I've only heard that the failure rate is much higher with aftermarket wires. Boy do those MSD's look pretty though.

ZZPs view on wires and coil packs

Aftermarket coil packs

The stock ignition on a Grand Prix is very good. So good that we run stock coil packs on all of our cars at ZZP. Failure rate of stock coil packs is almost zero and the spark output is extremely high. We have A/B dyno tested aftermarket coil packs and seen no difference in HP. We have seen many aftermarket units fail and when customers have a problem it's very hard to diagnose with 'extra' mods on the car.



Aftermarket Plug wires

Unless you have a problem with your stock wires, don't buy aftermarket ones. In our experience of working on GPs the failure rate of aftermarket wires is over 10 times that of stock wires. GM puts everything they have into making cars get the best mileage they can with the least amount of problems. A poor ignition system would increase emissions, which GM couldn't afford. This means plug wires from the factory are designed for high spark, low radio noise and excellent performance. All of the ZZP cars run stock wires.

I'm going to have to disagree with ZZP's statement on wires and I wo'nt be brand specific,ZZP is a great co. for the 3800 crowd do'nt get me wrong but they are not god and they make mistakes and have blunders ,so take there advice with a grain of salt ,I do'nt like the idea of quoting a vendor when giving parts advice .Chico.

But you gotta think if the vendor is pushing OEM and not an aftermarket brand that there should be some validity.

What do they have to gain from saying buy the OEM parts? If they were saying by brand X then that would be a different story.

i think it would be different if ZZP said "Brand X wires are the greatest! Buy them from us!"

Instead, they run OEM coil packs, which they dont even offer

Well I'm not going to debate ZZP's take on plug wires,I will say OEM wires are adequate and there is no real need to upgrade but I do not agree that they are the best wires out there,one of my favorite wires are the Accel 8.5 race wires also the PRJ wires are excellent both are expensive but I've never had them fail .Chico.

I understand what you are saying. Im sure that if you really want to spend the $ and not get any real noticable gain, then you can. But OEM wires work for me