@@rawbsworld6604 It's only a neon sign transformer at 30mA so it's very unlikely to kill you but it will hurt like heartbreak when ya get zapped by it.
The project on cleaning fouled spark plugs using a neon sign transformer was published in the December 1949 issue of Popular Science. I love your channel by the way! All these years replace and toss....when they could have just been restored!
the only thing about spark plugs i could find in all of 1949 was some mention of using them to reduce static in certain applications, but i think it was the advancement of spark plug tech and not a howto build thing. same story for popular mechanics in 1949. save they have no mention of the spark plug static thing at all.
Back in the 60’s, Champion sold a spark plug tester. It was similar to what you have, with one major difference. The machine was hooked up to the compressed air system of the garage so that the plug was tested under simulated compression. It takes more voltage to jump the air gap under compression. What I found in my small engine repair business, is that plugs that had a black coating on the porcelain that surrounds the central electrode were the ones more prone to failure. My theory is that the black coating on the porcelain is basically carbon, and carbon is a conductor. Therefore under compression the high voltage would take the path of least resistance, namely the carbon, and therefore fail to jump the gap to ground and of course fail to ignite the air fuel mixture. If I would take one of the failed plugs and clean it in my glass bead blaster, the plug would then work fine in the engine. The time taken to do this was not worth it, so I simply replaced fouled plugs. The old Champion spark plug tester also had a built in bead blaster. I used glass, not sand, and took great care to make sure none of the glass was lodged into the base of the plug. Thought you might like to hear of my experiences, ran my own shop for 39 years.
I’ve used my baking soda blaster to clean fouled plugs, then a quick blast of air and Bob’s yer auntie! I have seen plugs that would spark just fine outside the engine, but would not start the motor. Usually Champions.
We had a Champion plug tester, as you have described, at a place that I worked at, in my younger years. We typically used it it charge up condensors (from points type automotive distributors), so that we could toss them to unsuspecting victims. great fun !!!
I used the champion cleaner in high school and wish I had one. These days I hold the plug with pliers, hear it up with a program torch until I see a couple licks of a flame and then I use a fine wire brush to clean the porcelain insulator. A squirt of carb cleaner and it's back to sparking.
Learned a trick from my dad (he would be 106 if still around, I'm 70) that he learned during WW2. Hold a fouled plug with pliers and place into the blue flame of a gas burner. Flame will turn yellow while it cooks off the carbon and oil fouling then revert to a normal blue flame once the fouling has cleared. Works like a dream, I have 20+ year old B&S 4 strokes and similar age 2 strokes that have done a power of work and are still on their factory plugs. Your gizmo does similar with the added benefit of visually testing for spark at the same time.
🔥Back in my day we used a propane Benz-O-Matic plumbers torch to renew plugs. Clamp plug in vise, heat up tip and wire brush it to remove carbon. We saved a lot of plugs but sometimes not because carbon was deep and unreachable to burn/brush it out. But I like your machine better! Thanks 👍
Taryl snd Doc Neon need to make a part II video. Showing how to actually build one. Include a schematic, layout, parts list, so we can all have one too😊😊😊😊
That is quite ingenious and gives me ideas for not wasting money before trying to fix a spark plug. The person who crafted that device should be applauded. Thanks, Taryl, Doc Neon, and the fan that sent it!
Cleaned a lot of plugs in the 60/70's with a sand blaster plug cleaner with good results. One neat thing about the neon tester is the visual conformation the plugs are usable. Specifically for those old flat head engines that run on the rich side. 👏
Champion, and Eastern Electric, I think, made/makes spark plug testers for aviation engines. They are common in aircraft repair stations. In aviation you don't change spark plugs every time you pull them out, you change them when they go bad, which isn't often, even with them running leaded fuels. You just clean the plug, test it with a similar device and put it back in. The testers used in aviation however, use compressed air to pressurize the chamber the spark is tested in, in order to simulate the conditions in an engine.
It's a spark plug tester AND it burns off the fouling and deposits! That's pretty cool, whoever built that device must've been the Terry A. Davis of small engines.
The oil burner transformer came to my mind too, but those aren't plentiful. The transformers from discarded microwave ovens are more readily available and would probably work to make one.
@@boblamparter3676The microwave transformers are more dangerous but less likely to work for fixing spark plugs. They put out about 2,000 volts instead of 7500 for the neon. They also don’t have a mechanism to limit the current so instead of a steady spark at .03 amps (like the neon transformer makes) they will output about 2A for a few 10’s of seconds before overheating and burning out. The voltage might not even jump the gap in a spark plug, and if it did it probably would damage the plug with the current. The electrocution risk is also much, much worse because it’s high current plus high voltage.
Very impressed with this! Perhaps you could even use it while the plug is still installed? You could clean spark plugs in hard to reach cylinders instead of replacing... I used to "clean" the plug with a propane torch, it burns everything off much the same. These days I just keep fresh plugs on hand...:) And I have like 10 of those Torch plugs, I won't use them, but for some reason I won't throw them away either!
Ok two things Taryl. First off, you're right the AC voltage from the transformer does have a cleaning effect. It's the same thing as when people TiG weld aluminum, it can't be done with DC. Has to be AC. And also the AC balance is important, one side of the AC sine wave provides the cleaning action, and one side the welding action. But in the old days with transformer machines it was all 50/50 postive and negative and still worked ok, but modern technology with inverter machines it's more efficient and makes better welds with an offset balance. AC current is needed to weld aluminum because of the natural aluminum oxide layer that quickly forms on aluminum when exposed to the oxygen in the air, even if you buff it off with a flap disc or sandpaper, it reforms in literally seconds. Argon shielding gas, AC current, and very clean work pieces and filler rods are needed to successfully weld aluminum. A magneto is only supply a brief pulse of DC current when the points open, and the magnetic field collapses. The second thing is; it's not just the voltage that's important. Notice on your neon sign transformer the current is limited by shunt pieces in the secondary winding to max of 30 milliamps. If the load is too high (resistance too low), the voltage drops to maintain that constant current of 30 milliamps. If the load resistance is too high, like too much of a sparkplug gap, then the voltage will go up to 7500 volts, but the current will fall until the point where the 7500 volts is not enough voltage to jump the gap and create an ionization path thru the air or whatever gas the current is trying to jump. This is why sometimes if you're right at the limit of a gap, you can "blow" out the arc with a puff of air, this blows away the plasma which is a lower resistance than non ionized air. This is why old school fluorescent light fixtures or metal halide/sodium vapor lamps use a high voltage to strike an arc, then a lower voltage constant current ballasted supply is used to maintain the arc and light the lamp. That little transformer you showed for a torpedo heater might not work for a spark plug cleaner because the output current might only be 10 milliamps or lower. Your Neon sign transformer is rated for 240 volt amps, which is a max of 32 milliamps at 7500 volts. If that little torpedo heater high voltage power supply only supplies like 10 mA at 13kV, then that's "only" 130 VA or 130 watts of power, which still might be enough, but won't have the horsepower that that old NST does. YMMV.
Welder's stick welded aluminum years ago before all the new technology. Did a bit myself if a pro wasn't around. It didn't fall apart.... One of the machines i worked on had aluminum buggies. Had to be loaded on the machine by hand so were much lighter. When they started making them out of steel, they changed the whole design where the buggies mounted on the front of the machine for travel, and it was all hydraulic to load them to the travel position. Bit of physical work involved but not much.
