Didnt want to hijack Rich's thread too much so thought I'd start a new topic anyway. Several of you are running with no balance belt. I've heard of a few balance belts failing and causing the cam belt to fail. So sure seems like a good idea. But what else needs to be removed? just the balance belt, or more?

ok to keep it over on mine if you wanted then the thread could be cleaned up a bit so peeps know what damage can be caused

Probably worth it's own thread I reckon anyway. Might help for search purposes.

very true

Just the belt mate, you cannot remove the shafts without getting blanks made for the holes as they have oilways in, can do the tensioner too as it'll be redundant. No problems to the running until you get to around 3500 - 4000 RPM, then a slight engine vibration, dont see that being an issue to 'normal' L200 drivers...

I ran mine for years without one on and it was great. Just literally stripped it down and cut the belt off with a nice sharp knife. Can remove the tensioner and belt if you really want though.

Did you ever experience this vibration Stick?

I didnt on road (6months) and off-road it never really went past 1500rpm so no aswell.

We took mine off to and was fine. Used it to tow sticks about and it never seemed any different

I have seen them driven around for years with no issues. Take the belt off and out don;t just cut it and leave it in there though.

Up to 3k rpm you wont really notice it. Drive around much above 3krpm for any length of time and your engine is going to die anyway with or without balance belts.

In theory, by not balancing the engine out you will wear it out quicker. The shafts are fitted as the engine has a 2up/2down setup for the pistons (makes them cheap to manafacture)
Also, I have never seen a 'factory serviced' one with a snapped balance belt.

I am sure 90% of the ones I see with a snapped balance belt are due to the balance belt not being changed when the cam belt was done.
I have seen plenty where the cambelt was a contitec and the snapped balance belt was a mitsubishi one... at 80k or so..

You are also supposed to check/re-tension both the belts every 20k or so and although most garages can cope with the cambelt most of them think you have to take the bottom pulley off to do the balance belt so they don't bother to tension it