I am to the point in my build planning that i need to get my heads rebuilt. They are a late set of 2L 914 heads. I know HAM in the past was one of the best but have read that he has phased out doing rebuilds. Any recommendations?

If you are prepared to ship them, Foley knows a guy up here in the Northeast...and Cap'n Crusty speaks very highly of his guy in CA.

They guy up here does work for many of the 356 engine shops, he is very good.

Both will redo 2.0 liter heads...both have many years of experience.

Rich

I do still work with most models of used Type 4 heads. These include pretty much all models except the O.E. VW 2.0 transporter heads.

I offer only complete re-manufacturing of Type 4 heads.

I will not service heads suffering with the following issues:-Severe detonation damage.

-Severe water damage

-Prior weld work in the combustion chambers.

-Excessive fly-cutting

-Port work that we deem to be excessive or poorly executed

-They have a GEX stamp.

-They have a JCS stamp

-Poor casting repairs to valve cover rail, push-rod tube bores, rocker stands.

-This covers the majority of the issues that will drop a head from consideration for service, but there may be other reasons your head(s) don’t qualify.

Some prior work performed by another shop, while it may not kick the heads out of consideration for our services, may cause an increase in the service cost. The most common examples of this are if oversize valve seats have been installed, or if poor quality work has been performed to the exhaust stud bosses.

I will service heads if they have dropped a valve seat and the damage is confined to the seat counter-bore and the immediate area. This is what we typically see when the seat works lose and wedges sideways into the head. This usually looks worse than it actually is and the repair is surprisingly affordable.

I will service [i]heads if they have suffered minor water damage in an intake port. Provided the heads are not being considered for high-performance port work. If the damage is very minor we may still consider the heads for HP work, but this on a case by case basis.

I encourage anyone considering having me work on their heads to send me as many photos of their heads as they like to help me determine if their heads meet my criteria for service. I will do my best to spot any issues in these photos. However, if heads are sent to me for inspection that are not eligible for service the customer is responsible for the return shipping cost if they want the heads back
Len Hoffman

I would add to Len's list of things to do and that he can do. I am currently experiencing a set of heads that were done by a guy here in Sacramento named Dwight Mitchell. He obsessively port matched the heads so that the ports all flowed pretty much exactly the same. I have experienced this with Len's LE200 heads and now with these Dwight Mitchell heads. There is power to be had with this. Len can CNC port the heads to probably any of his LE configurations. I am sure he would have a charge for this and I don't know what it would be, but if you are building some performance into your rebuild, it is worth asking him about.

I should add before someone wants to know how to get hold of Dwight that this engine was built in the 1990's and sat on a pallet for some time. Dwight has retired and moved to Florida. His engines and the cars he built are the stuff of legend here in Northern California. I won my class in the last SCCA event with this engine by 7 full seconds. I have won every other event this year in my class as well. In fairness, the 7 seconds probably had more to do with new V710's than anything.

Rob,

Ever Dyno your Dwight built motor?

Rich

No sorry, but think strong 2056...

Does anyone have a good recommendation for head rebuilds these days?

These guys. http://www.europeanmotorworks.com/contact.html

My understanding is that if you want a GOOD set of heads, you buy brand new castings and send those to Len to have them done "right".

I figure $2500 for heads only for my next 2.0L build but I have a very nice set right now so I'm not in a big rush.

Stu

There are some significant changes coming to our new T4 head program. Wouldn't mention it now if it weren't for this thread, as details are still being hammered out. Many of you know that Jake sold the T4Store to LNEngineering. If you're not in a big hurry you may want to wait til the new Type4Store is rolled out to make your decision on the heads for your next powerplant.

Yep.. And ironically Charles and his team are coming down tomorrow to pack up all of the inventory and ship it to Illinois. I can't wait to be out of the parts business!!!!

The T4 Store will be better than it was when I owned it, because I suck at dealing with anything retail. Charles has a bigger team and he doesn't build engines, so this will allow both of us to only work with what we are best at.

Now its all about development and engine building here. The T4 Store was a decades worth for me and I have been fed up with it for the majority of that time. It was very effective for the growth of the business and engine program, and was effective.

Charles is even bringing back the kit program and will add a lot more of the items back into the store that we had omitted, like the Mallory Uni-lite distributors and other parts.

So if anyone calls here for parts, we'll just hit a button and transfer them straight to LN. The infrastructure is already in place. It'll be a seamless transition. I have sold my last part, the store was getting in my way of the growth explosion that we have gone through and it had to go… Else my actions would end up as front page headlines!

Thanks Jake, you just pretty much answered most of the questions I was gonna pester Len with about whether LN was going to continue his heads, etc. Good to
hear that more things will be added to the mix.

Well good luck unleashed Jake! And i am looking forward to seeing whats prouts from type four.

The entire store will stay the same, and will only get better. Same website, same components and etc. LN will only be adding to it.

Unless someone knew it had happened, they'd never even realize that the store had changed hands except if they looked at the shipping location of their parts or paid attention to the domain that the store was hosted on :-)

LN and I have worked so closely together that its time that they handle all of the interface with the public outside of engine builds, and its time that I get back behind that green curtain and perform magic. The part that I won't miss is product support, I can't wait to click forward on the first email that comes through :-)

Yes, of course, Len is still the exclusive cylinder heard provider for the Type 4 Store. In fact, when the LN Type 4 Store opens there will be the most updated profiles available. Things will only get batter, because all the important stuff isn't changing, and because I stayed on to continue developing new goodies :-)

Will Charles be selling the DTM , thanks Bill D.

Charles and his staff at LNEngineering are bringing new enthusiasm to the store and I'm thrilled to be working with them. Jake and his staff have just flat had too much on their plate the past couple of years. The work hasn't suffered from it, but it's hard to focus on retail sales and run an active engine program for multiple engine platforms.

We're tweaking our new head program to fill gaps that are widening as good used cores become increasingly difficult to source, specifically the 2.0 914 heads. In the past couple of years we have rejected way more heads than we accepted for service because they didn't meet the minimum condition for our service criteria.

More info will be available soon.

LN WILL BE SELLING EVERYTHING THAT THE T4 STORE HAS ALWAYS SOLD.. Just like I stated above in a prior post.

Not to abuse the caps lock key, just wanting to clearly state this.

The ONLY difference is who you'll be paying and where the parts ship from… And that we are completely out of the transaction, offering no support. The support is what KILLED me.