Electrical engineer here. That E3 plug can't arc to both sides of the terminal on each spark. Each spark will arc to one side only... the path of least resistance. Each spark blows away microscopic amounts of material off the terminal, and the "path of least resistance" can change over time, as you saw as you continued to spark it. This effect of blowing away material from the terminals is how spark plugs wear. And it's why plugs have a lifespan. Automotive plugs used to have a maintenance interval of 30K miles. Now they're 100K due to better materials. Since plugs DO wear, my policy is, if the plug is bad, replace it if I have one. Plugs are cheap enough. If I don't have a replacement, I'll try to clean it. As to why this thing will spark a plug when that plug won't work in an engine. Two things. One, in the engine, the plug is in a cloud of compressed air & fuel, making it harder to spark. Two, when a plug "goes bad", the engine stops running, and the plug doesn't get any more sparking. Also whatever caused the plug to go bad (rich mixture, etc) still exists until it gets repaired. I wonder how many times the creator of this tool shocked himself while building it? Good video. Cool tool. My guess was a starter tester.
Gearhead is right. Electricity is lazy. It will jump to the closest point of ground, first. When that point is no longer the closest, between two choices, it will begin jumping to the other terminal. So....perhaps the only benefit to multi-prong spark plugs, might be longevity...???? Certainly NOT a bigger spark. If you want a bigger spark, increase the gap (assuming you have a coil capable of producing enough energy to make that large jump (gap).
If you really need to "clean" a plug--- just throw it in a vice and burn the end with a propane torch for a minute or two and get it red hot.. That will burn off all the carbon all the way down to the bottom of the ceramic and you'll get a lot more life out of the plug before it fouls again. This machine gets it going again-- but it's not very far from fouling out again, because it's still covered in carbon. It's still neat machine though... and can get you going again in seconds. Very cool.
Regarding the E3 plug, some years back I checked a dual ground terminal spark plug. I had the plug removed from the head & grounded while i turned the engine over with the starter. The spark alternated from one ground electrode to another. My instructor told that the spark went to the cooler electrode. In the case of your E3 plug, after it runs long enough for the two electrode gaps to become equal it will also fire alternately between the two electrodes.
Mr Taryl Dactyl, I love your videos. You’ve taught me sooo much with your funny and entertaining yet highly educational channel. I’m forever grateful for you and your boys. 🫶🏻
Awesome idea! It should be noted (as you said) in the video that these transformers are MUCH higher current than ignition coils! I know of an oil burner tech who was nearly killed when the little old lay who owned the house of the furnace he was working on saw that the oil burner switch was off and decided to turn it on. He should have shut off the breaker (obviously). He sustained several substantial permanent injuries as a result. Even the sign transformer is capable of lighting up a 100 watt (or so) sign.
Excellent test! You are a good mechanic that does beyond just fixing stuff. I recall your fuel additive test between different formulations using the same engine model. Who does that? You.
I came across a device just like that when I was in my teens there was this abandoned Oldsmobile dealership way on the outskirts near Allentown. The dealership was being worked on at the time as that was how I got there to start demo work with a guy that hired me. The place was closed up since the mid 1950's the owner had passed away. There were even cars inside which the new owner covered em up. He was a car collector and we quickly became friends because I liked to race at the time. So that thing is ancient and the guy that made it is probably no longer with us. Outside of the one I got to play with there it was a green tube transformer made by Magnetic Windings Co. Easton Pa. The old timers knew their poop too I guess. The thing is rare never saw another one until now. The same family owns the place to this day they restore cars there now in their spare time.
current matters also. I once had a webster ignition transformer off a gun type oil burner for hot water house heater. it put our 10000 volts at .023 amps. it would burn crud off spark plugs as well as lots of stuff. it will not fix things like cracked porciline insulator. but will burn off fouling. good idea. I have used a propane torch to burn fouling off plugs.
over 60 years ago i worked in a garage where we had one of these things. we also had a plug cleaner which used baking soda for an abrasive. we seldom had to replace plugs. the omly pligs we replaced were ones with cracked ceramic insulators. mechanics do not test plugs anymore because the cost detracts from profit. these are also used to test igniters on diesel fueled steam boilers.
The person who built this came from a generation who literally saved the World. Literally designing, developing, testing and building fighter aircraft and bombers in 6-8 months not years or decades. New types of RADAR even faster. He probably didn't think much of it when he made the device, so never bothered to patient or license it. Shows just how special those men and women of that generation were.
It's an homemade spark plug tester and also carbon cleaner , intestesting and clever! Before testing I always clean the plug as best as possible with a heatgun with max heat amost touching the plug, and fine metal brush and others , to eliminate dirt and conductive carbon on both electrodes , specially the inside one....and many plugs are not really dead but simply half shorted by carbon as you show it in your video. But it's not the final solution, we must find and modify if possible the reason why the plug was so carboned and dirty (air filter, carb screws regulation, bad piston rings etc...) A good plug with always light brown colour can spark a lot of years if ceramic has no issue. A spark plug can be defective, but sometimes (often?) it's no plug issue but motor issue. My little engines (not very often used, like by many users) run perfectly since...30 years with the same plug .
Lovely spark plug tool! Just heats the carbon hot enough to oxidize away. The neon sign transformer has many more milliamps of current and a continuous AC current as opposed to the pulses of a spark coil. Comparing the secondary voltages on the transformers is not a good comparison as to how much it will burn the carbon away. The current (milliamps) going through the resistance of the carbon is what is burning the carbon away. The voltage just needs to be enough to establish the arc, then the amps through the resistance do the work. Thanks for doing these videos! I need to experiment with this concept myself. (Don't worry, won't be doing it at home and am qualified.)
I have done that with a more basic setup. Regarding the old vs new transformer, as long as there is enough voltage to spark, no more is needed. To make such a cleaner better, what you need more of (and what also makes it less safe) is current. The current causes heating that burns off the junk. You can also use a torch to heat the plug. It is the same basic idea, just a different approach. However, the transformer has the advantage that the appearance of the spark tells you when the plug is clean enough. As was pointed out in the video, the transformer cleans and tests.
Very cool homemade unit! Champion makes one for aviation spark plugs. It tests under pressure to determine if the plug will fire. Tester is very expensive, but so are aircraft spark plugs.
Air is an insulator. Pressurized air is even more insulative. There's just more molecules in the way. Which is why you can test a plug out of an engine and get a spark but the plug still won't fire in the engine.
@@1pcfredI’ve had that happen to me before, spark outside the engine but no spark when installed. You can argue this till the cows come with people on forum and no one will listen.
@@brandonstclair6530 what usually causes no spark in the cylinder usually isn't the plug itself though. The spark plug just sparks. The rest of the ignition system is what makes the spark. It's also what creates the strength of the spark too.
