SP542 Thread

[Toadster]

same question

What problem are you trying to solve?


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[cao0215]

What problem are you trying to solve?


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is changing to the SP542 without a tune be better? or it is only for tuned

 

[vince7870]

I’m assuming you have a 17?. Has anyone done this on an 18?. Straight from dealership my truck felt like there was a weird misfiring/stumbling on heavy acceleration. I was waiting for a code thinking something was wrong, but never got one. Last week I hoped in truck and there was a cel light on. Had the code read at local shop....came back as a random misfire. It cleared itself up a day later. I’m definitely interested in doing this. I can’t say I’ve ever changed a spark plug in my life, can’t be too hard but since I’ve never done it before I’d either have a buddy come help me or have my local garage do it for me! It may be a silly question but how many of these plugs do I have to order! Thanks

I think it’s time the SP542



gets a titled thread. There are posts about these little gems all over the forum in various threads from SPD to Whipple.

So post your setup, your experiences changing to the SP542 and your plug gap. Post why you changed and if it made the improvements you hoped.

For my own experience....

I had no issues with the factory plugs at 15k miles. MPT93 PRX, CAI, whipple intercooler, SPD adapters, FOMOCO catback.

I didn’t expect much. My hats off to you all for inspiring me. There is sharper throttle response. The low end, nonboosted power is smoother, and the idle is even smoother than it was before. It made the truck a little easier to drive and it’ll be easier to off-road with the improved low-end throttle control.

So the million dollar question....

Why?

GRANTED I left the gap on the plugs at .030.
I didn’t think .025 was necessary.

 

[smurfslayer]

I’m assuming you have a 17?. Has anyone done this on an 18?. Straight from dealership my truck felt like there was a weird misfiring/stumbling on heavy acceleration. I was waiting for a code thinking something was wrong, but never got one. Last week I hoped in truck and there was a cel light on. Had the code read at local shop....came back as a random misfire. It cleared itself up a day later. I’m definitely interested in doing this. I can’t say I’ve ever changed a spark plug in my life, can’t be too hard but since I’ve never done it before I’d either have a buddy come help me or have my local garage do it for me! It may be a silly question but how many of these plugs do I have to order! Thanks

You didn’t discover this on the test drive? I’m asking because you said ‘straight from the dealership’. If so, you should have discovered this in the pre-purchase phase and not signed anything until it was fixed or they had a comparable truck with no issue.

My pre-purchase routine has been documented here before, and I’ve been soundly criticized for being a hard a$$ with the dealer. Scoff all you want, but I didn’t drive away with a truck that had known issues. My test drive was almost an hour, with several full throttle blasts in normal, sport, 2h, 4a, and engagement of the other modes, back to normal, then sport, manual, more full throttle, back to the dealer and crawling under the truck to see if I could find any leaks or issues. Not to browbeat you, but to illustrate this-

Don’t -change- anything on the truck while it’s misbehaving. If you change something, it’s one more variable in the equation and every dealer you go to will point to it as the known change, possible culprit.

Although it should go without saying, some people on here are a little hard headed, fer f@@k’s sake, DON’T mod the truck while it’s exhibiting this behavior - at least anything to do with the power train. That is only going to exacerbate the problem, if anything.

If you do the plug change yourself, despite really needing to take the truck to a dealer, you might as well buy 8, since you’ve never changed one before. If you have a mech. do it for you, then you only need 6.

Just sayin’

 

[k-rub]

It would be good to know what misfire code the truck threw. More than one code will trigger a "misfire fault detected".

I’m assuming you have a 17?. Has anyone done this on an 18?. Straight from dealership my truck felt like there was a weird misfiring/stumbling on heavy acceleration. I was waiting for a code thinking something was wrong, but never got one. Last week I hoped in truck and there was a cel light on. Had the code read at local shop....came back as a random misfire. It cleared itself up a day later. I’m definitely interested in doing this. I can’t say I’ve ever changed a spark plug in my life, can’t be too hard but since I’ve never done it before I’d either have a buddy come help me or have my local garage do it for me! It may be a silly question but how many of these plugs do I have to order! Thanks

 

[vince7870]

You didn’t discover this on the test drive? I’m asking because you said ‘straight from the dealership’. If so, you should have discovered this in the pre-purchase phase and not signed anything until it was fixed or they had a comparable truck with no issue.

