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Our High Performance Engines

NOTE: This page is undergoing serious "renovation" RIGHT NOW!

Unlike a great many shops in the USA, we work almost exclustively in the metric system (whenever practical) and know the difference between 0.010" and 0.25mm - and know this difference matters! We know our engines are run hard so we build them to run that way a long time, primarily through careful attention to detail, quality workmanship, and careful selection of parts.

Engine Information On Our Site

Here are some handy links:

• Background on us, our work, and our attitude
• Standard Engine Service Offerings
• Optional Engine Service Offerings
• We have individual pages for some engine types that discuss their unique features
  • Porsche 356 / 912
  • Denzel
  • Okrasa
  • VW 25hp, 36hp, etc
• Engine accessories for all of the above
• Engines we have for sale outright or with trade-in
• Some Engines of Our Past

Our Background and Attitude

We are true engine enthusiasts and are passionate about all the high-performance engines derived from the earliest VW engines, especially Porsche, Denzel, and Okrasa. One of us, Richard, is writing two books on the subject, one focused on running dimensions and specifications (intended for mechanics) and the other a volume showing nearly every component side-by-side with all its counterparts and commentary on how to pick out one part from another. (Text giving assembly advice is also in the works but it hasn't been decided yet into which volume it will go.)

Our philosophy is that engines should be ready to be "run hard and put away wet."

Richard has been building high-performance VW based engines since the late 1970s, and began building Porsche, Denzel, and Okrasa engines in the mid 1980s. He began building them for others starting in 1989. His engines are well known, even famous in some communities, and he has served clients from all over the world - places like Germany, Australia, New Zeiland, Dubai, Finland, the Philipines, South Africa, Japan, and many more. We are now offering long-blocks and completed ("turn-key" engines outright on an occasional basis, and both service and rebuild all the engines in our venue, including the 4-Cam Carerra as well as older 911s.

AT RIGHT: Here, Richard's 1959 Okrasa 1500cc powered Karmann Ghia tows home a Porsche 356 Convertible D - a journey of more than 1000 miles.

While we have experience rebuilding a wide variety of air-cooled engines, ranging from the immediate post-war 1947 Volkswagen engine right through the Porsche 911 era, our business focus is on Porsche, Okrasa and Denzel engines. VW is specifically not included because we simply don't wish to compete in that market. Our priorities on rebuilding any engine are, in order: reliability, performance, and authenticity. If you wanted the true ultimate in performance of the modern era, you probably wouldn't be reading this. We presume that you, like us, are interested in the vintage machine. You want the engine to be as it was "back in the day," though a few unseen improvements for performance or reliability are often welcome. You want it to look great and run even better, and never have to worry about it. Our philosophy is that they should be ready to be "run hard and put away wet." So, we do all our work presuming that the throttle will be either at idle or wide open most all the time. ...If you want an engine for a garage queen, we can provide for you but don't be surprised when we are just as focused on performance and reliability as good looks. While customers are the backbone of our business and we always want a happy customer, we won't be happy - and may refuse - to cut corners regarding reliability.

To use an old, well known saying to emphasize and summarize our attitude, as the old saying goes: Reliability, Performance, and Economy - pick any two! Our focus is on the first two: Reliability and Performance. If you want a cheap engine, go somewhere else - you'll do us all a favor since a cheap engine can neither also be reliable and have great performance. But if you want a vintage engine that's authentic, runs great and is reliable at reasonable cost, you've come to the right place.

Standard Service Offerings

Most often, we are asked to rebuild engines, but sometimes there are other things that need doing, such as fixing a problem. Here's a list of our basic services, irrespective of whether it's for a rebuild or other service:

• We offer a comprehensive set of standard machining services (such as line-boring cases, replacing valve seats, flycutting, etc) and can usually provide restoration services such as reparing cracks, replacing broken cylinder head fins, etc. We have a very capable in-house machine shop and have solid, decades-long relationships with machine shops who have the required machinery we don't have.
• We offer complete blue printing, if desired, and we offer a great alternative that's a lot cheaper and yet almost identical in effect.
• We offer servicing and rebuilding of all engine components and stock a great many hard to find small parts for distributors, fuel pumps, and carburetors.
• We have a comprehensive welding, soldering, and brazing capability, including MIG, TIG, resistance (spot) welding, oxygen / aceteline, and we even have a blacksmith forge and our own casting furnaces capable of melting up to around 15 gallons of metal at a time! We can work with all the metals used in these automobiles.
• We offer complete engine detailing.
• We know the vintage engines very well and can advise on originality, and durability.
• We have serious racing experience, and know a lot of performance "tricks".
• We have access to lots of engine accessories (parts).

If our customer were to hand us an engine core and ask us to rebuild it, these are the steps we will perform without asking - this is our standard work. If there's anything from this list you do not want done, you'd have to explicitly discuss it with us!

• We provide documentation on every engine we build, typically these days, so long as the customer does not object, in the form of a web page unique to that engine. (Unfortunately, a lot of customers do not want their engine detail on the web.)
• We always balance every engine, both rotational and reciprocating parts, and combustion chamber volumes.
• We will always install new valve guides and do at least a basic "valve job," depending on exactly what we were asked to do.
• We will not go over 9:1 (nominal) compression ratio without a special discussion with the customer because with modern fuels, this can be risky.

Optional Service Offerings

Here are things which we offer which are non-standard in the sense that our customers must ask for them, but most customers do ask us for these services! Here's our list:

• We have our own Stuska water brake Engine Dynamometer which permits us to offer four different services
  • We can run-in new engines as per factory specifications.
  • We can tune engines using our dynamometer in conjunction with our five-gas exhaust analyzer.
  • We offer a run-in and tune service - both at the same time, saving our customers $$.
  • We can perform diagnistics and repair that others without a dynamometer simply cannot perform, such as getting stubborn piston rings to seat, or finding the cause of a tick noise or leak.
• We offer powder-coating services.
• We offer plating services.
• We offer four standard long-block rebuild service packages
• We offer three Premium long-block rebuild service packages

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