The thing that makes it work is that it provides constant power to the plug That’s what burns out the oil/carbon Most ignition systems just spark quickly. Also, although power supplies have come a LONG way, you have to remember that there would be an amperage rating on both of those transformers- which means to me that the red one may be better for fixing plugs. I understand this well enough to have been able to build a test rig for the Mercedes v12 ignition cassettes that are $1500/side And playing with spark duration, amount of time between ignition events (which would change based on the car’s engine speed) allowed me to identify the bad coils. Of course, the thing is FAR more complicated than ignition coils mounted to a board (heard of ionic current detection?) so there’s a lot more to my test system But man, somebody really grasped the concept here. I wonder if they only built it to test plugs, and got lucky and ended up with something that would repair them too?
That homemade tester is probably putting out way more voltage than a small engine. You should test the difference between the tester and a small engine Taryl. Love the Mysteries and Oddities videos!! Thank you!
I remember my electrical teacher showing us videos of switching centers and the high voltage arc. It's burning the carbon deposits off the plug. Very nice.
Taryl wouldn't miss your video's for love or money. Had a 2 stroke mini bike in the 70's that fouled plug after 7-8 hours. My Dad would sandblast the plug. Ran like a new plug was put in it.
I remember as a kid the local auto service garage had a sparkplug tester and cleaner that worked on the same principle but had an enclosed area the spark plug threaded into to seal and had a little window so you could view the spark as the plug was getting tested/cleaned and it would clean fouled plugs right up in about the same amount of time. I would guess that someone saw how well the manufactured ones worked and how simple it was and made their own but who knows. I even remember cleaning plugs as a kid with a wire brush or a wire wheel, filing and regapping to get more life out if them. Spark plugs can get to be very expensive, especially when you have to replace 6 or 8 of them at once.
An electric arc is very hot. About the hottest thing we know of. Maybe a high power laser can get hotter? I don't know. Electric arcs are damned hot though. So they'll burn just about anything. That gadget was just burning those carbon deposits right off the plugs.
That picture of you looking surprised is a classic that you should consider making it into posters for folks that need 😅 a good laugh ! You're funny, and I don't mean any harm.
Reminds me of the old proverb "Necessity is the mother of invention”…….someone was curious enough to build a mousetrap and while it doesn’t have a commercial value seeing plugs are a disposable product at $4 each, nonetheless an ingenious and simple contraption to solve a problem. Cheers.
It definitely had a value back in the 50s and 60s when people fixed things instead of throwing them away like we do today. Why? Because they had to. We wore jeans with patches, not as a fashion statement, but because we couldn't afford to run out and buy a new pair. Winter's long sleeve shirts became summer's short sleeve shirts. We, and I include myself, are spoiled.
Taryl, this was a really interesting video. It got me to thinking. My background is in law enforcement so I've gotna littlebexperience with stun guns. They have a test mode where you press the button on the side and press the button on the side and a spark jumps between the electrodes. It seems that with a little manufacturing and sodering you could rin wiring from the electrodes to the spark plug and make one that runs off a 9 volt transistor radio battery. Easy to make and no 120 volt power supply making it light and portable. Just a thought and maybe you might want to build one and make a video. Love you videos.
SPARK PLUG SAND BLASTER vs. that PLUG TESTER/FIXER!!!! I believe that super high voltage is just sizzling the dirt and debris until it's cleaned. You can visually see it getting cleaned and know when to stop....I think that is a PLUG CLEANER w/o using sand........ Nothing cleaner than a flame to clean a sparkplug......
Hey Taryl,, I used to use what is called a megger to test aircraft ignition sytems..very similar to what you have. For fun we hooked it up to a door knob to an office one day ...boy, those were the days. We also checked jet igniters with it. IM sure the grass rats will have a problem with the door knob gag !😮
This really demonstrates the mindset of folks, then VS now. People used to spend money (replace things) as a last resort. Currently, we live in a throw-away society.... and it has caused many unforseen side-effects. People have lost the ability to see value in many things, and instant gratification has become the norm.
Absolutely agree. Build quality was also much better in the 50s and 60s until planned obsolescence and "disposable" became the norm. Making it easier to repair equipment made in those days. My dad had a 1950s freezer that was still in use in the mid-80s. Now you would be lucky to get a Costco freezer to work for 3-4 years without some sort of problem.
1971 I was playing around with a neon transformer like this one but rated at 9000 volts and 30 mA. I had it sitting on a old kitchen table in my garage. The output wires were loosely attached to two nails on a board. Wires were 12 inches or more apart and my hands were kinda near each end but back enough to not get shocked, that is until for some reason both wires jumped off the nails and landed on both thumbs. This sent the voltage straight up my arms and centered in chest. The last darn place you want that to happen. What seemed like 5 minutes , was I am sure, only 1 or 2 seconds. During this time my eyes shut off. Wide open but only could see blackness. Freaking out of course, I managed to push outward with my legs and make myself disconnect from the wires. Had burn marks on each thumb but my sight returned and I just sat there a bit, getting my wits back about me. I had the power off once loose btw. I was very lucky to survive all that. My first instinct was to throw the transformer away but I have kept it all these years. I remember connecting my transformer to a plug once but not a dirty one really, just for heck of it. Never did it again but may try taking a dirty one that fails and see what mine does. Your other transformer that is about twice the voltage may not have the mA as high as the big one. It is not voltage that is doing the work, but amperage. You can generate up to 25,000 volts just from dragging your feet on the carpet and still not clean any plugs. 20mA can kill if appllied long enough. Labored breathing. 75 mA can take you out faster and 100 mA , you get fibrillation of the heart.
you know a lot of old timers knew their stuff. unfortunately we've lost a lot of their wisdom. I'm a retired CNC machinist but I can run manuals too. the old tool and die guys I worked with could make me look like forest gump ( run forest run ) . but even in the electrical field there were some guys working on the next level.
Neat box! Those plugs just needed cleaning! Back in 1997 worked in service station repair shop (gas station) we had a spark plug cleaner that sand blasted the plugs with compress air! 28:17 That sparking you can see on the left of the plug (top) is from the neck cord either moisture in it or human skin they conduct very well!
We had one-o-those at the gas station where I worked. It sat on a workbench under a long metal shelf. We pulled a prank on every poor bastard we could. Went like this... hook the lead to the metal shelf...One guy would lean on the bench.. The other guy working over yonder would ask the victim to grab that long metal funnel from the shelf.. When he grabbed the funnel The first guy would push the button and ZZZAAAPP em. What fun..
Spark plug cleaners were a thing back in the day. A friend had one from the 1970s which was a 6 inch long plastic tube fillled with very thin but hard steel rods, like long needles. You put a spoonful of gasoline in there, then screwed the plug in the end of the tube and shook it vigorously with your hand. The tiny needles cleaned the end of the plug and inside the plug on the cone, then your pour out the dirty gasoline and the plug has the carbon removed and works like a new one.
Maybe if you could make it with a lid that had safety interlocks it could be safe? But at a certain voltage and current you're dealing with a high hazard if there's any way for that current to go into a victim.
TARYL, ILL BUILD YOU A 80KV SETUP AND SEND THAT TO YOU AT MY EXPENSE BECAUSE I LIKE YOU AND YOUR STUFF IS COOL. IT WILL PROBABLY MELT THE ELECTRODES IF YOU YOU LAY INTO IT BUT IT WILL BE FUN. I USE THAT SETUP FOR JACOBS LADDERS BUT IT USES 2 IGNITION COILS AND A LAMP DIMMER TO CONTROL THE VOLTAGE OUTPUT. IT WILL SPARK 3 - 4" SO A PLG GAP WILL SIZZLE THEN MELT. IT WILL BE ADJUSTABLE OUTPUT BUT ABOUT 40KV ON THE LOW SETTING. I COULD MAKE A 20 - 40KV MODEL IF THAT WOULD SUIT YOU BETTER. SAY THE WORD AND YOU'LL GET MY HOME MADE VERSION TO COMPARE. IN A JACOBS LATTER SETUP YOU CAN PULL6" ARCS. FUN!
