Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

General engine tech -- Drag Racing to Circle Track

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SchmidtMotorWorks
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Re: Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

Post by SchmidtMotorWorks »

Ron Clevenger wrote:Lot's of thoughts there to ponder for sure.

Maybe I missed it in the dialog, but I still have no clear understanding why or what for you would balance neutral or 52% over?? What are the different effects between the two?

Blessings............Ron
For cross-plane cranks:
If you over balance to compensate for the oil in the oil holes, the engine will vibrate less.
If you over balance more than that, it will vibrate more and the crank is heavier.
If you underbalance the engine will vibrate and the crank can weigh less.

Since a crank is flexible and you can achieve overbalance by adding mass to locations that make bearing loads worse, over balance alone really doesn't mean anything to bearing loading.

For flat cranks, you can reduce the BW (considering a single rod throw in isolation) much lower, depending on the proportions of the engine.
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SchmidtMotorWorks
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Re: Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

Post by SchmidtMotorWorks »

brandonu wrote:http://www.circletrack.com/enginetech/c ... ewall.html

Maybe try the link above. It could help explain over/under balance.
Nope, it claims that the required BW changes by the RPM of the crank, the physics of balance don't change by speed.

If the crankshaft has vibrations at a particular speed, the cause is likely torsional vibration, and a change to BW up or down might improve that or make it worse, it is not predictable unless you know the natural freuency of the rotating assembly.
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Re: Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

Post by Ron Clevenger »

Thanks, I'm catching on.

I build all my own motors and a few for others. I'm methodical in assembly and disassembly. When I raced only naturally aspirated engines you could really feel the smoothness of the engine in your body going down the track. But with the blown engines you are accelerating so much harder it is not as easy to feel the smoothness in the engine. But it's way more fun. So just wanted to better understand the why and want for in this area.

Thank you all, greatly appreciated your input and sharing of knowledge in this area.

Blessings.............Ron
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Re: Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

Post by In-Tech »

In my mind, the over balance works at high rpm because there is only so much time.
Heat is energy, energy is horsepower...but you gotta control the heat.
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SchmidtMotorWorks
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Re: Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

Post by SchmidtMotorWorks »

In-Tech wrote:In my mind, the over balance works at high rpm because there is only so much time.
Time for what?

All of the parts are moving at the same RPM so they are subject to the same time.
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Re: Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

Post by PFC1 »

I did hear Darin Morgan say that Pro Stock under balances 5% as of 2009 I believe. Have it written in my notes..... WHY?
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Re: Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

Post by SchmidtMotorWorks »

PFC1 wrote:I did hear Darin Morgan say that Pro Stock under balances 5% as of 2009 I believe. Have it written in my notes..... WHY?
I have balanced a few hundred Pro-Stock cranks, most of the time they order several cranks at once in rounded number bob weights in increments of 20 or 30 grams. Most of the time when they came back for inspection or repair they had no modifications done to them. The reason is they don't sweat bob weight that much and just use the closest one, high or low.

The comment I remember from Darin was under-balance. Why, an under-balanced crank is lighter.

One thing people might be interested to know in regards to current crank design technology is that NASCAR cranks with 2.0" mains are far more developed than any cranks used in drag racing. Some of the NASCAR teams have engineers dedicated just to design and analysis of crankshafts. That's possible because they can afford the staff and equipment to do the work, drag racing teams just don't have enough people, equipment, software or money. The larger NASCAR teams supply the crank designs to the manufacturer to make the cranks to print.
Drag racing teams typically rely on the manufacturers to do the design, solve problems as they arise and occasionally suggest an experiment.

When billet cranks 1st became popular it was the other way around, Pro stock, alcohol and nitro were the first to need stronger cranks, the NASCAR teams continued to use OEM forgings for some time (maybe it was a rule, I don't remember).
Bob Glidden was by far the most forward thinker in the crank ideas he ordered, in regards to ideas that lived on for a long time. His ideas were not particularly unusual, just good combinations of existing features.
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Re: Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

Post by LSP »

[quote="SchmidtMotorWorks"][quote="PFC1"]Some of the NASCAR teams have engineers dedicated just to design and analysis of crankshafts.[quote]

Do they ever miss on their designs?

