base setting. With the arrival of multiple earth-electrode plugs and exotic materials there's little need to adjust the gap(s) at all to be honest.

All current (no pun intended) systems will provide loads more than enough PD to jump a 1mm gap. If this widens during use over tens of thousands of miles it really doesn't matter.

There's no benefit in constantly adjusting the gaps. You might even put stress fractures in the electrodes by doing so. Should an electrode weakened in this way part company with the plug and fall into the combustion chamber you will wind up with a severely damaged piston, compression ring, cylinder bore.

 

[UK GED]

Are these pulse plugs the same as electro acoustic plugs??