[Shop-talk] Stuck Spark Plug

[Douglas Shook]

I am a big believer in impact wrenches, air or electric. It is that fast,
hard whack they give that actually puts less torque against the threads.
Penetrating oil may or may not do anything, but if you wanted to soak them
down overnight and then hit it with an impact wrench in the morning, I
would not be surprised if they all came out without any damage.

If they do not need changing at this point (new plugs can last 100K miles)
you might just want to leave sleeping dogs lie.

On Mon, Nov 10, 2025 at 4:30 PM MIQ MILLMAN <miq at bigllama.com> wrote:

> The new battery powered impact guns are much better than numbers would
> indicate when compared to air powered.  Probably something to do with
> electric motors having full torque at 0 rpm.
>
> I have a snap-on 1/2 pneumatic that is rated at 1200 ft-lb break away and
> 800 ft-lb working torque and a hercules 20v 1/2 drive with a 1000 ft-lb
> break away rating,   The battery can remove anything I jam on max effort
> with the Snap-on with only 2 or 3 ugga-duggas.
>
> The above is not a non-sequitur, just pointing out that if you do use a
> modern battery impact gun, you might be limiting the rotation, you will not
> be limiting the effort exerted.
>
> I'd remove the rubber hose inner bit on the spark plug socket so that it
> fully seats on the hex faces of the spark plug if you do try this, to limit
> breaking the ceramics.
>
>   --Miq
>
>
>
>
> On Mon, Nov 10, 2025 at 3:15 PM John T Blair <jblair1948 at cox.net> wrote:
>
>> Was over at my son's house this afternoon.  He's working on his Ford F150
>> up with the turbo (can't remember what Ford calls that - economy of a 6 and
>> power of a V8).  He had to replace the valve (rocker box) cover as it was
>> leaking as were the spark plug gaskets as the well the plugs were in were
>> foll of oil.  He managed to get it all done.  However, we wanted to change
>> the plugs.  When he tried to break the 1st plug loose, it wouldn't budge.
>> He was using a 3/8s" ratchet and breaker bar to no avail.  We went looking
>> for a 1/2" to 3/8" adapter so we could get more torque using a larger 1/2"
>> ratchet and or breaker bar, but we couldn't find an adapter.
>>
>> Now this being said, I remember seeing something about using an impact
>> wrench on an ezout because it turns so little that you don't break the
>> ezout.  I was wondering if this would work for a stuck spark plug?  We did
>> squirt some PB blast doen into the plug wll and let sit for about 5 min and
>> tried again with the 3/8" drive breaker bar.
>>
>> So my question to the group is:  Do you think that we could use an impact
>> wrench to break the plug loose then once it's broken loose remove it with
>> the ratchet?
>>
>> JohnT
>>
>> John T. Blair  WA4OHZ     email:  jblair1948 at cox.net
>> Va. Beach, Va                  Phone:  (757) 495-8229
>>
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