Ross wrote:
texas slacker wrote:
Went out this morning and rolled the Warrior out for a little soul
restoring and piston oiling. It totally fulunked the run-up, tried to
burn the crud off the offending plug, no joy. Took it back to the
hanger and started pulling plugs. They all felt hot so I pulled them
in order. The crudded up plug was the last one. Didn't have anything
small enough to get in the massive type gap. Finally took the plug to
the mechanic and he dug out a special tool to gouge out the offending
material. Put the plug back in and Warrior passed the run-up. Flew
for a half hour just to be sure and made a good cross wind landing.
Life is good.
Now - I need to buy or fabricate some sort of gadget to do a decent
job of cleaning the plugs. In looking around I see that Chief
Aircraft has a sand blaster type for about $23. This looks possibly,
has anyone ever used this particular gadget and did it do the job?
Anyone have a better suggestion? Thanks. Leo

I have cleaned lot of plugs and generally you will always find some
material. That was one reason that I aggressively lean while on the
ground. I noticed the little lead deposits were not there or smaller. My
mechanic had the "special" tool to first dig out the little nodules,
then I took it to his plug sandblaster to finally clean them out. It
looked like he had a awl that was filed and bent to get into all of the
areas of the plug. I have some old dental picks that my dentist gave me
that seem to work also. BTW, his sandblaster was a professional kind and
much more that $25.00. We also took a wire wheel and carefully cleaned
the threads before applying the antisiezing compound to the first two
threads. Oh, and blow out the plug with a air gun to get any grit out.


I should have read more posts before I responded. I seemed to have said
the same thing that everyone else said. One thing about the aggressive
lean on the ground is that if you try to take off and forget to push the
mixture in, the engine quits or sputters as a good reminder. Ask my how
I know

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Regards, Ross
C-172F 180HP
Sold
KSWI