TIPS When making your own plug wires

I made new plug wires for my T

I made new plug wires for my TR yesterday and wanted to share my experience. I bought the wire in bulk, for a TR you'll need about 40 feet of it! I also found the 45 deg. crimp connectors locally - for a change! The spark plug boots will only accept 7mm wires unless you enlarge the hole. I chose to leave them alone. You'll need some slippery stuff to help move things along, I used silicone spray but vaseline would be good too. To get the plug boots off you can either try and pull the old wire through and snip off the connector, or do as I did and CAREFULLY pull the wire out with the old connector in place. It takes a bit of doing but it will come out, just go slow. Also you'll need to slip off the red silicone jackets and be careful not to loose the little bands with the cylinder numbers on them. To determine the exact length needed, you can use the old wires. But I went and loosely fitted the wires on the motor and cut to length to get the cleanest install possible. Next lube up and push the wires through the plug boots far enough so you can crimp on the connectors. Strip the wires back about 3/4 inch leaving just the carbon core conductor sticking out, then bend it around the end of the wire and place the crimp connector onto the wire and pinch it good. I bought the special crimp pliers to do this job right. Then very carefully pull the wire back through part way untill the connector is just starting to go up into the boot, then use a screw driver and PUSH the wire the rest of the way into the boot. If you try and pull it all the way you run the risk of compromising the crimp connection. I then sprayed lube into the silicone jacket and slipped it over the wire and up onto the boot, and the wire is essentially done. After each wire is assembled, but sure to check the resistance to verify everything's okay. Next clean out the dist. caps, for the contacts carefully use fine sand paper or emery cloth, and see that the carbon button and spring are in good order. I had to replace one button and spring as they were nearly "disolved". I found that a Mercury Tracer cap has nearly the same button, and a little sanding made it fit perfectly. I made a new spring from a ballpoint pen, not rocket science here. Next I installed the wires onto the motor and ran them through the looms back to the dist. cap. I then did any last bit of trimming needed to get a clean installation. Insert the wire into the dist. cap and tighten the lance-screw. IMPORTANT: Even though you have verified the resistance of the wires themselves, do it again with the dist. cap too. What appeared to be a good tight connection was NOT! I had to snip and retighten 5 out of the 12 wires to get a good reading. It is a struggle to get all the wires through the rubber dist. cap cover and lots of lube will be needed. You don't want to use too much force for fear of damaging the work you've already done. All in all it's a very satisfying feeling to know you've got good connections...and you did it yourself! A bit of trivia....once done the resistance of my wires from the dist. cap contacts to the plug connectors was from 13k to about 19k ohms. I also checked the plug extenders and they were "0". Bottom line is that for less than $100 I have new wires!