Vanguard 18hp flywheel on 16hp motor
 

Wondering if one of you guys might have any information on this. I have a 2160ags with the vanguard 16hp. The ring gear on the flywheel is about half stripped of its teeth. The replacement ring gear for this flywheel is no longer available, as is the flywheel, but there is a kit with a new flywheel with plastic fins and a different cover. It is very pricey for a 21 yr old mower. Not worth the investment at that price. My other option is to install a flywheel I have from a vanguard 18hp engine. It is the type with the bolt on fins, but will bolt to the flywheel, and the driveshaft coupler will attach to it. I'd have to modify the screen cover for the driveshaft to fit thru, but it will all physically fit together. My question is are these flywheels zero balanced, or do they act as a counter balance to the crankshaft? If they are zero balanced than I should be fine, but if balanced to the weight of the rotating assembly I'd probably throw things out of balance.

Not sure they will interchange..... and by that I mean even bolt on.

Pretty sure you can still get the ring gear for a Vanguard through aftermarket. Look on Vogul's website. I think he has them.

http://i115.photobucket.com/albums/n...pspl7uifhi.jpg

It bolts on perfectly fine, Same diameter as the old one, starter gear meshes, the driveshaft coupler fits as well. This is the 18hp flywheel on my 16hp engine. I will look into the aftermarket replacement ring gear. In the mean time I was just wondering if anyone knew how these flywheels are balanced, which would tell me if I can use it or not. If usable I'd prefer to use this one as it has a steel ring gear, and obviously because I already have it on hand.

In case anyone is curious I went ahead and ran it with the the 18hp flywheel and it runs fine, not out of balance or anything. I used the flywheel cover, fan, and screen from the 18 hp engine as well as the 18hp flywheel and fan are thicker than the original. Only had to trim the plastic tube that goes between the firewall and flywheel cover a bit and it all fit together well. Back in business for now.

Glad that worked out for ya despite ill info.. :beerchug:

You can look at a flywheel and see if it's balanced for the engine or not. If it's round with no additional weight or castings, it is just a flywheel. I've not seen a small engine yet that I can recall that uses the flywheel as a balance/counter weight.

You could have checked it for balance in less time than it took to post the question.

There was no ill info...... WTF are you talking about?

Now if I had said that and was wrong. You would have told me not to guess and to get correct info before posting

No.... and I didn't say it would or wouldn't work. I said I didn't know. I've never hounded you for saying you didn't know the answer. (That I recall.) Only when you give an incorrect answer.

I'm not doing this AGAIN. :beatdeadhorse:

Easy answer, call Vanguard and ask them, they built the engine. Damn do I have to do all the hard work around here? :biggrin2: