Harmonic Balancer

1st Official Post

    I plan to call tomorrow to get a quote and will post it here.


    I saw in the NPD catalog that they have a "exact repro" of the HIPO balancer for $295. Does anyone know if they are any good as this might be a way to go if the rebuild is too expensive.

    Jack

    Thanks for the info.

    I called the Damper Doctor and a rebuild is $83.95 plus shipping and their turnaround time is 2 or 3 days right now - so that is a lot better than buying a new one!

    Jack

    • Official Post

    Before you send off your balancer you might want to check and see it it is even the correct one. You may possibly have a C8ZE replacement balancer which would not be worth fixing.


    -Fred-

    65 Koupe early San Jose Phoenician Yellow 4 speed
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    For the $83 and change I might have ALL my spares redone, sure would be safer.<img src=images/icon_smile_big.gif border=0 align=middle><img src=images/icon_smile_big.gif border=0 align=middle>

    My engine machine shop owner has checked over the balancer and feels it is good and usable. He does not feel a rebuild is needed. My builder is going with his word as the expert. He has built and machined many drag and race motors so he sold know so I will go with what he says - so at this point no rebuild.

    Jack

    Rubber coming out of a damper is a vague description. The rubber is squeezed quite tightly between the hub and ring. Any rubber protruding out from the two pieces is uncompressed. The stress of this expansion causes the rubber to crack. It is not very attractive, but Ford said it would not affect the performance of the damper. I have seen rubber bits outside of the hub and ring start to fall away. Still does not mean the damper needs rebuilding. The compressed rubber is fine. There is a wavy groove in both the hub and ring surfaces in contact with the rubber. This groove makes it virtually impossible for the outer ring to shift position. It usually requires an engine seizure at high rpm where the hub stops almost instantaneously while the inertial of the outer ring wants to continue rotating to cause the rubber to slip. You can check that by measuring the angle bwteen the woodruff key slot and the TDC marking. It should be 40°.


    A bigger reason to rebuild a damper is to have the hub resleeved so you have an ungrooved surface for the front timing chain cover seal to ride on.

    Thanks for the info Bob, I appreciate it. My engine is in the boring machine today and they hope to get the pistons installed tomorrow and get everything connected and spin it to see how it will balance out, so we should soon know if the balancer is still good. I reinspected it the other day and I think it is fine but time will tell.

    Jack

    I just talked to the machine shop and the balancer cleaned up fine and is very usable and he has spun it with the polished crank and all is well. The new pistons are in along with the new valves. The valve seats have been replace with hardened seats and they are doing some final honing on the block to match the pistons so it should be ready to reassemble by next week.

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