My pre-purchase routine has been documented here before, and I’ve been soundly criticized for being a hard a$$ with the dealer. Scoff all you want, but I didn’t drive away with a truck that had known issues. My test drive was almost an hour, with several full throttle blasts in normal, sport, 2h, 4a, and engagement of the other modes, back to normal, then sport, manual, more full throttle, back to the dealer and crawling under the truck to see if I could find any leaks or issues. Not to browbeat you, but to illustrate this-

Don’t -change- anything on the truck while it’s misbehaving. If you change something, it’s one more variable in the equation and every dealer you go to will point to it as the known change, possible culprit.

Although it should go without saying, some people on here are a little hard headed, fer f@@k’s sake, DON’T mod the truck while it’s exhibiting this behavior - at least anything to do with the power train. That is only going to exacerbate the problem, if anything.

If you do the plug change yourself, despite really needing to take the truck to a dealer, you might as well buy 8, since you’ve never changed one before. If you have a mech. do it for you, then you only need 6.

Just sayin’

You sir are right! I should’ve beaten on it at the dealership before signing docs. I test drive it but rather quickly. It was an out of state purchase so I baby’d it on ride home.....and then I started mashing it, I just thought it was due to having burn itself out and seat in a little better. It’s not a horrendous studder and it got better, it was just very pronounced to me coming out of a twin turbo X5m where I was use to the lag but then a strong clean powerful climb. The raptor is a lag and then a truck/roughish kind of climb. I may have just been used to the beemer more than anything. But if these plugs will smooth that out, I’d rather do it and have it be great, than give it to them and describe a feeling which let’s face it they will never address unless there is a code or something is broken! So I drive it like it’s stolen , just like a did with my 13.....that’s what warranties are for!

---------- Post added at 10:22 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:20 AM ----------

The code always an p0300 random misfire code. I called my ford guys I’m pretty familiar with and discusssd it with them. Claimed it will happen on remote starts on cold days. Which is when it happened. I have an appt to have it scanned by them on Friday, but short of them saying hey we’re going to change all the plugs, I don’t think anything will happen.

 

[Skyline]

what does he run for fuel?

He was originally running 87 for a while but said its still happening with 91. Wish I could do better but all we have is 91 is california

 

[Spartan1]

542 vs 534

My truck is running well without any issues. I have the MPT tunes running 93 PRX for now. I couldn't find much on MPTs site about plugs other than they recommend changing the plugs at max every 6K miles. They also recommend a gap of 0.28-0.32 with the lower gap for higher boost tunes. I am definitely going to change the plugs since I am over 10K miles but help convince me to go with a colder plug.

MPT Ecoboost Tuning Overview

Its interesting that on MPTs website when you click on the link to buy the sp534 plugs it says "For the Ecoboost, there are two main plugs we recommend. Stock OEM SP-534 aka CYFS-12Y-T3 and NGK 6509. Some applications may require 1 step colder, but for most all we recommend these two plugs. Both should be gapped at .030 or .032.

2017 Ford Raptor 3.5L V6 Ecoboost Fuel Pump and Spark Plug Upgrades | MPT Performance

Does whipple have a recommendation regarding the plugs?

 

[VegasRaptor18]

Calling BS on this. That being said I did order the new plugs but I don’t see the change doing anything, maybe I will be surprised though. Currently running the whipple tune, properly gapped stock plugs to what whipple recommends .025, zero issues with this setup but new plugs and a swap are cheap/easy enough to test it out.


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[Guy]

You’ll see

I thought so too

Calling BS on this. That being said I did order the new plugs but I don’t see the change doing anything, maybe I will be surprised though. Currently running the whipple tune, properly gapped stock plugs to what whipple recommends .025, zero issues with this setup but new plugs and a swap are cheap/easy enough to test it out.


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