View Poll Results: Balance or no?
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Unbalanced turbo lq4
Thread Starter
Teching In
Joined: May 2020
Posts: 19
Likes: 0
Unbalanced turbo lq4 opinions please,
stock crank (checked and polished) + summit forged rods and pistons, can I get by with a home balance (weighing it all and matching it up) or must I take it to the machine shop. Anyone else done this and been okay?
Thanks!
stock crank (checked and polished) + summit forged rods and pistons, can I get by with a home balance (weighing it all and matching it up) or must I take it to the machine shop. Anyone else done this and been okay?
Thanks!
Teching In
Joined: Sep 2003
Posts: 44
Likes: 1
for what its worth i did the math and the combo is pretty close to stock weights. also the rods and pistons are going to be very close to the same across the board.
I know another guy who needed to make a race and slapped some pistons and rods in a motor and then ran it that way for the rest of the season cause it ran great.
according to most machine shops i have talked to if you balance an assembly take it off the machine and remove all the weights and then set it up again it will still not balance out. So who knows how exact it truly needs to be.
I guess it depends on if you wanna take the risk to save a few hundred bucks or more likely the time at the machine shop.
I know another guy who needed to make a race and slapped some pistons and rods in a motor and then ran it that way for the rest of the season cause it ran great.
according to most machine shops i have talked to if you balance an assembly take it off the machine and remove all the weights and then set it up again it will still not balance out. So who knows how exact it truly needs to be.
I guess it depends on if you wanna take the risk to save a few hundred bucks or more likely the time at the machine shop.
Back when I was in Mustangs, I was in the middle of fly cutting pistons, when things went South. At any rate, I had 3 pistons cut on 1 side of the engine. The engine had to be running, so it went together. The "I'll finish it" day never came for that particular engine. It was regularly ran to 7k, and never caused any metal in the filter, and never came apart. I am not saying balancing isn't important, just saying I don't think it's as earth shattering as some people think if you don't do it.
TECH Enthusiast
Joined: Nov 2017
Posts: 661
Likes: 91
From: S.F. East bay
For what is worth I took a 2001 lq4 and put .030 ls2 pistons and gen 4 rods in it on the factory 24x lq4 crank and didn't balance it and threw it all together, and it runs great, no harmonics or funny rpm vibrations like people would claim.....been running that motor for a little over 2 years.......and those ls2 .030 over pistons weren't factory gm ...the were cheap ebay dnj $150 jobbers. ...........good luck, and happy motoring....literally! !!
Thread Starter
Teching In
Joined: May 2020
Posts: 19
Likes: 0
For what is worth I took a 2001 lq4 and put .030 ls2 pistons and gen 4 rods in it on the factory 24x lq4 crank and didn't balance it and threw it all together, and it runs great, no harmonics or funny rpm vibrations like people would claim.....been running that motor for a little over 2 years.......and those ls2 .030 over pistons weren't factory gm ...the were cheap ebay dnj $150 jobbers. ...........good luck, and happy motoring....literally! !!
Not balancing any engine doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s going to shake itself to death. But it guarantees you that it won’t make power to its full potential due to harmonics. It will run just fine without balancing.
