one, two, three, four!
Rev up your engines!
It's time for the Scotty Kilmer Channel
today I'm going to show you what spark plug you should buy for your car
now spark plugs play an important part in how your car runs so you want the
right ones in you don't want to waste money on buying something that's too
expensive but you don't want to buy cheap junk that isn't going to work
right so I'm going to show you how you can pick the right ones and save money
at the same time now engineers spent a lot of time and energy designing the
right spark plug so of course the original equipment ones will always work
right now this Toyota Matrix originally came with Nippon Denso Iridium spark
plug so of course if you bought them they'd be great for the car when I pull
these out you'll see they're Iridium and they're Denso so they're nip and Denso so
they're the factory spark plugs but when you replace them you don't have to buy
Nippon Denso and GK Iridium plugs are fine or any
other quality manufacturer they all have very good quality control you just want
to make sure that it's the right one for the vehicle people can look it up for
you and that it's an Iridium plug because iridium plugs last the longest
for example this Toyota has 68 thousand miles on it
the plugs have never been changed they still got plenty of life left in them
I've seen some cars with iridium plugs that had 200 thousand miles on then with
the original spark plugs and they still ran fine and I wouldn't push a dead fire
and here's the reason why as spark plugs wear, the gap where the
spark goes gets wider and wider over time if it gets too wide it makes the
ignition system work a lot harder and it can burn parts of the ignition system
out and computer ignition parts on modern cars aren't cheap so me I just
change them every hundred thousand miles regardless now if you're curious about
where you can use one of these gauges see what the wear is, in this case it's
about 40 thousands of an inch and the specs for this car is 39 thousands of an
inch to fifty one thousandth of an inch so since it's 40 thousands of an inch
these babies are hardly even worn at 60,000 miles and if you noticed I use
these water gauges not a good idea to use these cheap $2 flat ones because
when you check them a lot of times you can bend stuff the wires are much more
accurate and safe to measure the spark plug
gap, since Iridium spark plugs last the longest even longer than platinum I'll
use them in most cars that I tuned up these days just because it's going to
last such a long time why not spend the extra few bucks on iridium plugs and not
have to think about it for a hundred thousand miles
so whatever brand you decide on using here are some tips on how to change the
spark plugs right, first be cautious as a cat you don't want to break anything
take your time and work on a cold engine most heads are made of soft aluminum
alloys work on a hot engine you can rip the threads do it when the engine is
cold and on most modern cars don't put any kind of lubricant on the threads
these threads generally already have zinc or something else plated on them
and if you put a lubricant on you're actually going to torque them on the
head incorrectly which can cause problems later and when you put the new
spark plugs in I've been doing it for a long time so I just get them tight then
I get a little bit snug to make them right but you can use a torque wrench if
you're not sure this one uses 18 foot-pounds so we'll turn it until it's
at 18 and it locks in place then we turn it until it clicks and now we know the
spark plug is set in perfectly and I've got another tip for everybody out there
- don't be suckered in by this nonsense that oh these special spark plugs will
get more horsepower and better gas mileage it's a load of baloney the OEM
equipment ones are what they were designed for and they run best with that
design and like I said it doesn't matter who manufacture them as long as it's a
quality manufacturer plenty of guys make good spark plugs but you want to make
sure it's the same exact design that the car originally came with so the next
time you're changing spark plugs on your car now you know how to do it right
remember if you've got any car questions just visit the Scotty Kilmer channel
before it's too late and I end up in here
you