Well a few weeks ago I pulled my K/B off and sent it back to get the seals replaced in the snout due to oil leaking out under high boost, while I had the blower off I replaced the stock fuel rails out with some aftermarket fuel logs and a Aeromotive fuel pressure regulator. Fuel pressure was adjusted to 32# at idle.
I changed out the plugs while everything was out because the fuel logs now sit right over the coil packs and must be removed to change out the plugs so I did it because it was the easiest to do at that time. All the old plugs looked great (NGK-IT-22's with 5K on them) and replaced them with fresh ones.
I got the K/B back the following week and finished up the install. Had a few problems getting the 60# injectors to seat up inside the fuel rails and had to make several stops during the test run to fix the leaks. Seems the aftermarket rails do not have a tapered seat and the O rings on the injectors did not want to slip up inside and seat. The truck developed a miss in it while driving it shortly after wards. Thinking I had a loose coil pack or vacuum line off I rechecked everything and it looked fine but still had a miss at cruising speed...sort of a stumbling miss. After I check everything I took for a test ride and punched it a little bit and it was breaking down terrible!
The following day I pulled all the plugs back out...(yes I had to remove the fuel rails again.) I had 5 blown up plugs...the ground strap burned off of 4 of them and 2 of them had the porcelain busted off and missing around the electrode...not good. I reinstalled my old set of IT-22's because that is all I had at the time and they looked great. I knew that the engine must have ran lean due to the fuel pressure being different than the stock rails and must have blown the plugs.
I took it to my tuner to get the tune adjusted and he only had to bring the fuel pressure back up to where it was when it was tuned before. The engine still had a miss and we made a few soft dyno pulls on it just to check the A/F ratio.
I drove home after the dyno runs and picked up some new plugs...NGK-TR6's installed and gaped at 28-30.
When I pulled the plugs back out they all looked great but this one...
I thought maybe the coil pack was bad or it was not connected tight because when I started the engine it still has a slight miss in at high idle (2000) and driving it it was still popping through the exhaust slightly. I drove it back to the shop and pulled the coil pack connection off with the engine running and could not hear any difference in the idle but these engines with LT and loud cat backs it is hard to tell. I cleaned the coil pack plug real good and stuck her back on it tight. Took the truck back out and pulled and few more launches...it sounds really good and you can't hear any missing at WOT. I stayed into through the 1-2-3 shifts and it never missed a beat...smoking the Nittos like a cheap cigar!
Question is....
By looks of that black plug did I blow out a ring or valve seal in that cylinder? It is the second from the front on the driver's side. Or was the plug just not being fired and fuel fouled it out?
We have a track rental coming up this Friday and I want to race to the truck but if I have a internal issue I don't want to make it worse. It is a VT billet engine with all the good stuff...
Sorry for the long post guys just want a few thoughts on this issue.

 

Being an expert on bad plugs here's my take

Your first issue was related to not having enough fuel pressure and now that is corrected.

The plug you showed is fouled because that coil WAS NOT firing
I dont care how loud your exhaust is, YOU CAN CLEARLY tell the diff of the cylinder firing and NOT firing when you pull that coil wire, you said you DID NOT feel a diff, so I say it WAS NOT firing.

Of course check that plug again soon and see how it's burning NOW

GOOD LUCK BRO

 

As the resident expert on burned plugs Rob I treat your word as gold...I was actually planning on trying to find compression checker and check that bank to see if I had issues there along with checking that plug...it is was such a PITA to pull those plugs I would have done it yesterday.Thanks for your input Buddy...
wjm

 

No Probs Bro, unfortunately of course there could still be an issue, (I pray not for your sake)
But being I had that bad harness, I do have a lot of experince with what happens when a cylinder isnt firing due to a bad connection. And I became pretty good at disconnecting them while running to find the culprit. You really can tell the diff, and when you mentioned that one NOT seeming to effect it,
I kind of put two and two together.

Of course with me, that sometimes equals -1
OR SOMETHING

GO GET UM WJ

 

Yes i have to agree with a bad coil pack causing the plug to foul. Just the other day i had the same problem with one of my work vans(5.4 of coarse). What i dont understand is that every time a coilpack goes on one of my work trucks it triggers the SES light and when you pull the codes it will say missfire in cylinder 1 ,2, 3 etc..And this has happened to me at least 50 times over the coarse of years with all my 5.4 vans. I own 5 of them and its almost as commin as a chick gettin her period.lol.. Why do i hear so many lightnings with bad coilpacks not throwing codes. I now the computer has to cycle 3 times to detect it. Is it that most dont drive their lightnings more than three times once they detect a missfire or what. Anyway ,i dont think you have to worry, your plug looks just like mine did when the coil went bad. Just a fouled plug my friend. Enjoy your ride.

Jason

 

OH CRAP!!!!
I forgot to mention I am running the Plasma Booster also...with those cheap dang T-taps! Is there a way to test the pulg wire to see if it is getting the signal to fire???

 

Take a look at Lightningrodder.com and check out mod of the month. Its a handheld tester for the coil packs that lights up to see if its firing. Real cool item . Ill be picking one up soon myself. I think they were around $60.00

Jason

 

SNAP ON has them also .

 

Well I just ordered one...it will be a great tool to have on hand.

 

Glad to help.

 

I'm glad we will have one local. Haha. Hope you get it straight soon.

 

Oh oh "YIKES"

Well then you know my horror story, one by one they eventually cut through 4 out of 8 of my coil wire's (and mind you my truck only has like 15K on it)

I found one by running the truck and wiggling each connection one at a time, when I saw one actually put out a light on the Plasma Booster I knew I had a bad connection.

1 Sal found on the Dyno because we kept getting interference and loosing the signal.

And 2 of them outright cut the wire and created a miss, (found those by disconnecting the Coil Plugs one at a time and find the one that DID NOT effect the way it ran)

I was very lucky to be able to get to and solder the 4 that gave me trouble,
but when I decided to remove the Plasma Booster "and then remove each and every T Connector" (not an easy task) I found that most of the coil wires they were connected to had only 2 or 3 strains of wire still remaining making the connection, the rest has already been cut through and through.

One did drive me crazy because it would come and go, I FINALLY found that one by running it and again sitting there wiggling each coil connector, finally I wiggled it just right and that cylinder (coil) fired. I wiggled it again and I lost that coil. After that I cut my losses bought a new Harness on E-Bay (Thanks Rich for finding it for me) and Sal put it in, PROBLEM FINALLY SOLVED.....

TG I now have a new harness..... (well new old harness but A GOOD ONE : o )

 

Good news and bad news....
Good news is my coils are all firing!! WooooHoooo!
Bad news is I did a compression check on that dead cylinder and it is dead..."0" pressure! Must be a bent valve or a part of the spark plug is stuck in the valve seat...anyways I'll be pulling the engine out in few weeks when I get time. Thanks guys for the input.

 

Damm bro so sorry to hear that. Were you running a stock setup? Valves that is.

 

Nope they are a set of FoxLake stage II heads & cams and SS valves. I bought a full billet motor from VT and have about 6K on it before I hosed it up running it lean unintentionaly.