I have a 460 in a 1994 motor home one ton chassie and I wanting to install new plug wires. the motor home is not driven as much as a car or truck and auto zone has a set of wires with a life time warrenty and Im wondering how well they will perform for me and how long will they last. Any body have any experience with these plug wires ,,they cost 22.00 . Im not sure the brand ..tks Terry

 

I've used Auto Zone & Advance plug wire sets & only problem with them, if your exhaust gaskets leak or heat sheilds not in place, it will burn the plug boot & cause a skip.
M/H engines produce more heat in the exhaust area than say a car or pickup truck & its easy to burn up the plug end of the wires.
Mr Gasket sells a nice nomex sleeve you can buy to put over the plug end & will make them last a lot longer.
Neil

 

Neil thanks for the comeback My engine has the heat shields in place and the previous wires on the engine now show no signs of burn or deteriation ..Im not sure if I need new wires but the ones on there now have 49000miles so since I have a little skip in the engine and I have replaced the plugs and cleaned the IAC vlv I figure I wld go ahead ane repalce the wires ,,I know it cant hurt and maby it will help the little pesky skip in the engine.Can yo8u suggest any othe areas I might try to clear up the skip if new wires dont work....Thanks for the tip on Mr gasket... terry

 

Yours being a 94 year, that means EFI engine & hopefully the skips not a valve seat. Those 460s build a lot of heat in the cylinder & heads & it realy works on the seats & valves.

Mine is an 88 year, but has an 87 year engine which is carbed. Carbed 460s dont or didnt fair as well as the EFI like you have.
Realy been a learning curve for me cause the 460 was new to me, been youst to Chevys for many years.

When you check yours, wouldnt hurt to go over the vacuum lines & see if any broken hoses. Unless your real good on vacuum hose checking, probably be best to check one hose line at a time.
If you find some cracked open, that are the little small colored lines & just wanting a quick fix, you could go to a small engine repair shop & get some string trimmer or chain saw fuel line about the same size inside as the vacuum line is on the outside, then just snip the vacuum line & slip it over to patch the line.
The good quality fuel hose you need to get is a Tygon brand type of hose & will last longer than the clear cheap hose like you find at building supply houses. The Tygon hose not real high priced either.

Have you ever done the test of pulling a plug wire loose from a plug to see if the engine changes sound.
You can find which cylinder it is skipping by doing that, but be carfull cause its easy to get a jolt from the ignition if you dont have the tool to pull the wire off with.
Wouldnt hurt to go ahead before the engine is hot to wiggle,, & pre pull each wire off the plug, because after they are hot, its easy to pull the inside metal piece off the wire & it stay on the plug when doing this test.
Neil

 

I will try the pull wire diag. but I can get to the distrubrutor much easier than the plug wires. The plug wires are a bitch to pull off the plug end they didnt leave enough room to get your hand in there to get a good grip I just changed the plugs and the hardest thing to do was to pull the pl;ug wires off abt 3 of the plugs. I will do a vacum test to see if I have any leaking vac lines and spray a little propane gass around the head to see if I have one there I cant find The engine only has 49000 miles so I hope it isnt a valve seat. tks nd I will keep you posted on the outcome here. terry PS the skip I have is very erattic and not constant and it reves up fine with a little skip at high rev ,its usually a double skip and then fine for a short while and then it will double skip agn

 

i use napa's premium beldin wires. the will snap on the plugs tight and stay on. ihave had nothing but probs with those cheap wires. all it takes is a little bit of heat and they don;t want to n stay on anymore.

 

I used to run life-time warranty'd Autolite plug wires on a 351W. They lost their a$$ on that deal! Once the missing started, I would do a night time inspection to see where the problem was. All you need to do is run the engine in complete darkness and look at the wires. Just look closely along the routing, particularly at areas where the wires touch each other or any metal. If you're lucky, you will see a faint purple arc that cooresponds to the missfire.

You will have to give your eyes time to adjust to the darkness and of course, safety first! Know what you are doing and avoid any moving parts... This is a look-see thing not a touchy-feely thing. Hands off!

 

What he said, but you can also take the water bottle your g.f. uses on the ironing board (and I use to spray the cats) and "mist" the entire ignition wire system, including the distributor itself. This will invite the underhood lightening gremlins to show their faces more readily. If the engine is warm when you do it, it will dry itself off fairly quickly.

 

Best I can remember, what I have on mine right now are the Motorcraft ones from the advance store, cost I think 44.00 & some change. So far so good, but with the help of those Mr Gasket nomex covers.
When you got a motorhome with a 460 running down the road toting about 24,000, red exhaust manifolds come real quick & them plug boots need all the help they can get.
Neil

 

Neil, Don't discount those Motocraft OEM plug wires too much. My 95 F53 has 85k on the OEM wires. 45k with manifolds & 40k with with Banks headers. But then I just might not drive as hard as you. I cruse between 62 & 65. GPS did recorded a top speed of 82 when I was hurrying past a P32/454 MH. Shhhhhhh, I didn't say that............

Richard
RLS7201

 

Speed not what I got to keep in mind, its climbing them mountians pulling the weight.
Its kinda like a Jeff Foxworthy deal, you might be a redneck ,,, except with me,,, you might have cherry red exhaust manifolds if when climbing hills & a Provost while passing you has a red glow on its shinnie side as it goes by.

Years ago driving trucks, I remember drivers talking about truck engines with the pumps turned up so much, they had to run a EGT probe in the pipe right after the turbo to read the temp & keep from melting the engine down.
Soon as I find a gauge & probe that I can afford its gitting hooked up.
In the meanwhile, I'm working on a Hydrogen kit & water or washer fluid injection to cool it off.
Neil