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Broken ignition coil: spark plug's fault?

Motor Vehicle Maintenance & Repair Asked on October 1, 2021

Two days ago my Opel Corsa D LPG’s engine started to misfire, and by means of an OBD interface I found out it was cylinder 1.

First thing I thought about were the spark plugs, as I haven’t changed them in the last 36k-40k kms. When I took them out, though, I found them quite clean and not corroded at all. Plus, I’ve measured the gap with a makeshift thickness meter and they seem ok (1.1 mm, as spec’d).

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Today I’ve checked the coil pack with a multimeter and it seems that cylinder 1 coil is broken (others show 15MOhm to common, this one seems an open circuit). So I’m going to change the coil pack, but I had it changed few months ago, after a similar failure (I didn’t do it myself then, had the car repaired by a shop since I was far from home).

Now I’m thinking of blaming the shop for not completely fixing the fault, but I’m wondering: could the cause be the (relatively) wide gap of the spark plugs? Other recommended parts for my model have a 0,7 to 0,9 gap instead, and I suppose this limits the peak voltage of the discharge, thus (I suppose) stress less the coil (beside other effects).

Current installed spark plugs are NGK ZFR5F-11, some sites indicate Bosch 0 242 235 666 as a possible replacement. Couldn’t find any recommendation by Opel itself.

One Answer

Coil packs do go bad and become problematic and intermittant. They are constructed with very thin wire winding to keep them small, but the smaller size itself falls victim to heat more easily by going open. If you are operating a car or truck in hot climate, keep a spare and an OBD-II code reader in the glove box. Your choice of LPG is quite admirable. I saw a friend operate a truck on LPG for 25 years and he removed his spark plugs and checked the gap every 5 years and reused them because they were pristine clean.

Correct answer by Old-School Engineer on October 1, 2021

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