Type 4 head experts in SF Bay Area?, Head/engine advice Options

[gregmharrison]

Good day, I recently purchased a 2.0 type 4 motor with a bad valve seat and wondered if there were any good shops in the SF Bay Area who could look at the heads for me and determine if they are worth repairing or better to replace. If anyone has any knowledge of them, these are made by AA Performance out of Covina, CA
Thanks!

[JamesM]

Were your heads from AA? Looks like your cylinders are but this would be the first I have heard of any new casting heads dropping valve seats.

For a long time original 2.0 heads were always reused/machined because there was no other option but now there are a couple options for new 2.0 castings. If this is just a stock 2.0 I think you are better off just buying new heads vs having a shop rework what you have. Many of the better shops that work on type 4 heads wont even touch original castings anymore.


https://pmbperformance.com/products/empi-su...AF8mEGLoXI5q07q

[Jack Standz]

You could ship to:

https://dprmachine.com/

Or

https://www.europeanmotorworks.com/vw/head-service.html

Best to call first.

Or

Aapistons.com sells AA heads (less than half the cost of Empis) or AMC heads.

[JeffBowlsby]

Ken Jansen in Belmont. He is very experienced and usually very busy, so don’t expect it in a few days or a week.

https://m.yelp.com/biz/jansen-enterprise-belmont

[yellowporky]

Shawn at Star Machine in Emeryville does excellent work
https://www.yelp.com/biz/star-machine-emeryville

[ssstikircr]

Ken Jansen in Belmont. He is very experienced and usually very busy, so don’t expect it in a few days or a week.

https://m.yelp.com/biz/jansen-enterprise-belmont

I second Ken Jansen at Jensen Enterprises. They are in the old Donsco VW building off of Ralston in Belmont.

[zippy_db]

I hope my question helps the thread owner if he goes the new route! My son's 2.0L 914 has a similar valve seat challenge. If I went with new heads, are there any recommendations or strong preference of the EMPI SV4 or AA heads from the 914 World collective?

There are no machine shops in my area that have good knowledge or experience with TYPE IV motors, so I am thinking new heads for now is his best option. The motor will remain stock displacement. Thanks!

https://pmbperformance.com/products/empi-su...AF8mEGLoXI5q07q

https://aapistons.com/collections/stock-per...der-heads-44x36

[Jack Standz]

I hope my question helps the thread owner if he goes the new route! My son's 2.0L 914 has a similar valve seat challenge. If I went with new heads, are there any recommendations or strong preference of the EMPI SV4 or AA heads from the 914 World collective?

There are no machine shops in my area that have good knowledge or experience with TYPE IV motors, so I am thinking new heads for now is his best option. The motor will remain stock displacement. Thanks!

https://pmbperformance.com/products/empi-su...AF8mEGLoXI5q07q

https://aapistons.com/collections/stock-per...der-heads-44x36

There are many many ways to go. DPR or European Motor Works and others can perform the type of work you're looking for.

First, you don't "need a machine shop in your area." Why? Because you can easily ship your heads (or entire engine).

Recently, we shipped a set of bare new "2 liter"heads we had bought several years ago. We specified the valve size, how to machine the seats/height, the valve manufacturer, etc. They will also run beehive springs, have been opened up for larger "nickie" cylinders, and other modifications. And they cost less than the Empis discussed previously in this post.

But the main point is that you can get exactly what you want with the right vendor/shop. These are options we didn't used to have. Or were very hard and very expensive to find.