40 years ago I was looking into my oil heat in the house I rented. It was a spray system like you described the torpedo heater. I was young and stupid. I opened the door and looked inside with my cheap metal flashlight. I turned the heat on and nothing happened. So being curious I of course looked deeper. There was a heavy transformer with a hinge in front of me that I opened towards me. The transformer had two brass spring contacts. With it moved out of the way I could see the spray nozzle. I wanted to see if it was spraying oil and realized that it had a safety switch on the door so it could not start. So I did the right thing and pushed the switch in. Keep in mind that I was holding a metal flash light in my right hand trying to see if the oil sprayed. Well when I looked away to push the switch in I let the flash light come in contact with transformer. I was squatted all the way down to the floor. When I pushed the button my legs straitened out so fast it pushed me backwards into the wall behind me so hard my wife came running into the hall screaming at me to leave that F#$%ing thing alone. lol the good old days. Some say I haven't been right since I tested a 9 volt battery on my upper and lower braces as a kid. That went off like a flash cube behind my eyes and put me into the wall.
@@astroboy5137 this device would use very little electricity. The downside here is risk and liability. You can buy a lot of new plugs for what a human life is worth.
This device needs a video dedicated to us cheapskates who take fouled plugs and use carb/brake cleaner to spray them out, burst of air from the air compressor, and a folded sandpaper resurface job. Show the bad plug before and after the cleaning to see if it sparks clean compared to a fresh plug.
That thing is pretty cool and is a nice verification that a plug is the culprit. As far as fixing the plug, it is obvious that it brought them back to life, but I would like to see how long the fixed plugs last in use.
Nope. Spark plug testers were around long ago in the early days. So were spark plug cleaning machines. It's just we are reaching peak stupidity currently and people marvel at the most simple things as if they had just come out of a 70 year coma.
If you are only doing a plug once in a while, can't you clamp the fuel hose and just put the fouled plug in the torpedo heater? If I were testing plugs every day, I would set up a little more permanently, but the box Taryl has is a pretty good example.(It ain't the Space Shuttle...😊)
Makes perfect sense that someone made this plug cleaner/tester. The high voltage does the trick. Got to hand it to the person who thought of and made it !
likely built by some old tractor mechanic working on farmall tractors, i've seen similar things built but not quite to that level of professionalism and quality, most were sketchy things like nails driven into a 2x4 screwed to the base of the neon sign transformer with a wire wrapped around a nail for the plug to sit against, then either a plug wire or boot end on a piece of wire run from the other terminal of the transformer to "clip" onto the spark plug, that thing is quite well built and well thought out
In the 1990’s my friends dad made one of those from a bug zapper transformer. I remember him saying it would fix a spark plug by burning off all the crap on it. Smart dude he was
Cool idea, that home-brew tested. Just a reminder, voltage is not power. Power would be the voltage across the spark plug gap times the current flowing through the arc. Of the two, I suspect the neon sign x-former can dish out wore power to roast the goo on the end of those bad plugs.
When I was doing an automotive course at tech 31 years ago I used to take motorbike spark plugs to there which were from a motorbike which was a bit of an oil burner & it fouled plugs which led to a no start condition. I took them to tech & cleaned them in their spark plug cleaner which blew grit on the electrodes which cleaned all of the carbon off the electrodes then I would test them in their spark tester which tested them under vacuum. That was so that I would know that the spark plug was firing under vacuum conditions similar to that which is inside of the combustion chamber,it did a good job but it was a mechanical issue which caused the fouling issue so that couldn't fix that problem. I could probably make that tester as an electrician but I rarely have a spark plug failure due to fouling in a lawnmower, etc now !
![ILLSLICK - KILLSHOT REMIX [FULL VERSION]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/RIK8RrqIAzE/mqdefault.jpg)
Un freaking believable!
I saw one of those in the 70 it burns off the micro metallic dust that is in the cooked on oil in the plug
Only Taryl can make a video about a spark plug tester and make it this entertaining. Love all your videos.
Right off the bat if your buddy didn't know what and you didn't know what it was then how would he ask you to put that in your lawn mower mysteries
Wow, whoever made that machine is kind of a genius. Hats off to him.
We will never know , he probably forgot to lift his thump off the power button and tried to remove a plug ☝️🤦♂️🤷♂️😆
@@rawbsworld6604depends if it’s AC or DC current
@@rawbsworld6604 It's only a neon sign transformer at 30mA so it's very unlikely to kill you but it will hurt like heartbreak when ya get zapped by it.
Only "kind" of a genius?
The project on cleaning fouled spark plugs using a neon sign transformer was published in the December 1949 issue of Popular Science. I love your channel by the way! All these years replace and toss....when they could have just been restored!
Which page was it on? I found the 1949 december issue online, but after flipping through all pages I couldn't find it
the only thing about spark plugs i could find in all of 1949 was some mention of using them to reduce static in certain applications, but i think it was the advancement of spark plug tech and not a howto build thing.
same story for popular mechanics in 1949. save they have no mention of the spark plug static thing at all.
@@kenabi yeah, i would like to build one of these devices tho
Thought it was popular mechanics. The white encyclopedia sets.
Hats off to Doc Neon for bringing the machine back to life!!
Back in the 60’s, Champion sold a spark plug tester. It was similar to what you have, with one major difference. The machine was hooked up to the compressed air system of the garage so that the plug was tested under simulated compression. It takes more voltage to jump the air gap under compression. What I found in my small engine repair business, is that plugs that had a black coating on the porcelain that surrounds the central electrode were the ones more prone to failure. My theory is that the black coating on the porcelain is basically carbon, and carbon is a conductor. Therefore under compression the high voltage would take the path of least resistance, namely the carbon, and therefore fail to jump the gap to ground and of course fail to ignite the air fuel mixture. If I would take one of the failed plugs and clean it in my glass bead blaster, the plug would then work fine in the engine. The time taken to do this was not worth it, so I simply replaced fouled plugs. The old Champion spark plug tester also had a built in bead blaster. I used glass, not sand, and took great care to make sure none of the glass was lodged into the base of the plug. Thought you might like to hear of my experiences, ran my own shop for 39 years.
We had one in the Air Force shop FMS Ground Equipment back in 1968. I wanted that thing so bad. They were great.
I’ve used my baking soda blaster to clean fouled plugs, then a quick blast of air and Bob’s yer auntie! I have seen plugs that would spark just fine outside the engine, but would not start the motor. Usually Champions.
We had a Champion plug tester, as you have described, at a place that I worked at, in my younger years. We typically used it it charge up condensors (from points type automotive distributors), so that we could toss them to unsuspecting victims. great fun !!!
I used the champion cleaner in high school and wish I had one. These days I hold the plug with pliers, hear it up with a program torch until I see a couple licks of a flame and then I use a fine wire brush to clean the porcelain insulator. A squirt of carb cleaner and it's back to sparking.
