On my PR coil set I originally ran a 0.030 gap, ran for about a week then miss fires. Gapped it down to .022 and no issues. Still that way on 97506's at 26.5 PSI with 10 degrees of timing on 100% E85. I've not tried the dielectric grease, but I also dont have any marks on my coils from arcing like shown, if I do I'll use some.
What I have experienced though is what people are talking about with the plugs. I have to use a pair of pliers to put them on and take them off. I've learned a procedure to it to make it work or else I destroy them. To put them on, I slide them on as far as I can by hand, then put the pliers on the blue center part right at the base of the rubber skirt, pinch down decently and push until "click!" its on. To get them off I have to pull the skirt up so its up around the blue center line and grab with the pliers around the base of the skirt that is now exposed so I can use the rubber AND the blue center wire to pull it up at the same time. Then it usually comes off without me destroying it.
There's a reason I had PR send me an entire second set of plug wires. The guy from PR on the phone thought I was crazy and said I shouldnt need them, but I'm glad I did as I just destroyed another one a few weeks ago and its nice to have 6 spares when I go through one every few months.
I really hope he gets those new plug wires out soon, I'm likely to buy a set if it makes life a lot easier!
Good news is though, with proper gap and making sure the plug wires are on all the way... never a miss fire.
Dude... I can say with absolute certainty that you are doing it wrong. Put the grease on the ceramics so you don't continue to stress your boots when removing and installing, two main reasons, equally important EQUALLY IMPORTANT that professionals use grease is arc prevention and preventing damage to boots upon removal. If you need pliers to remove or install your boots, it is one of the symptoms of not using the grease. You are putting undue stress on the components and will need to replace them often, then you will blame manufacturer design flaws... not cool.
And if you been using your coils without grease, it doesn't matter if you can't see visible arc scars, they are internal. I guarantee you have damaged plugs and coils by this point that you cannot see and your coils are not functioning 100% capacity. I would take a guess and say that after one week of running .030 gap without grease, your plugs and coils were damaged to the point of misfire with no visible scars. They still work, but they are damaged to the point that they cannot sustain .030 gap anymore, that is proof that they are less efficient due to internal damage.
Why do you think they could do .030 for a week then suddenly they couldn't? It took that time to fry the internals due to lack of grease insulation. The grease is insurance against arc damage, it is an insulator and protects your internals which are not designed to work with stray pathways.
I recommend that you get new coils, new plugs and never ever fail to use grease when installing plugs. Your plugs and coils will thank you, reward you with the proper power and response and your boots will last 10x longer.