Do they ever overbalance?
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Re: Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

Post by SchmidtMotorWorks »

Do they ever miss on their designs?

Do they ever overbalance?
It depends on what you mean by "miss". Miss is is a good word to use because crankshaft design is like the Whack-a-mole game, there are many more issues to deal with besides counterweight design in crankshaft design. Take for example the 2.0 main cranks, the trade-off for reduced bearing drag is a crank that is very flexible. Flexibility brings lots of new problems such as torsional vibration, and distortion because a crank distorts in contorted ways due to it's offset rod pins. One of the problems that comes with distortion is the snout wobbles out of position which causes problems for the cam drive.

There are lot's of things you can do to try to reduce the problem by stiffening the crank but they are all trade-off compromises. For example you can add stiffness by making the rod throw arms stronger, but there are an infinite number of variations for how to do that and just simply making them wider or thicker won't get you competitive anymore.
Making the compromise to have stronger but heavier rod throws will bring new problems, for example it might change the frequency of torsional vibration so that it coincides with the frequency of a force in the engine and now the problems are worse than they were before strengthening the crank. When you run into this problem you have to get weight off the crank or move it to other locations to change the natural frequency. That means another compromise like using counterweight designs that are not what you would choose for bearing loads but they make the crank lighter. As you can see, it is all involved with trade-off compromises, you can't just design a crank that is strong or light and say it is the best design.
So given all those variables and the situation that the team may be able to simulate some of the dynamics but may not have all of the data or technical skills or software or time/priority required to simulate everything, at some point they have to do experiments to determine the consequence of a change. Sometimes those experiments are made without expectation that the problem will be cured, they just need to have data about the consequence of changing some design parameter.
So after many cycles of improvement inevitably a change is made elsewhere in the engine that for example results in faster combustion that introduces a new frequency for the crank to deal with and avoid vibration. It's a game of whack-a-mole, there is no such thing as a final perfect design.
As an engine reaches higher performance levels it becomes impossible to make the required shapes from economical crankshaft forgings.

As you can probably see from this process, in all of this compromise and relocating of counterweights to solve a specific problem, balancing to some particular bob-weight that could result in any infinite number of non-specific results becomes meaningless.

Evaluating a counterweight design and balance by something as simple as bob-weight and over/under-balance is like trying to determine if your meal is nutritious by weighing it, you need more specific information, the weight doesn't tell you much that is useful to determine if the meal is nutritious or not.
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Re: Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

Post by JCR »

=D>
SchmidtMotorWorks

Thanks for taking the time to provided so much technical information and debunking old wives tales on the subject.
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Re: Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

Post by SchmidtMotorWorks »

You are welcome, I'm glad you enjoy it, it is an interesting subject with lot's of issues that are not obvious to the eye.
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Re: Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

Post by SchmidtMotorWorks »

Here is a video that gives an insight into the tools some engineers have to work on these problems:

http://www.lmsintl.com/demo-movie-powertrain-motion
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Re: Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

Post by Ron Clevenger »

Well Thanks, I now have full confidence when someone asks me why did I balance my engine at 52% over. My answer and looking them straight in the eye,.......cause!!,....it's all about dynamic motion... :D


Thanks seriously, I always enjoy learning.

Blessings...........Ron
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Re: Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

Post by Warp Speed »

Whack a mole........that is perfect!!!!!!! :lol:
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Re: Balance...neutral.....over.....under..????

Post by dwilliams »

Your ordinary small block Chevy (and many other) cranks has most of the counterweighting at the ends, to control the rotating couple. The inner throws have little or no counterweighting.

This means the inside two throws are underbalanced and the outer throws are overbalanced. This causes the crank to try to bend as it rotates under load. That's why the #2 and #4 mains are usually the first to show distress at high RPM.

The overbalance at the ends is more than the underbalance in the middle, so it can help if you overbalance the assembly... though if you were playing that game, it would be reasonable to underbalance the center two throws.

Any way you play the game, in my opinion it's useless fiddling unless you're seeing repeatable bearing problems.
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