Workshop Photos

Valve Seat Machining

Crack Testing

This Cleveland crankshaft had come out of an engine that had spun it’s main bearings. The heat generated by the failure produced the heat cracks shown as horizontal light blue lines in this photo. Crank is unserviceable. When testing a “K” series Lotus crankshaft last month, we unexpectedly found a crack around the rear main journal.

The owner was able to relate this to vibration that the engine developed when last out on the track. The clutch and flywheel has been put to one side waiting for the replacement crank to arrive. A test balance has to now clear this assembly as a possible source of the problem.
Our Non-Destructive-Testing (NDT) methods mainly rely on our 3000 AMP Magnetic Particle Bench but we also have the training to use dye penetrants when applicable.

Aluminium Welding

Read more about Aluminium Welding here

Assembly Heads

Modern cylinder heads depend on clean modern oils fed through clean oil galleries and metered through clean small feed drillings to lubricate and operate all the small costly componentry that operate the engine valves. We operate under the SIX RULES of engine assembly in our shop: CHECK CHECK CHECK and CLEAN CLEAN CLEAN.

This Cleveland engine block has been mounted onto the CNC mill to hold the customer’s fabricated inlet manifold so that we can machine it to take the new supercharger. It was of some interest to us that a nice piece of fabrication like this had been made at home in the owner’s garage using nothing more than a single phase welder, oxy set, basic power tools and some twenty man hours. Oh, and some skills.

Thought you might appreciate seeing what goes on at night in your neighbour’s garages. We have offered the customer access to our web site should he want to share more of the many stages of work left in his 1934 Ford hot rod project.

Back to top