How many flywheel teeth for 302?

[xb-60]

Originally Posted by DAVID GAGNARD

...As far as flywheel weight goes, some like a steel, some like a lighter aluminum, depends on what you plan to do with the car....

Good pickup there on the “weight”, David.

As far as the actual weight of the flywheel goes however, the flywheel and the harmonic balancer need to be correctly matched to effectively smooth out, or ‘absorb’, the torsional forces in the crankshaft.

If you think that a lighter flywheel will make you accelerate more quickly, all it will really allow is quicker up- and down-rev when ‘blipping’ with no load (no drive) applied. A lighter flywheel (IMO) would make no measurable difference on the road or track.

The effect of a lighter flywheel by itself will be less capacity to absorb those torsional forces that necessarily result from a complex assembly like a fast revving internal combustion engine. And, if your lighter flywheel doesn’t match the spec. of your harmonic balancer, that’s compounding the problem that you’ve just created. The mismatch will increase the crankshaft torsional forces rather than dampening them.

So yes it does depend on what you want to do with the car. If you like to rev it a bit, and you want some longevity out of the engine, get expert advice before going for a lighter flywheel.

Cheers,

Glen