You’ve just finished degreeing the cam, you’ve checked your piston-to-valve clearance, and you’re staring at a beautiful, brand-new harmonic dampener bolted to the snout of your crank. If you’re like a lot of entry-level builders, you might be thinking, “That dampener is going to eat up all the vibrations. This rotating assembly is good to go.” Stop right there. Harmonic …
The 90-degree cross-plane V8 is the undisputed heavyweight champion of the American performance shop. From drag strips to circle tracks, it’s the bread and butter of our industry. But unlike an inline-six or a flat-plane crank, you can’t just throw a standard V8 crankshaft on the balancer, spin it up, and call it a day. To achieve the kind of …
There is an undeniable soul to old-school engine building. You know the exact feel of a perfectly dialed-in micrometer, and your shop was built on decades of hard-earned craftsmanship. But let’s talk facts: when a customer brings in a high-dollar rotating assembly destined to live at 10,000+ RPMs, relying on the drifting calibration of a 40-year-old analog balancer is a …
When you’re spinning a heavy, long-stroke diesel crankshaft, you aren’t just building an engine—you’re managing a localized seismic event. Unlike a high-RPM gas race engine where lightweighting and rapid acceleration are the names of the game, heavy-duty commercial diesels are all about surviving extreme, sustained load and massive torque output. In this environment, rotational mass inconsistencies aren’t just power-robbers; they …