Yeah those used to be in garages everywhere,still see them in auctions and sales every now and then.
Learned a trick from my dad (he would be 106 if still around, I'm 70) that he learned during WW2. Hold a fouled plug with pliers and place into the blue flame of a gas burner. Flame will turn yellow while it cooks off the carbon and oil fouling then revert to a normal blue flame once the fouling has cleared. Works like a dream, I have 20+ year old B&S 4 strokes and similar age 2 strokes that have done a power of work and are still on their factory plugs. Your gizmo does similar with the added benefit of visually testing for spark at the same time.
my favorite part about sundays. new taryl video!
Taryl and Mustie and Project Farm, wouldn't be Sunday without them!
Mysteries & Oddities always reminds me I miss Service Bulletin Classics.
That was AWESOME!
Give it to Skippy lol
2nd That .... AWSOME 😊
This man is good . Probably the most informative small engine mechanic on you tube . Jokes aside
🔥Back in my day we used a propane Benz-O-Matic plumbers torch to renew plugs. Clamp plug in vise, heat up tip and wire brush it to remove carbon. We saved a lot of plugs but sometimes not because carbon was deep and unreachable to burn/brush it out. But I like your machine better! Thanks 👍
I still do that. it saves me going for a drive in to town to buy a new plug
Damn! If that ain't cool as hell. He was a genius. Thanks Taryl for showing something that's really special.
Wasn't expecting that Taryl. That was fantastic.
Fricken AWESOME, Taryl !!!!!
Nothing better than LMMO on a sunny Sunday.
Taryl snd Doc Neon need to make a part II video. Showing how to actually build one. Include a schematic, layout, parts list, so we can all have one too😊😊😊😊
That is quite ingenious and gives me ideas for not wasting money before trying to fix a spark plug. The person who crafted that device should be applauded. Thanks, Taryl, Doc Neon, and the fan that sent it!
Cleaned a lot of plugs in the 60/70's with a sand blaster plug cleaner with good results.
One neat thing about the neon tester is the visual conformation the plugs are usable. Specifically for those old flat head engines that run on the rich side. 👏
Champion, and Eastern Electric, I think, made/makes spark plug testers for aviation engines. They are common in aircraft repair stations. In aviation you don't change spark plugs every time you pull them out, you change them when they go bad, which isn't often, even with them running leaded fuels. You just clean the plug, test it with a similar device and put it back in. The testers used in aviation however, use compressed air to pressurize the chamber the spark is tested in, in order to simulate the conditions in an engine.
It's a spark plug tester AND it burns off the fouling and deposits! That's pretty cool, whoever built that device must've been the Terry A. Davis of small engines.
That's really cool. Thanks Doc Neon for the help!!!
That old thing reminds me of an old furnace ignition system converted to a plug tester fixer. Now that’s some grass rat engineering right there. 👍
I thought about that too.
The oil burner transformer came to my mind too, but those aren't plentiful. The transformers from discarded microwave ovens are more readily available and would probably work to make one.
@@boblamparter3676The microwave transformers are more dangerous but less likely to work for fixing spark plugs.
They put out about 2,000 volts instead of 7500 for the neon.
They also don’t have a mechanism to limit the current so instead of a steady spark at .03 amps (like the neon transformer makes) they will output about 2A for a few 10’s of seconds before overheating and burning out.
The voltage might not even jump the gap in a spark plug, and if it did it probably would damage the plug with the current.
The electrocution risk is also much, much worse because it’s high current plus high voltage.
Very impressed with this! Perhaps you could even use it while the plug is still installed? You could clean spark plugs in hard to reach cylinders instead of replacing...
I used to "clean" the plug with a propane torch, it burns everything off much the same. These days I just keep fresh plugs on hand...:) And I have like 10 of those Torch plugs, I won't use them, but for some reason I won't throw them away either!
Ok two things Taryl. First off, you're right the AC voltage from the transformer does have a cleaning effect. It's the same thing as when people TiG weld aluminum, it can't be done with DC. Has to be AC. And also the AC balance is important, one side of the AC sine wave provides the cleaning action, and one side the welding action. But in the old days with transformer machines it was all 50/50 postive and negative and still worked ok, but modern technology with inverter machines it's more efficient and makes better welds with an offset balance. AC current is needed to weld aluminum because of the natural aluminum oxide layer that quickly forms on aluminum when exposed to the oxygen in the air, even if you buff it off with a flap disc or sandpaper, it reforms in literally seconds. Argon shielding gas, AC current, and very clean work pieces and filler rods are needed to successfully weld aluminum. A magneto is only supply a brief pulse of DC current when the points open, and the magnetic field collapses.
The second thing is; it's not just the voltage that's important. Notice on your neon sign transformer the current is limited by shunt pieces in the secondary winding to max of 30 milliamps. If the load is too high (resistance too low), the voltage drops to maintain that constant current of 30 milliamps. If the load resistance is too high, like too much of a sparkplug gap, then the voltage will go up to 7500 volts, but the current will fall until the point where the 7500 volts is not enough voltage to jump the gap and create an ionization path thru the air or whatever gas the current is trying to jump. This is why sometimes if you're right at the limit of a gap, you can "blow" out the arc with a puff of air, this blows away the plasma which is a lower resistance than non ionized air. This is why old school fluorescent light fixtures or metal halide/sodium vapor lamps use a high voltage to strike an arc, then a lower voltage constant current ballasted supply is used to maintain the arc and light the lamp. That little transformer you showed for a torpedo heater might not work for a spark plug cleaner because the output current might only be 10 milliamps or lower. Your Neon sign transformer is rated for 240 volt amps, which is a max of 32 milliamps at 7500 volts. If that little torpedo heater high voltage power supply only supplies like 10 mA at 13kV, then that's "only" 130 VA or 130 watts of power, which still might be enough, but won't have the horsepower that that old NST does. YMMV.
Welder's stick welded aluminum years ago before all the new technology. Did a bit myself if a pro wasn't around. It didn't fall apart.... One of the machines i worked on had aluminum buggies. Had to be loaded on the machine by hand so were much lighter. When they started making them out of steel, they changed the whole design where the buggies mounted on the front of the machine for travel, and it was all hydraulic to load them to the travel position. Bit of physical work involved but not much.
So many things weren’t commercially available, years ago. I love how the older generation built what they needed. Thanks for sharing!!
Electrical engineer here.
That E3 plug can't arc to both sides of the terminal on each spark. Each spark will arc to one side only... the path of least resistance. Each spark blows away microscopic amounts of material off the terminal, and the "path of least resistance" can change over time, as you saw as you continued to spark it. This effect of blowing away material from the terminals is how spark plugs wear. And it's why plugs have a lifespan. Automotive plugs used to have a maintenance interval of 30K miles. Now they're 100K due to better materials. Since plugs DO wear, my policy is, if the plug is bad, replace it if I have one. Plugs are cheap enough. If I don't have a replacement, I'll try to clean it.
As to why this thing will spark a plug when that plug won't work in an engine. Two things. One, in the engine, the plug is in a cloud of compressed air & fuel, making it harder to spark. Two, when a plug "goes bad", the engine stops running, and the plug doesn't get any more sparking. Also whatever caused the plug to go bad (rich mixture, etc) still exists until it gets repaired.
