[944imraan]

I've got a early 944, and in the last few months noticed a mild "clunking" sound like a pair of shoes in the drier. Since the weather has warmed up lately, I changed oil from 10W-30 to 20W-50, and the noise is now suddenly a clanking, most noticeable at idle, and tapering off with increases in RPM.

The guy who owns the race shop where I get some of my parts thought it was probably the balance shaft bearings going bad. (I suppose that the extra clearance and less-lubrication provided by the thicker oil would make it worse.)

In case it's relevant: it's been running roughly recently also, so I've got a new distributor cap, rotor, etc. on order that should help.

I'm just trying to determine the scope of the problem, as I see three potential options:

1) cut the bal shaft belt and put up with vibration (upgrade motor mounts to prevent them from going bad?)

2) pull the shafts, replace bearings, change and retension timing and bal shaft belts, and water pump ($$$, 12k since timing belt +wp change)

3) just rebuild the engine (might not be much more expensive than #2)

or am i barking up the wrong tree?