Balance shaft ? PLEASE HELP

[Boost Freak 3]

Im doing a rubuild on a galant vr-4 that i purchased with a blown engine. When I went to do the the timing there was no balance shaft belt. The guy said that they might have been removed hes not sure, he said that the car ran fine with out it. He didnt even know it wasnt there. The pulley is still there. My question is if i dont run the belt and there is balance shafts how bad would that be for there car? To be honest I couldnt tell you what it looked like when I rebuilt the engine its my first rebuild so im learning as I go.

 

[yokotabrat]

There are two balance shafts. The front one is the one that has the pulley and gets connected to the crank sprocket with the balance shaft belt. The other balance shaft is behind the oil pump attached to the oil pump pulley. The way to find out for sure if the balance shafts have been pulled would be to pull the oil pan. If this isn't possible, you might be able to cheat. Here's something to try:

Take the oil pump pulley (the small pulley to the right of the crank pulley) and place it so that the arrow is at the 12 o'clock position. Hold it there then let go of the pulley. Does it have the tendency to move to the left or the right when you let go? If so, the balance shaft is still there. If not, try a few more times to be sure it doesn't move from the 12 o'clock position. Also try turning it by hand. Does it feel weighted while you turn it? Does it seem to get slightly harder to turn in certain spots?

The reason for this test is the balance shaft is counter weighted. When you hold it at the 12 o'clock position, the weights on the balance shaft like to pull the pulley to the left or the right depending on how many rotations you've done on the pulley. If there is no weight on the pulley, like when the balance shafts have been pulled, the pulley won't move when it's in the 12 o'clock position.

There is also another way to do this, and that would be to stick a screwdriver into a plug on the back of the block toward the bottom and rotate the oil pump pulley to see if it catches the screwdriver. This is the procedure in the manual for determining the position of the rear balance shaft. The plug is located toward the bottom of the block. There is a bolt that's just there not holding anything. Once you remove that you can insert a screwdriver into the hole. The screwdriver has to be pretty long. Put the pulley at 12 o'clock again and insert the screwdriver. Note how far it goes in. Then take the screwdriver out and rotate the pulley one turn so that it's at the 12 o'clock position again. Insert the screwdriver again. Did it go in just as far as the last time? If so, no balance shafts. If it doesn't go in as far or it went in farther, the shaft is still there.

Hopefully this makes sense. The key is realizing that there are two shafts installed in the engine stock. You don't want to only run one otherwise you'll get a horrible vibration. Let us know what you find.

 

[Boost Freak 3]

wow thanks dude thats great i had no idea. Great info though awsome thank you very much.