Iv used those cheap lighters that use a quick spark to ignite the gas, but after a couple weeks they die out. How are the ones in engines so reliable and last for so long?
Furthermore, how can they fire at JUST the right time, thousands of times a second?
Thanks in advance
In: Engineering
the small spark thingi on a cheap lighter works by smashing two crystals together at hopefully just the right time but that means you need moving parts, a spring and all of that needs to be made as cheaply as possible.
spark plugs are just a dumb device that has two contacts at a specific distance so that a spark or a specific voltage will be able to jump across them.
the magic happens in the ignition coil where low voltage thats used all over the car is turned into a higher voltage that to make it able to reliably spark across the gap of the spark plugs.
all of these have zero moving parts so your spark plugs can fire as fast and precise as your control system can handle which thanks to modern electronics means you can easily activate them thousands of times per minute if you want to.
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