I wonder how many times the creator of this tool shocked himself while building it?
Good video. Cool tool. My guess was a starter tester.
Gearhead is right. Electricity is lazy. It will jump to the closest point of ground, first. When that point is no longer the closest, between two choices, it will begin jumping to the other terminal. So....perhaps the only benefit to multi-prong spark plugs, might be longevity...???? Certainly NOT a bigger spark. If you want a bigger spark, increase the gap (assuming you have a coil capable of producing enough energy to make that large jump (gap).
If you really need to "clean" a plug--- just throw it in a vice and burn the end with a propane torch for a minute or two and get it red hot.. That will burn off all the carbon all the way down to the bottom of the ceramic and you'll get a lot more life out of the plug before it fouls again. This machine gets it going again-- but it's not very far from fouling out again, because it's still covered in carbon. It's still neat machine though... and can get you going again in seconds. Very cool.
@calholli And overheat the plug causing the porcelain to crack and come off inside the running engine... nah I wouldn't do that.
Exactly. Good explanation, the extra electrodes are there just as backup if the first one doesn't fire.
Regarding the E3 plug, some years back I checked a dual ground terminal spark plug. I had the plug removed from the head & grounded while i turned the engine over with the starter. The spark alternated from one ground electrode to another. My instructor told that the spark went to the cooler electrode. In the case of your E3 plug, after it runs long enough for the two electrode gaps to become equal it will also fire alternately between the two electrodes.
Mr Taryl Dactyl, I love your videos. You’ve taught me sooo much with your funny and entertaining yet highly educational channel. I’m forever grateful for you and your boys. 🫶🏻
Awesome idea! It should be noted (as you said) in the video that these transformers are MUCH higher current than ignition coils! I know of an oil burner tech who was nearly killed when the little old lay who owned the house of the furnace he was working on saw that the oil burner switch was off and decided to turn it on. He should have shut off the breaker (obviously). He sustained several substantial permanent injuries as a result. Even the sign transformer is capable of lighting up a 100 watt (or so) sign.
Excellent test! You are a good mechanic that does beyond just fixing stuff. I recall your fuel additive test between different formulations using the same engine model. Who does that? You.
I came across a device just like that when I was in my teens there was this abandoned Oldsmobile dealership way on the outskirts near Allentown. The dealership was being worked on at the time as that was how I got there to start demo work with a guy that hired me. The place was closed up since the mid 1950's the owner had passed away. There were even cars inside which the new owner covered em up. He was a car collector and we quickly became friends because I liked to race at the time. So that thing is ancient and the guy that made it is probably no longer with us. Outside of the one I got to play with there it was a green tube transformer made by Magnetic Windings Co. Easton Pa. The old timers knew their poop too I guess. The thing is rare never saw another one until now. The same family owns the place to this day they restore cars there now in their spare time.
current matters also. I once had a webster ignition transformer off a gun type oil burner for hot water house heater. it put our 10000 volts at .023 amps. it would burn crud off spark plugs as well as lots of stuff. it will not fix things like cracked porciline insulator. but will burn off fouling. good idea. I have used a propane torch to burn fouling off plugs.
over 60 years ago i worked in a garage where we had one of these things. we also had a plug cleaner which used baking soda for an abrasive. we seldom had to replace plugs. the omly pligs we replaced were ones with cracked ceramic insulators. mechanics do not test plugs anymore because the cost detracts from profit. these are also used to test igniters on diesel fueled steam boilers.
The person who built this came from a generation who literally saved the World. Literally designing, developing, testing and building fighter aircraft and bombers in 6-8 months not years or decades. New types of RADAR even faster. He probably didn't think much of it when he made the device, so never bothered to patient or license it. Shows just how special those men and women of that generation were.
It's an homemade spark plug tester and also carbon cleaner , intestesting and clever! Before testing I always clean the plug as best as possible with a heatgun with max heat amost touching the plug, and fine metal brush and others , to eliminate dirt and conductive carbon on both electrodes , specially the inside one....and many plugs are not really dead but simply half shorted by carbon as you show it in your video.
But it's not the final solution, we must find and modify if possible the reason why the plug was so carboned and dirty (air filter, carb screws regulation, bad piston rings etc...) A good plug with always light brown colour can spark a lot of years if ceramic has no issue. A spark plug can be defective, but sometimes (often?) it's no plug issue but motor issue. My little engines (not very often used, like by many users) run perfectly since...30 years with the same plug .
That’s truly awesome
Very well done guys. Appreciate you and all the grass-rats folks
Such a cool little invention for the time, great video taryl
Sunday breakfast at Tiffany’s can’t hold a candle to Sunday breakfast with Taryl. Interesting and entertaining. Thanks Taryl. 👍
Anytime 😊
i want to play with it. the spark tester. great find. thanx for sharing.
Thank you for sharing.👍
Lovely spark plug tool! Just heats the carbon hot enough to oxidize away. The neon sign transformer has many more milliamps of current and a continuous AC current as opposed to the pulses of a spark coil.
Comparing the secondary voltages on the transformers is not a good comparison as to how much it will burn the carbon away. The current (milliamps) going through the resistance of the carbon is what is burning the carbon away. The voltage just needs to be enough to establish the arc, then the amps through the resistance do the work.
Thanks for doing these videos! I need to experiment with this concept myself. (Don't worry, won't be doing it at home and am qualified.)
Thanks Taryl, and Mr. Cameraman, that was loads of fun!
What a great experiment! I love it!
I have done that with a more basic setup. Regarding the old vs new transformer, as long as there is enough voltage to spark, no more is needed. To make such a cleaner better, what you need more of (and what also makes it less safe) is current. The current causes heating that burns off the junk. You can also use a torch to heat the plug. It is the same basic idea, just a different approach. However, the transformer has the advantage that the appearance of the spark tells you when the plug is clean enough. As was pointed out in the video, the transformer cleans and tests.
Very cool homemade unit! Champion makes one for aviation spark plugs. It tests under pressure to determine if the plug will fire. Tester is very expensive, but so are aircraft spark plugs.
Air is an insulator. Pressurized air is even more insulative. There's just more molecules in the way. Which is why you can test a plug out of an engine and get a spark but the plug still won't fire in the engine.
@@1pcfred yep!
@@1pcfredI’ve had that happen to me before, spark outside the engine but no spark when installed. You can argue this till the cows come with people on forum and no one will listen.
@@1pcfred Yep. and that is the truth.
@@brandonstclair6530 what usually causes no spark in the cylinder usually isn't the plug itself though. The spark plug just sparks. The rest of the ignition system is what makes the spark. It's also what creates the strength of the spark too.
The thing that makes it work is that it provides constant power to the plug
That’s what burns out the oil/carbon
Most ignition systems just spark quickly.
Also, although power supplies have come a LONG way, you have to remember that there would be an amperage rating on both of those transformers- which means to me that the red one may be better for fixing plugs.
I understand this well enough to have been able to build a test rig for the Mercedes v12 ignition cassettes that are $1500/side
And playing with spark duration, amount of time between ignition events (which would change based on the car’s engine speed) allowed me to identify the bad coils.
