Spark plug go BOOM!

The check engine light came on yesterday on the way home from work. The Jeep was running crappy anyway so I knew something was up. The code reader tells me I have a misfire on cylinder 5. I pull the plug to see what is going on and it looks like this

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How the heck do I get the rest of it out of the cylinder?? Was this just a faulty plug or do I possibly have a bad coil pack? Any suggestion what to do next?

Oh yeah, I just put those plugs in about 4 months/3k miles ago.

A not uncommon way to get the electrode out of the cylinder, is to fire off the motor on the remaining cylinders, with the plug hole left empty. Rev the piss out of the motor, letting the compression stroke's pressure force the broken piece out of the (empty) plug hole.

You might get a second opinion. But that's how I'd do it.

There is an inherent risk that the broken piece will impale itself into the piston head.

And you might get a second opinion before you attempt this.

Or, you could pull the head.

Or, you could drop the oil pan, pull the crank, and slide the piston out the bottom of the block.

Interesting Ideas. I was thinking shop vac. Is that retarded?

or you could go really fanscy and get one of those really cool camera grabber tool thing!!!!

I saw it on Xtreme 4X4 they said it can be used for your exact problem!!!!

Is what it is, is a little mini optical camera nestled in the center of four the little grabber prongs, you look into a binoculor type device and have alittle had held trigger that lets you control and grabber and look around in the cylinder!!!!! said it was under $500


Or you could try a long slinky magnet and just slide it in! hopefully you'll get lucky and get the electrode!!!!

Or just pull the head! I WOULD GO THIS ROUTE!!!! you gotta think about how far you drove it like that and even if you do get the pieces out there could be possible hidden damage!!!! I would be safe and just pull the head and check the cylinder out as well:awesomework:

Pull the head?

Time consuming. Pain in the ass. Waste of money, buying head gaskets, coolant, etc....

Remember, you drove it with the check engine light on. That means the damage was already done. That motor has already been run with the broken part inside.

Now, if it's a 100k motor, who cares?? It's not like it's going to do any more damage.

Try my way.

Of course, if it don't work, don't come knockin' on my door, wink wink, nudge nudge.

The problem I have running the motor with the plug missing is that the TJ has a coil pack instead of individual wires. By putting it on to run the engine I essentially block the whole with the plug boot. Any pieces that could come out, wouldn't have much room to come out.

I think I'll try a few things and see if I can get everything out.

okay then, crank it over without the coil packs. You still have compression pushing. Maybe you'll get lucky and pffffttt it out. If nothing else, try and get that cylinder on top dead center, and maybe you can visually see the little bastard piece thru the hole. Then find some way of picking it up with either stickum or grabbers. Piece of tape or gum or whatver on the end of a pencil.

I would think you would want the piston as low as possible on the stroke so you have a better chance of seeing the piece on the face of the piston (viewing angle and such through the plug hole). Although, the further away it is, the harder it may be to retrieve the piece.

~T.J.

EDIT: Are you sure its even still in there? I had something similar happen on an old car I had, and the piece (pieces?) were nowhere to be found. I can only assume they made their way out the exhaust valves.

84Toyota4x4 said:

I would think you would want the piston as low as possible on the stroke so you have a better chance of seeing the piece on the face of the piston (viewing angle and such through the plug hole). Although, the further away it is, the harder it may be to retrieve the piece.

~T.J.

EDIT: Are you sure its even still in there? I had something similar happen on an old car I had, and the piece (pieces?) were nowhere to be found. I can only assume they made their way out the exhaust valves.

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I'm not sure anything is still there. I just wanted make sure I did everything I could to get it out if it was.

I ended up hooking a small hose with rubber ends (left over dishwasher drain hose) to my vacuum and put the other end right in the spark plug hole. It was a pretty tight fit. I then let the vacuum run while I turned the motor over several times. If anything was left in there, I feel pretty confident that I got it out.

I'm going to install a new plug and go from there. I am beginning to think my coil pack is crapping out. This is the second spark plug problem I have had in a few months. The last one was cylinder 4 and the plug was pretty fouled. I guess If I have another plug problem in a short time, I'll look into getting a new coil pack.

Did you drop that spark plug before you put it in?

First off, I see you have Bosch Platinum plugs in there; IMO these have got to be one of the crappiest plugs out there---seen WAAAAAYYY too many driveability problems caused by just these plugs(put in a good quality plug, NGK,A/C Delco, Denso).I've also been to Jim Linder's mini Guru class, and he showed us many cases where the Bosch Platinums were the source of many driveability concerns!!!) By the looks of the body of the plug, the pieces that fell out are long gone (or lodged somewhere as mentioned before). My advice would be to at least take a look with a boroscope(kinda like one of the things that anglefly mentioned, except it doesn't have the grabbers) to see if any damage has been done to the cylinder walls, or piston--then put new plugs in & see how it runs.....

Thanks zukkev. I didn't realize they were such crappy plugs. I Installed a new plug and it seems to be running like a champ. I'll run down and get some different plugs tomorrow.

Totalled said:

Did you drop that spark plug before you put it in?

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Not that I remember. I'm hoping it's just what zukkev said and the Bosch's suck.

Put OEM plugs in it. Dont use the Bosch plugs. A lot of vehicles are very picky on what type of plug they will run properly on.

JOOP said:

Put OEM plugs in it. Dont use the Bosch plugs. A lot of vehicles are very picky on what type of plug they will run properly on.

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You're welcome Slidillon!
True, true; I think the newer Jeeps ran NGK's, but ask your parts salesman--It should note which brand of plug was OE....

ive always liked the way bosch plugs have ran, when i was drag racing, my car would run a full tenth quicker useing bosch super plugs over NGK's.
I do however agree with zuk on bosch plat's, i put them plat 2's in my MX-3 and it ran like ****, misfired...
Me personally i would stay away from them, id go with a copper core plug.

If the newer jeeps run NGK's there Iridium plugs, which are suppose to be good for 100k. Most new vehicles have Iridiums which mean cha'' ching... $15 per plug :haha: Should of bought a YJ :haha:

I have Bosch+2's in my jeep, Only because I got them for free. But I also don't have a stock motor After these are turded up. I'm going to go back to OEM. The Bosch's have a missfire at Idle.

I had a set of the +4's once, did pretty much the same thing. Junk.

I run NGK 2288s. Borrow a bore scope and look inside. (I heard Harbor Freight had a cheapo one for sale. I was going to check it out as NAPA's was @$100!)