What happened?

[ShadowBolt]

Here it is. I know it's the DOHC they are talking about but it's the same engine.


Here is a who’s who of the nation’s top modular engine builders that recommend avoiding small size dampers like Steeda on DOHC Ford engines:

Boss 330 Racing. Al Pappito

Modular Performance. John and Mike Tymenski

Accufab Racing. John Mihovetz. NHRA AA/AT World Record Holder

Livernois Motorsports

Pauls High Performance

Sean Hyland Motorsports

VT Engines




Here is small sample of the things they’ve had to say about small diameter dampers:




Quote:
"Do you rev your engine over 6500 rpm? If you do you should worry...The next time you blast through the gears might be your last"
Al Pappito



Quote:
"We do not install small dampers on any DOHC engine builds. All our engines get Innovators West full size dampers"
Livernoise Motorsports



Quote:
"There is alot of harmonic vibration on the front of mod. cranks. The small dia. dampers do not adequately control the vibration"
Al Pappito



Quote:
"The net of all this information is to use the (stock) '96-'01 Cobra balancer (F6ZZ-6312-AB) on all manual transmission, forged crank applications"
Sean Hyland



Quote:
"It appears that if you want your engine to live a happy life keep your stock vibration damper/pulleys"
Al Pappito



Quote:
"Cheapo balancers just do not work with powdered metal gears"
J. Mihovetz



Quote:
"Food for thought..I just rebuilt a '98 cobra it has spent the last five years as a road race car. The bone stock engine had never had a wrench on it, including the rusty stock damper sitting right where it was bolted in 1998. 20,000 mi at full throttle. This thing was totally worn out .guess what....The flats on the crank and the stock pump looked great.
In contrast...A slightly famous Factory stock cobra after a mid season NMRA teardown showed a problem. After 500 street miles and about 35 quarter mile passes the rotors had beat depressions about .040.'' deep into the drive flats where the pump contacts the crank. That engine was wearing a small dia. underdrive damper"
Al Pappito



Quote:
"There also seems to be increased instances of oil-pump failure when some brands of underdrive pulley kits are used. I believe this is due to inadequate damping with the reduced-diameter harmonic balancer"
Sean Hyland



Quote:
"I have experience with just about every dampener available for the Modular engines. Seen plenty of failures. For sure the smaller lighter dampeners will cause shorter oil pump life."
J. Mihovetz



Quote:
"After building truckloads of modular engines a pattern has emerged. Most all oil pump failures involve underdrive pulleys"
Al Pappito



Quote:
"If anyone will spend $5000+ to rebuild an engine, $400 for a damper should be one of the first things. I'm using an ATI"
VT Engines

[jdlingle]

Good info. Wish I had seen this stuff a year ago when I put the Steeda on. Just gonna cross the fingers now I guess.

[jdlingle]

Do you have one of the older Steeda units? I have seen some stuff on various forums after looking now that they had some dampening issues with earlier batches that are supposedly worked out with the newer units. I know that the product page now states that they receive their dampening information directly from Ford. Think Im gonna shoot them an email and see what they say about reliablilty concerns. I know they wont come right out and say our stuff sucks or anything but maybe I can read betweent the lines of their answer. Ill let you know what they say.

[mitchntx]

Heard about your motor woes. Sux ...

Investing in quality vibration and harmonics elimination is money well spent.
I have a Fluidampner on my LT1.

[ShadowBolt]

Heard about your motor woes. Sux ...

Investing in quality vibration and harmonics elimination is money well spent.
I have a Fluidampner on my LT1.

I never even considered it. The car came with the Steeda crap on it and I assumed it was okay. I do understand that Steeda did a redesign on their kit but I don't know if mine is the old one or the new one. Still Ford racing will only use the Innovators West units on their Road race engines. Innovators West even says their smaller units do not do as good a job as the full size units do. Not worth the risk for me.


JJ

[BlueFirePony]

I never even considered it. The car came with the Steeda crap on it and I assumed it was okay. I do understand that Steeda did a redesign on their kit but I don't know if mine is the old one or the new one. Still Ford racing will only use the Innovators West units on their Road race engines. Innovators West even says their smaller units do not do as good a job as the full size units do. Not worth the risk for me.


JJ

We've probably just been lucky in that I changed the rev limiter to 6200 a year or so ago (from 6800) since the car pretty much falls flat after 5800 (another thing to work on..) - the car pulls like a beast down low and through the mid-range but I generally grab 4th at 5500 and ride it back up just shy of the (new) limiter on TWS and ECR straights (and 5th gear is an anchor so I rarely use it). Definately plan to change the pulley once we re-dress the engine (when that will be who knows)

[Rob Liebbe]

We've probably just been lucky in that I changed the rev limiter to 6200 a year or so ago (from 6800) since the car pretty much falls flat after 5800 (another thing to work on..) - the car pulls like a beast down low and through the mid-range but I generally grab 4th at 5500 and ride it back up just shy of the (new) limiter on TWS and ECR straights (and 5th gear is an anchor so I rarely use it). Definately plan to change the pulley once we re-dress the engine (when that will be who knows)

Yeah, but the rev limiter won't help when you miss a downshift and the rear wheels mechanically force the engine to 9000 rpm.

[BlueFirePony]

Yeah, but the rev limiter won't help when you miss a downshift and the rear wheels mechanically force the engine to 9000 rpm.

I've been lucky there too ...well in this car any way

Since I don't use 5th the 4-1 shift is really the only chance for that and it's actually pretty hard to do a 4-1 shift in this car as notchy as it is...not impossible but less likely that a 5-2. Its also pretty hard to RPM match in this car so I am pretty attentive to the downshift normally anyway

[marshall_mosty]

Well, did a leakdown on mine toiday and #7 and #8 are trouble. Both had oil soaked black plugs... Also, there wasn't enough compression to even register on the leakdown. It was blowing all down the crankcase...

Pulled the motor and will be dropping the long block off at Richard Painter's tomorrow for a full tear down and diagnosis...

I figured I would get more from this than ECR and Saturday at MSR-H...

[jdlingle]

That sucks man. Any idea what caused it?