crusty grey deposits on spark plug?

[The motor guy]

Been having trouble getting the blower started lately. Sometimes takes a good hard pull to get it to fire off and usually you only need a somewhat light pull halfway out. Anyways, it's used commercially and I think the plug was last changed at the beginning of the year, so I threw a new one in it. Anyways, when I pulled it out the entire area around the white ceramic part was caked solid with grey hard crusty deposits. It looked like someone took concrete and put it in there. What does that mean?

 

[slacktide_bitog]

Take a picture of it for us

 

[spasm3]

Need a pic, sounds like too much 2stroke oil or possible they added oil that was not 2 stroke oil.

 

[The motor guy]

Is that what I get for running 40:1 instead of 50? lol

 

[BrocLuno]

No, you can run as rich as 24:1 and get only mild black deposits if it's jetted right. That sounds like either wrong oil with unknown additives or aluminum being deposited ...

 

[spasm3]

Originally Posted by motor_oil_madman
Is that what I get for running 40:1 instead of 50? lol


No, i run 40:1 in my saws, and all my ope.

 

[FowVay]

The deposits could be evidence of bottom end destruction. The fuel enters the engine and travels through the crankcase to lubricate the main bearing, lower rod and upper rod bearings before making its way into the combustion chamber. Inspect the plug to try to determine if the deposits could be from wear metal as a sign of lower end damage.

The only other producer of spark plug deposits is additives in the fuel. Have you changed fuel brands, oil brand or adding any additives to the fuel to help improve the starting?

Edit note: are you the same gentleman who was using ether to get this blower started?

 

[The motor guy]

The blower runs fine I don't use ether.