Just a little background, the harmonic balancer is also called a
vibration damper. It has nothing to do with timing or anything other
than keeping your crankshaft healthy. In my other life (Corvairs) the
early models (102s) had a steel crankshaft pulley and at times the
harmonics were such that the crankshaft would break, always at the same
journal. When they changed to the 110s (and 140s etc.), the harmonic
balancer became a must. I had one break on an early model, everything
was fine until one day I started out from a signal and the crankshaft
parted, just like that, no warning. Of course, to be fair, it had been
cracking for some time before it parted but who knew. Corvairs now use
a sandwich of steel core and steel outer portion with a layer of
Neoprene or Viton in the center. That takes care of the problem.
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