OEM Spark plug gap ... I thought they are pre-gapped and any attempt to move them will break the gnd leg.

Thoughts? Opinions? Experience?

Salim

 

Thats what I always hear about them.

 

Take a closer look at the gaps when you get new plugs and measure them. My uncle would always check the gaps of new plugs and he'd always find at least 1 or 2 for every set that weren't gapped right. My college roomate Mike had his plugs done for his Z06 Vette last year and 2 of the 8 were not gapped properly.

 

Will driving with a dead cylinder due to a bad co il do any further damage? or am I simply driving a 5 cylinder.

 

Yes, because you would be dumping in raw fuel into the system. I could understand that if it happens in the middle of nowhere you may not have much choice, but generally you don't want to be driving on it any bit longer than you have to.

 

360K on my 01 with the original coils. Yes, i'm very lucky!

The ECM will not allow the injector to open for a particular cylinder if it is not detecting a spark. Just FYI.

 

True, when it's dead.

The situation I had about 7 years ago, where it was sputtering, coil was still functioning, just not perfectly, and wasn't getting a complete combustion.

 

Wow. That is pretty rare. Usually when they go out, they are dead dead dead!

 

Most do die. In my case, I had sprayed too much cleaner into the intake manifold and paid for it a few hours later with the coil issue. We actually tested it by hooking it up (at arms length) and watched it spark...not spark....spark, but then tried it a bit later and it had died, but we never started the vehicle up until we got another coil (actually had to use a modified Camry coil in Mexico until we could get the one for the RX300 from the U.S. since no Lexus south of the border).

When I came back to the U.S., I did have a P03XX codes come up with a flashing CEL (obvious coil issue), and hesitation and then it would go away (both the hesitation and the light).

 

208k & i just replace 1 & 3 today