Of course, the thing is FAR more complicated than ignition coils mounted to a board (heard of ionic current detection?) so there’s a lot more to my test system
But man, somebody really grasped the concept here.
I wonder if they only built it to test plugs, and got lucky and ended up with something that would repair them too?
That homemade tester is probably putting out way more voltage than a small engine. You should test the difference between the tester and a small engine Taryl. Love the Mysteries and Oddities videos!! Thank you!
Amazing
Just found this channel, and this is an easy sub. Deserves way more views.
I remember my electrical teacher showing us videos of switching centers and the high voltage arc. It's burning the carbon deposits off the plug. Very nice.
It fam also down by Heating the Plug with Benzoylmatic and Burning off Carbon
Very cool tool,might have to collect parts to make my own.
Bizzare, tester to repair plug. Quick easy way to get rid of the carbon build-up. Great find.
Taryl wouldn't miss your video's for love or money. Had a 2 stroke mini bike in the 70's that fouled plug after 7-8 hours. My Dad would sandblast the plug. Ran like a new plug was put in it.
Glad you got it fixed up by doc neon
Hats off to Doc Neon!!!
@@jimhoward1655 he is definitely The best neon Guy to fix up neon signs 👍😁😎
This is great! How about a longevity test to see how long these resurrected plugs last?
That's awesome
I remember as a kid the local auto service garage had a sparkplug tester and cleaner that worked on the same principle but had an enclosed area the spark plug threaded into to seal and had a little window so you could view the spark as the plug was getting tested/cleaned and it would clean fouled plugs right up in about the same amount of time. I would guess that someone saw how well the manufactured ones worked and how simple it was and made their own but who knows. I even remember cleaning plugs as a kid with a wire brush or a wire wheel, filing and regapping to get more life out if them. Spark plugs can get to be very expensive, especially when you have to replace 6 or 8 of them at once.
I need one of those for the pile of fouled two stroke plugs in the garage
An electric arc is very hot. About the hottest thing we know of. Maybe a high power laser can get hotter? I don't know. Electric arcs are damned hot though. So they'll burn just about anything. That gadget was just burning those carbon deposits right off the plugs.
That picture of you looking surprised is a classic that you should consider making it into posters for folks that need 😅 a good laugh !
You're funny, and I don't mean any harm.
Reminds me of the old proverb "Necessity is the mother of invention”…….someone was curious enough to build a mousetrap and while it doesn’t have a commercial value seeing plugs are a disposable product at $4 each, nonetheless an ingenious and simple contraption to solve a problem. Cheers.
It definitely had a value back in the 50s and 60s when people fixed things instead of throwing them away like we do today. Why? Because they had to. We wore jeans with patches, not as a fashion statement, but because we couldn't afford to run out and buy a new pair. Winter's long sleeve shirts became summer's short sleeve shirts. We, and I include myself, are spoiled.
Taryl, this was a really interesting video. It got me to thinking. My background is in law enforcement so I've gotna littlebexperience with stun guns. They have a test mode where you press the button on the side and press the button on the side and a spark jumps between the electrodes.
It seems that with a little manufacturing and sodering you could rin wiring from the electrodes to the spark plug and make one that runs off a 9 volt transistor radio battery.
Easy to make and no 120 volt power supply making it light and portable. Just a thought and maybe you might want to build one and make a video.
Love you videos.
SPARK PLUG SAND BLASTER vs. that PLUG TESTER/FIXER!!!! I believe that super high voltage is just sizzling the dirt and debris until it's cleaned. You can visually see it getting cleaned and know when to stop....I think that is a PLUG CLEANER w/o using sand........ Nothing cleaner than a flame to clean a sparkplug......
Hey Taryl,, I used to use what is called a megger to test aircraft ignition sytems..very similar to what you have. For fun we hooked it up to a door knob to an office one day ...boy, those were the days. We also checked jet igniters with it. IM sure the grass rats will have a problem with the door knob gag !😮
This really demonstrates the mindset of folks, then VS now. People used to spend money (replace things) as a last resort. Currently, we live in a throw-away society.... and it has caused many unforseen side-effects. People have lost the ability to see value in many things, and instant gratification has become the norm.
Instant gratification started in the 70's, especially in the schools.
Yep this is a BIG problem.
Absolutely agree. Build quality was also much better in the 50s and 60s until planned obsolescence and "disposable" became the norm. Making it easier to repair equipment made in those days. My dad had a 1950s freezer that was still in use in the mid-80s. Now you would be lucky to get a Costco freezer to work for 3-4 years without some sort of problem.
And we are in this throwaway world because of greed ,profit.
@@earlwright9715You got it
1971 I was playing around with a neon transformer like this one but rated at 9000 volts and 30 mA. I had it sitting on a old kitchen table in my garage. The output wires were loosely attached to two nails on a board. Wires were 12 inches or more apart and my hands were kinda near each end but back enough to not get shocked, that is until for some reason both wires jumped off the nails and landed on both thumbs. This sent the voltage straight up my arms and centered in chest. The last darn place you want that to happen. What seemed like 5 minutes , was I am sure, only 1 or 2 seconds. During this time my eyes shut off. Wide open but only could see blackness. Freaking out of course, I managed to push outward with my legs and make myself disconnect from the wires. Had burn marks on each thumb but my sight returned and I just sat there a bit, getting my wits back about me. I had the power off once loose btw. I was very lucky to survive all that. My first instinct was to throw the transformer away but I have kept it all these years. I remember connecting my transformer to a plug once but not a dirty one really, just for heck of it. Never did it again but may try taking a dirty one that fails and see what mine does. Your other transformer that is about twice the voltage may not have the mA as high as the big one. It is not voltage that is doing the work, but amperage. You can generate up to 25,000 volts just from dragging your feet on the carpet and still not clean any plugs. 20mA can kill if appllied long enough. Labored breathing. 75 mA can take you out faster and 100 mA , you get fibrillation of the heart.
you know a lot of old timers knew their stuff. unfortunately we've lost a lot of their wisdom. I'm a retired CNC machinist but I can run manuals too. the old tool and die guys I worked with could make me look like forest gump ( run forest run ) . but even in the electrical field there were some guys working on the next level.
Hey retired machinist here too.
We love this stuff even if it wasn't our specific trade.
Another great video, I would love to see these two genius (Taryl and whoever made this device) make a video together.
Maybe Doc Neon could make a more modern version from the newer transformer......do a head to head test which works "better".
Neat box! Those plugs just needed cleaning! Back in 1997 worked in service station repair shop (gas station) we had a spark plug cleaner that sand blasted the plugs with compress air! 28:17 That sparking you can see on the left of the plug (top) is from the neck cord either moisture in it or human skin they conduct very well!
When I worked in a garage back in the 60's in the UK we had a Champion spark plug tester which could also sand blast the spark plug to clean it
We had one-o-those at the gas station where I worked.
It sat on a workbench under a long metal shelf.
We pulled a prank on every poor bastard we could.
Went like this... hook the lead to the metal shelf...One guy would lean on the bench..
The other guy working over yonder would ask the victim to grab that long metal funnel from the shelf..
When he grabbed the funnel The first guy would push the button and ZZZAAAPP em.
What fun..
Out here in the boonies of Arkansas back in the 50s and 60s, out little gas station/garage had one too. Neat machine.
