shaving balancing rods from a ka24de?

[jc240zx]

ive posted a few times already , im building a high compression ka24de, with the ka24e pistons, ive purchased all new internals for this build, had the crank balanced, everything has gone .20 over. Now my next question is is it a waste of effort to shave and lighten and have the rods balanced . my main goal with all mods is to get as much horsepower as possible. Any suggestions or comments will be appreciated

[rogoman]

If you really want to do an all out NA motor, get the rods magnefluxed, straightened, polished, and shot-peened. Use ARP rod bolts and nuts. The crank should be also magnefluxed, straightened, and shot-peened. Magneflux the main caps and use ARP cap bolts. Custom balance the entire reciprocating assembly. You should run forged pistons for reliability. JE and Ross both make forged pistons for the KA.

Don't even think of lightening the rods unless you want to blow the motor up.

Early SOHC pistons in a DOHC will give you ~11.6:1 compression. Later SOHC pistons in a DOHC will give you ~11.1:1 compression. That's too much compression to run on street gas. You're going to have to run racing gas which is around 6$ per gal.

[ISUJinX]

All of the above is correct except the part about gas. You can run up to about 12.3 on 93 octane. If you only have 91 where you live, that will be pushing it.

You can sorta, kinda, a little bit lighten rods without blowing up the engine... but the best way to do it is just balance them all to the weight of the lightest one to start. ONLY remove material from the balance pads at the ends of the rods. Shot peening is a good idea.