Engine Builder??? Can i get some good names please
04-28-2011, 10:33 PM
#22
Racer
There is a reason HKE is backed up. His stuff works and is worth every penny. Everytime I have been to his shop he has stuff in there from other well known builders fixing their screw-ups..
04-29-2011, 10:29 AM
#24
Melting Slicks
Buy the parts. Take the block, crank, rods, pistons, and bearings to a machine shop, have them prep the block for assembly and set the bearing clearances as well as take care of the balancing. Do the rest of the assembly yourself. Putting an engine together is as simple as being able to use a torque wrench and plastigage. Regardless of what people want to try and make you believe, there is NO black magic to engine assembly.
04-29-2011, 02:51 PM
#26
Drifting
HKE is the best!
04-29-2011, 03:54 PM
#27
Burning Brakes
If he had an ego a *quarter* of the size of some other Ls builders, he would embarrass a lot of shops with pictures of their crap that he fixes when their engines take a dump and the original shop ***** on their customer.
Half of the "top" Ls builders out there were former students of his when he taught at SAM in fact.
Not many people truly realize how much better he is than the rest probably because he doesn't have his employees pumping him up on the forums.
He doesn't post pictures of the pretty and sexy RHS blocks, heads, manifolds, rods, and pistons laying around his shop.
He doesn't post threads about his latest and greatest builds and how much power it made or how fast it went.
When there is a thread about ANY of his engines, it's started by a CUSTOMER.
He is too busy on the forums actually giving away a ton of information to tech questions since he can't get the "teacher" out of him.
I'm not knocking any shop for marketing themselves as I'm not only all for it, but I really enjoy their threads and pics about their latest builds.
I'm just pointing out an interesting difference since not many people (average forum members) know about him, yet he is the busiest high end custom LS engine builder by a long shot.
I've been following his builds since the early 2000s when I still had my Supra and I started getting interested in LS engined cars.
He's been building super large CI/long stroke LS engines for 10 years while 99% of the other builders said it "wouldn't work", spouted off nonsense about "hp per cubic inch", or did build them with a dramatic FAIL.
Hell he was THE person who designed the proper piston for a 4" stroke Ls when all of the other aftermarket pistons burned oil like a heater. Then the rest copied his design. I could go on about other trails he blazed for the aftermarket Ls engine market but I wont'. The other builders are just trying to catch up.
A maxxed out NA engine is more difficult to build than a boost engine by a long shot.
I think he can handle your boosted motor.
**guess what else: He doesn't go around having negative threads about him deleted off of forums he is a supporting vendor at either**
Doesn't need to. The worst threads about him are complaining about his backlog, and slow email response. Which can be frustrating! But he always comes through.
04-29-2011, 04:09 PM
#29
Drifting
Member Since: Aug 2009
Location: Texas 1,002rwhp/928rwtq
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St. Jude Donor '09-'10
HKE is worth the wait. He will design / build around your requirements and not oversell parts unless you specifically want to. It will add to the lead time, but I recommend having him design custom pistons if you plan on running high boost.
Last edited by aTX427; 04-29-2011 at 04:13 PM.
04-30-2011, 10:20 AM
#30
Burning Brakes
HKE did mine, pretty quick turn around, 2-3 weeks once all parts got there. It's a 434 LSX with an F2. I wouldn't use anyone else.
Last edited by flyinmedic; 04-30-2011 at 10:23 AM.
