had the lightweight flywheel balanced at a cost of $75 to match the crate flywheel. the guy who did it or the business ari in grandview, mo has been there for 30+ years, he did a tilton flywheel i had about 20 years ago and after i took the stuff over to him i visited another guy who i sold some parts to and he still had the flywheel, with 50 oz. of heavy metal welded to it! the business owners son is now getting ready to build a ffr cobra with a dart blocked 427 so we chatted a bit, when he left 'nam he went to purdue and bought a gt350 and said there were 3 cars on the showroom floor, a 260ci cobra, a gt350 and a hipo mustang! said he couldn't keep up with his college buddy in a 260ci cobra. anyway, he builds lots of ford small block stuff for the circle track racers and has tons of go fast stuff from 30 yrs accumulation.
here is a pic of the flywheel assy with the massaged weight, and a pic of the bellhousing with the bottom cut off which should put it right at the bottom of the jbl frame. the
oil pan is still expected to be 1" below the frame.
i determined that i can use the flat faced throwout bearing, looking at the mcleod pressure plate the fingers are curved on the end which mimics the stock fingers. if the fingers were flat i would have needed to use a rounded throwout bearing which is usually the case with the smaller pressure plates.