Changing Spark Plugs for Dummies

Assorted spark plugs

Around here we love it when a money-hungry freelancer attempts to get people to leave the comfort of the couch and try a new skill; because about half the time, the writer doesn't have the skill him- or her-self to begin with. We especially like it when someone tries to get a woman to do "a man's job"; mainly because we like to give our DotD award to someone for insulting women. So without further ado, let's meet the freelancer (a woman herself) who raised our collective ire here at the Antisocial Network  today: she's Joanna Millar (formerly Msmillar, now Joanna at HubPages.com) whose condescending little article at "AxleAddict" is entitled "How to Change Your Spark Plugs!" – though we noticed by looking at the URL that the content was originally titled "Ladies, Change Your Spark Plugs"...

Millar claims to "repair cars for local friends," but we have to wonder how often she changes plugs. For one, most modern vehicle maintenance schedules call for plug replacement at 75-100,000 mile intervals; for another, the plugs on many vehicles, especially those with transverse-mounted engines (think minivans), require that you put the vehicle on a lift (and have special tools) to access some or all of the plugs. If you insist on DIY, though, you could always read suggestions from the pros instead of wading through Joanna's verbiage; some of which we'll recap here for you. First Joanna "explains" what a spark plug does:

"The spark plug is the very source of life for your car. It's what the beat is to your heart, the bounce to the ball, it's the driving force in your engine."

Besides her non-parallel construction, we think Millar understates the importance of all the other systems of an internal combustion engine. We're not very sure she understands them, anyway, based on her failure to mention the importance of the camshaft in piston and valve timing. And then there's this statement:

"After causing several thousand explosions a day you can imagine that poor spark plug is going to get tired! "

Anthropomorphism aside, a spark plug in a four-banger running at 2400 RPM fires 600 times a minute, so even running for an hour is 36,000 sparks per day (we think that's more than "several" thousand). She next "explains" how to determine spark plug change interval by telling her readers that

"The automotive number geeks have come up with so many different 'change your plugs estimates' I couldn't tell you who is right [don't they teach punctuation in HubPages Apprentice School?]. A good rule of thumb, and my personal habit, is to check one of the plugs after 20,000 miles."

We think a better "rule of thumb" is to RTFM, especially in an era when you're damned lucky to be able to reach even one of the plugs! But on to the "instructions":

Remove your acrylic nails (See what we meant about condescending?) Disconnect the negative battery terminal (That's not necessary, Joanna: do your friends get pissed because they have to reset their radios every time you change their plugs? But you did forget the rather important step, "Let the engine cool down.") Start at the number one plug (What difference does it make?) Pull off the spark plug wire and take out the plug with a socket wrench (Millar forgot to clean out dirt and rust from around the plug before exposing the cylinder to the ambient environment.) Evaluate the plug (Got anything more than "tan is good," Joanna? and just what is "the lady" supposed to look at, anyway? and what if the plug isn't tan?)

The rest of the article is, at best, OK; though still condescending, wordy, and sloppily written. By the time you've forced yourself to reread this rubbish several times to make sense of it, you could have read any number of straightforward articles written by professionals. That's why we give out Dumbass of the Day awards: at times like this, they're for people who want to reinvent the wheel, but do a bad job of it.

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