Well, you have 8 holes to plug for a delete. The pressure hole for each balance shaft (tap and plug) and then the 3 large return holes in the block on each balance shaft.

 

Mike,
I was reading your NA a turbo thread last night after I posted. I think I have a pretty good idea know on how to go about plugging off the balance shafts. Thank you for the detailed decription and documentation on how you did it. It is good to see detailed technical threads like that on rennlist.

 

I just removed my balance shaft belt last week, I have driven the car about 40 miles since then and I honestly can't tell the difference. I did it as a trouble-shooting step to help fix a rough idle problem. Needless to say it didn't fix it, but I picked up 2" Hg of vacuum at idle by running without the balance shafts!

 

I think you should never run with car parts. Take your time and walk - you don't want to trip and end up tossing a piston or throwing a rod.

 

Just thought I bring this back up...

You can hardly notice they are gone even in 3.0L motors with solid motormounts...

Also, if you have worn out O rings on the balance shafts they will leak vac as zero10 mentioned earlier..

 

I picked up 8" vacuum but I deleted a few unnecessary items while I was deleting the shafts.