well, last night my girlfriend and I figured out the spagetti mess of vacuum lines and electrical connectors and got ready to fire up the Trooper for the first time since its been out of comission due to a cracked head.

our initial attempts had me worried but i quickyl realized by the backfire through the intake i had dropped the distributor in with the timing marks lined up (another words TDC #1, but on exhaust rather than compress). I was 180* off, quickly rectified the problem and tried again.

This time, the trooper started up and sounds very mean i might add. either i have a big exhaust leak that i'm missing, or the Delta cam adds a lot more 'throaty' sound to it.

Now the problem... what i noticed almost immediately is the engine has a horrible shuttler. like the motor mounts are made of jello. any slight rev of the engine (even up to about 1200rpm) and the vibrations are transferred to the trooper and the car starts shaking. there is no way it could be driven or even rev'd like this, the engine what shutter itself apart in no time. So i quickly turned it off and haven't started it since. it sounds fine (other than a noticably deeper tone) and idles fine, doesn't act like its not firing on all cylinders or anything, its just there is way too much movement from the motor.

So i need your help, what should i be checking? obvisously it wasn't this way when it last ran with the old damaged head. I have a hard time believing anything in the bottom end was hurt, but maybe thats a little presumptive.

These were my initial thoughts:
- could ignition timing cause this? i haven't put a light on it yet, but it idles and otherwise sounds normal.
- what about valve adjustment? possibly caused from overtightening a valve? i don't think so, but just an idea.
- harmonic balancer? seemed ok when i examined it, do i need to reseat it? replace it? could it cause vibrations this bad?

then whole engine acts like its horribly (and i mean horribly) out of balance. what could this be?

Any insight would be greatly appriciated. thanks guys

-Rob