4 ms·

"The idea of replacing spark plugs - a technology that has changed little since their invention 150 years ago - with lasers is not a new one." There's a reason

"The idea of replacing spark plugs - a technology that has changed little since their invention 150 years ago - with lasers is not a new one." There's a reason that spark plug technology has not changed in 150 years: it works. The mechanism of a spark plug (and many mechanisms inside of an internal combustion engine) are so simple that they leave little room for mechanical failure. Everyone likes to make the joke about "If Microsoft built cars", but there is some amount of truth to it - automobile engineers value simplicity far more than computer programmers do, as it has a direct effect on reliability. The reliability of a car is far more important than the reliability of an online chat application. Spark plugs as they are now solve the problem, and are cheap. You can buy one for about $5 where I live. That one plug will last years. If by chance it does get dirty and start to fail, I can pull it out and clean it with a wire brush. The "fuel efficiency gain" from a laser plug needs to be substantial to justify the complexity and expense. Leave it to journalists to ignore the practical side of a story and make it all 'science'.

karolist 15y ago
Lasers instead of conventional sparkplugs actually sounds pale in comparison to what goes into a modern car of today, tens of sensors, different programmable modules and possibly thousands lines of code to run them. Wire harness got so bloated BMW (and possibly other modern car makers) had to replace them with fiber optics channels. I can definitely see this happening and production numbers will lower the expense. I'm sure spark plugs were more expensive than the equivalent of 5 USD now, when they were first introduced.
hugh3 15y ago
Indeed. And we've seen great improvements to engine efficiency over recent years with technologies like direct injection (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gasoline_direct_injection http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gasoline_direct_injection) but you'll see far fewer articles about that because it's complicated to explain and doesn't involve fancy sciencey things like fricking lasers.

karolist 15y ago

Lasers instead of conventional sparkplugs actually sounds pale in comparison to what goes into a modern car of today, tens of sensors, different programmable modules and possibly thousands lines of code to run them. Wire harness got so bloated BMW (and possibly other modern car makers) had to replace them with fiber optics channels. I can definitely see this happening and production numbers will lower the expense. I'm sure spark plugs were more expensive than the equivalent of 5 USD now, when they were first introduced.

hugh3 15y ago

Indeed. And we've seen great improvements to engine efficiency over recent years with technologies like direct injection (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gasoline_direct_injection http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gasoline_direct_injection) but you'll see far fewer articles about that because it's complicated to explain and doesn't involve fancy sciencey things like fricking lasers.