Hi all,

I'm Tom, new forum member from NSW, Australia - I'll get round to intro's and pics of the 1968 VE I'm currently restoring shortly but just hoping to get this question up and answered so I can wade right in come Saturday morning...

I've read a few threads here mentioning removing the crush rings from spark plugs installed in 225's between certain periods(1963-1974 If I remember right). I have a set of BPR5EIX's (just the Iridium equivalent of the BPR5ES) to throw in, and I was wondering if there was any differences in the Australian 225 meaning I shouldn't remove the crush rings? (Or any other standout differences worth noting, if there's any?)

I'd tend to think the Aussie 225 would be the same so off come the rings but I was just hoping to make sure...?

Thanks for your time, sorry for plowing in out of the blue and kicking off with questions

Aussie Slants will be the same as US, so remove the rings. FWIW, I ran my 225s with the rings on the plugs for many years before learning about removing the rings. I never noticed any difference in running. The main thing you gain from removing the rings, IMHO, is that you do not mess up your aluminum spark plug tubes as fast by squeezing the metal with the sealing ring.

Lou

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Home of Slant6-powered fun machines since 1988

Welcome to the forum, that's what it is for, keep'em coming!

Olaf

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Aspenized

Thanks for letting me know, Lou and Olaf.

I'll be throwing the plugs in today (and getting the rings off first) and I'll grab some pics of the creature when I do - the main reason I'm switching to the 5EIX is as a step towards tuning it all up not to be so sooty.

Since I put a set of pacemaker headers on, the plugs have been fouling up - likely because there's no hot box between the intake and exhaust manifolds any more. I'm willing to live with it, for now...but I'm doing my best towards getting it as clean as possible. Still got the old exhaust manifold should it come to putting it back on.

I've rebuilt the carby (carter 2 barrel) and tuned it using one of those gunson gas colortuners (which are pretty useful) and it's about as good as it gets, I think.

Would a hotter set of plugs be a bad move? I've seen people discussing hotter plugs in the front/back cylinders alone, but this is even fouling all the way along.

If this is worth shifting to another discussion because of the topic change just let me know and I'll tack it onto one of the relevant threads

Thanks for the help guys

I doubt that plugs will help you if you are getting sooty exhaust and fouled or black plugs. You likely either have a carb problem or an ignition strength problem, or maybe internal damage like skipped/wrong cam timing or low compression (bad rings or valves).

Slant on,

Lou

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Home of Slant6-powered fun machines since 1988

Hi all,

After a few weeks of driving I figured it'd be best to check in and mention how it all turned out - so far so good as far as standard driving goes. I did notice a somewhat smoother idle but that's likely just cleaner plugs since they're all new. Plug tubes thankfully seemed undamaged from the previous plugs with rings.

Lou, thanks for letting me know that - I've put a newer GT-40 coil on for a meaner ignition and a brand new set of leads along with replacing all the distributor bits, and the Carby's a rebuilt Carter 2 barrel, but I will do a compression test and see how it's all looking and dive in to do rings (did valves when the head came off)...

Thank you all for your advice and patience, I'll check back in again when I nail it in case anyone runs into anything similar.

-Tom