BLACK'98DSM
5+ Year Contributor
- 4,450
- 1,889
- Feb 9, 2019
-
Alabama
So I've been having some thoughts about my engine build and I wanted to share something with you guys. So before I installed my JE pistons, I balanced them. I have a weight scale that measures in grams and I put each piston on the scale. I used a Dremel tool to shave 3 of the pistons to match the weight of the lightest one. In this picture I circled the area where I took material from (I took material from the inside, not the outside, so as to not cause cylinder wall damage).
I only had to remove 2.5 grams on the heaviest piston, and 1 gram on the next to lightest. I was wondering if this would somehow affect the structural integrity of the piston. Like maybe creating a weak spot for it to break. That seemed like the best spot to remove material from. And I was trying to make the engine as balanced as possible, since I swapped over from a harmonic balancer to an underwrite pulley. And as we know the 420a doesn't have balance shafts like the 4g63 does. I'm basically just 2nd guessing my work. It seemed like a great idea at the time but now I lay back and wonder about it. In reality the pistons will probably outlive the next weakest link of the engine. But I just wanted some opinions and also to share how I kept my built 420a balanced.
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I only had to remove 2.5 grams on the heaviest piston, and 1 gram on the next to lightest. I was wondering if this would somehow affect the structural integrity of the piston. Like maybe creating a weak spot for it to break. That seemed like the best spot to remove material from. And I was trying to make the engine as balanced as possible, since I swapped over from a harmonic balancer to an underwrite pulley. And as we know the 420a doesn't have balance shafts like the 4g63 does. I'm basically just 2nd guessing my work. It seemed like a great idea at the time but now I lay back and wonder about it. In reality the pistons will probably outlive the next weakest link of the engine. But I just wanted some opinions and also to share how I kept my built 420a balanced.