Spark plug cleaners were a thing back in the day.
A friend had one from the 1970s which was a 6 inch long plastic tube fillled with very thin but hard steel rods, like long needles.
You put a spoonful of gasoline in there, then screwed the plug in the end of the tube and shook it vigorously with your hand. The tiny needles cleaned the end of the plug and inside the plug on the cone, then your pour out the dirty gasoline and the plug has the carbon removed and works like a new one.
Man. Imagine the money Skippy would save if he had that. 😂 ⚡️⚡️⚡️ Taryl would have to close due to lack of spark plug sales 😂
Now that’s funny
Thats awesome, great video
Tarly…. These mysteries and oddities are very scary 😢
Only taryl can make it enjoyable
And that’s my dinner
Need to label it to indicate use, then a Taryl Fixes All sticker.
Maybe a future episode, you and Doc Neon could build a more modern, safer version.
Maybe if you could make it with a lid that had safety interlocks it could be safe? But at a certain voltage and current you're dealing with a high hazard if there's any way for that current to go into a victim.
Really like it if I could I would build one
TARYL, ILL BUILD YOU A 80KV SETUP AND SEND THAT TO YOU AT MY EXPENSE BECAUSE I LIKE YOU AND YOUR STUFF IS COOL. IT WILL PROBABLY MELT THE ELECTRODES IF YOU YOU LAY INTO IT BUT IT WILL BE FUN. I USE THAT SETUP FOR JACOBS LADDERS BUT IT USES 2 IGNITION COILS AND A LAMP DIMMER TO CONTROL THE VOLTAGE OUTPUT. IT WILL SPARK 3 - 4" SO A PLG GAP WILL SIZZLE THEN MELT. IT WILL BE ADJUSTABLE OUTPUT BUT ABOUT 40KV ON THE LOW SETTING. I COULD MAKE A 20 - 40KV MODEL IF THAT WOULD SUIT YOU BETTER. SAY THE WORD AND YOU'LL GET MY HOME MADE VERSION TO COMPARE. IN A JACOBS LATTER SETUP YOU CAN PULL6" ARCS. FUN!
40 years ago I was looking into my oil heat in the house I rented. It was a spray system like you described the torpedo heater.
I was young and stupid. I opened the door and looked inside with my cheap metal flashlight. I turned the heat on and nothing happened. So being curious I of course looked deeper. There was a heavy transformer with a hinge in front of me that I opened towards me. The transformer had two brass spring contacts. With it moved out of the way I could see the spray nozzle. I wanted to see if it was spraying oil and realized that it had a safety switch on the door so it could not start. So I did the right thing and pushed the switch in. Keep in mind that I was holding a metal flash light in my right hand trying to see if the oil sprayed. Well when I looked away to push the switch in I let the flash light come in contact with transformer. I was squatted all the way down to the floor. When I pushed the button my legs straitened out so fast it pushed me backwards into the wall behind me so hard my wife came running into the hall screaming at me to leave that F#$%ing thing alone. lol the good old days. Some say I haven't been right since I tested a 9 volt battery on my upper and lower braces as a kid. That went off like a flash cube behind my eyes and put me into the wall.
Good morning grass rats! 🎉
Awesome demonstration!
I think I need one, maybe u should make some?
How many people need a spark plug checker? I trash the old one & replace it with a new one. The electric it uses costs more than a new plug.
@@astroboy5137 this device would use very little electricity. The downside here is risk and liability. You can buy a lot of new plugs for what a human life is worth.
I love that foot starter. 😂😂
This device needs a video dedicated to us cheapskates who take fouled plugs and use carb/brake cleaner to spray them out, burst of air from the air compressor, and a folded sandpaper resurface job. Show the bad plug before and after the cleaning to see if it sparks clean compared to a fresh plug.
The man who invented it hung himself shortly after publishing the results
I just did that yesterday 😂
Use a plug cleaner.
you can put fouled sparkplugs in a vice and heat with the torch to clean them burns the carbon off best method
You can also clean a plug with a propane torch.
That thing is pretty cool and is a nice verification that a plug is the culprit. As far as fixing the plug, it is obvious that it brought them back to life, but I would like to see how long the fixed plugs last in use.
Spark plug burner offer machine.
Thanks for the video guys. That’s a good one 👍
Any time i come across equipment with a Torch spark plug, i immediately replace it
I have only seen them on Chinese stuff.
Ebay tune up kits😂
Same with me. I work repairing lawnmowers in Northumberland England
Pretty cool Taryl thank you for the entertaining content.
Guy that built that probably got a visit from the spark plug makers……you know the story.
Exactly 🎯
No doubt Champion or AC probably bought the patent from this guy
Big spark plug got him, never to be seen again.
Nope. Spark plug testers were around long ago in the early days.
So were spark plug cleaning machines.
It's just we are reaching peak stupidity currently and people marvel at the most simple things as if they had just come out of a 70 year coma.
@@jayytee8062 True. My grandfather had an old vixen in his shop. Never knew what happened to it after he passed.
You guys are the best!!!
I'm with many of the guys on here. Join forces with Doc Neon and make one from a torpedo heater transformer. That way we can make our own safely.
I agree I would like to make one from a torpedo heater transformer to "fix" 2 cycle fouled plugs.
If you are only doing a plug once in a while, can't you clamp the fuel hose and just put the fouled plug in the torpedo heater?
If I were testing plugs every day, I would set up a little more permanently, but the box Taryl has is a pretty good example.(It ain't the Space Shuttle...😊)
Use a microwave transformer. Those things are a dime a dozen.
Makes perfect sense that someone made this plug cleaner/tester.
The high voltage does the trick.
Got to hand it to the person who thought of and made it !
likely built by some old tractor mechanic working on farmall tractors, i've seen similar things built but not quite to that level of professionalism and quality, most were sketchy things like nails driven into a 2x4 screwed to the base of the neon sign transformer with a wire wrapped around a nail for the plug to sit against, then either a plug wire or boot end on a piece of wire run from the other terminal of the transformer to "clip" onto the spark plug, that thing is quite well built and well thought out
Maybe it was a High School Shop Project.
In the 1990’s my friends dad made one of those from a bug zapper transformer. I remember him saying it would fix a spark plug by burning off all the crap on it. Smart dude he was
That is amazing I would love to have one of these.
Great find! Thanks guys!
What a great video brother
Cool idea, that home-brew tested. Just a reminder, voltage is not power. Power would be the voltage across the spark plug gap times the current flowing through the arc. Of the two, I suspect the neon sign x-former can dish out wore power to roast the goo on the end of those bad plugs.
When I was doing an automotive course at tech 31 years ago I used to take motorbike spark plugs to there which were from a motorbike which was a bit of an oil burner & it fouled plugs which led to a no start condition.
I took them to tech & cleaned them in their spark plug cleaner which blew grit on the electrodes which cleaned all of the carbon off the electrodes then I would test them in their spark tester which tested them under vacuum.
That was so that I would know that the spark plug was firing under vacuum conditions similar to that which is inside of the combustion chamber,it did a good job but it was a mechanical issue which caused the fouling issue so that couldn't fix that problem.
I could probably make that tester as an electrician but I rarely have a spark plug failure due to fouling in a lawnmower, etc now !
Didn't you infer pressure rather than a vacuum?