Hello, I have a hot rod shop in Austria.

Most of the time I let my engines done from a machine shop in the states but I am not satisfied anymore, or actually never.

My question is who can recommend a good but cheap machine shop?
I need to make profit on my engines and have an expensive shipping on them so I cannot pay that much as I would pay for my private motor.

Also I want to ask, what would be a good price for the machining of a block.

Lets construct an example:

Case 1:

I send an old BBC Mark IV 454 4 bolt main to the shop.
I look for the classic stuff like:

Cleaning it by oven cleaning or shoot peening or something like that.

Testing the block, for example pressure testing, magna fluxing, sonic checking
etc...

Torque plate boring and moly honing.

My customer require a 540cid so we sleeve the block to go the save way.

Square decking

Align honing

New freeze plugs

New quality cam and crank bearings

Blueprinting

If I have something important forgotten please add it to the list.
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How much should I pay for that (if I have orders more often at all)


Case II

Like case one but with an good but affordable forged and balanced rotating assembly (like a eagle stroker kit for example) arranged by the shop or a complete kit + plus balancing if the rotating assembly is not a set and need to be balanced (or need balanced sets also a final fine balancing to be really fine?)

Please members give me recommendations regarding the prices and machine shops.
I got some orders that have to be done and the customers wait.

This business is only parallel to my job, hot rodding is not a big business in Europe, unfortunately!

Thanks Hannes

 

Hannes,
I moved your thread because it really doesn't belong in the Advanced Engineering Tech Section. I chose this forum because it hopefully will have the best chance at getting exposure in the EU.

I have some thoughts on this subject. First, check into automotive machine shops that work with diesel trucks off road equipment (bulldozers, farm tractors, etc.). These shops are set up to handle bores larger than 100 mm. Align honing of crank shaft journals, decking a block or cylinder head, boring and honing are really no different on any engine as long as precision and careful practices are observed.

Hopefully, there will be some members in your region (Austria, Germany, Northern Italy, etc.) who will have some good suggestions.

I wish you the very best in your search.

Steve