and when that electrode builds up a bit of resitance, another one will take
its place as the lowest resistance one. I have no idea if there is ever
multiple paths to ground on a sparkplug, but high voltage is a very weird
thing.

tim in san jose

>From: David Brodbeck <gull@cyberspace.org>
>To: Aristotle Sagan <killer_jupiter@HOTMAIL.COM>
>CC: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
>Subject: Re: [VANAGON] spark plugs, etc
>Date: Fri, 9 Aug 2002 15:41:19 -0400 (EDT)
>
>On Fri, 9 Aug 2002, Aristotle Sagan wrote:
>
> > Well, no.
> > "electricity "ALWAYS" follows the path of least resistance"
> >
> > In a parallel circuit, current will always divide according to the
> > resistance in it's path (with contsant voltage). Only in the case of a
> > direct short will the higher resistance be cut out completely.
>
>That applies to most circuits, yes.  If we're talking about spark plugs,
>though, the first path that ionizes the fuel/air mix in the cylinder will
>suddenly have a *drastically* lower resistance than the other paths, so
>the current will all flow through it.
>
>              _ _
>   __ _ _   _| | |  | David M. Brodbeck (N8SRE)              Ypsilanti, MI
>  / _` | | | | | |  +-----------------------------------------------------
>| (_| | |_| | | | @ cyberspace.org
>  \__, |\__,_|_|_| "Geekdom is fantastic at being AGAINST something, and
>  |___/             it's hopeless at being FOR something."
>                                       -- Andrew Orlowski in The Register.

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