i have heard that timing gears, while they are very reliable, create a harmonic vibration, especially the "noisy" ones, and that vibration can rob you of some horsepower, even if you have a good balancer, such as a fluidamper you can still lose some HP to the harmonic vibrations...... i would aprecciate any input

 

I think the biggest problem with noisey timing sets gears/chains is the effect of them on the knock sensor.

 

Timing gear setups 'whine' at a different frequency then most KS's are tuned to respond to, so they usually don’t bother the KS.

Personally, I don't want my car sounding like it has a blower on it if it doesn't (I probably would rather hide the sound even if it did). Secondly, there is very little reason to go that way unless you've got a serious, $$$ effort, and if that's the case you're better off running one of the assorted timing belt setups out there.

 

JESEL:hail: :hail: :hail:

 

If you want max hp on the street a double roller chain setup is the way to go. Comp Cams did a study and the double roller chain free'd up 17 hp (supposely) over the gear drive. They said that since it was 2 chains not much worrying about them stretching and it will pretty much last as long as the motor is running.

The gear drives create a little more drag. The 3 gear types aren't as bad, but the 4 gear types one gear is always getting pulled into the cam and crank gears as the other gear is getting pushed out. That just creates more friction which limits hp. Does it really matter? Not really to most of us, but to some it might. I have a Pete Jackson noisy gear drive in my room waiting for my new 383. I also love the noisy sound + I picked it up for 80 bucks.

Course the other solution is a Comp Cams or Jesel belt setup... but they have a short life depending on mileage and weather. Wet ones will be tucked away from weather and road debris, but theres not much chance for you to inspect it. The dry types provide visual inspect but are free to weather and road debris. If you have around 600 bucks to spend and feel fine with checking the belts go for it.

Camshaft Drives Tech Article on HotRod.com

 

The nice thing about the dry belt setups is that you can adjust your cam timing as easily as you can adjust your ignition timing on most cars, making it dead simple to tweak things for best performance or to determine if you could use more or less lobe duration.