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Performance Automotive Motorsport technician. Specialist in Rally car preparation, fabrication and on event servicing.

Fml I’m excelling myself 🤣 Was gonna do a long informative post but honestly my arms and hands are killing me so you’ll ...
10/09/2026

Fml I’m excelling myself 🤣
Was gonna do a long informative post but honestly my arms and hands are killing me so you’ll have to wait till another day. After cutting 16 valve seats and grinding in 40 valves I’ve just about had enough today 🙄

So first off the s54 head, 1st of all take note of how clean those inlet ports are for the post I’ll do tomorrow. Secondly, look at how much of the back of the valve you can see, yes this is factory and std and epic in every way, a tuning dream. I keep looking at it thinking how I could improve it ? In all honesty it’s such a thing of beauty I’m not sure I’d want to touch it 🤭 it’s an exceptionally great design and explains why they make so much power in std form.

1965 alfa head in for some guides

Lotus sunbeam 911 engine in for some hugging.

The big cam m44 done and ready for collection

And finally the m44 I finished last week which is going this weekend has oil pressure. I’ve been meaning to do this for a while, but I cut the starter mount out of an old gearbox so I could mount the starter while the engine is on the stand. Made up a wiring rig, fitted a manual gauge so I could get oil pressure up before the engine leaves. 48 psi at 250rpm was all I needed to see, just peace of mind for me knowing I’m not fitting it. And that’s not I don’t trust Dave, I have every faith in the guy. But I have less faith in others that have fitted my engines before.

Any way, days over, I’m done 🤭

The green goblin, yes I did say I’d keep you updated about the progress of it but it all sort of went pretty quick. So, ...
08/09/2026

The green goblin, yes I did say I’d keep you updated about the progress of it but it all sort of went pretty quick.
So, this car was bought as a development sort of thing. But also to keep me a little more sane and get out competing with my mates again.
Suspension, I had some Bilstein front casings kicking around and also some challenge spec inserts. The casings were m3 and the spring saddles are smaller 🙄 I wanted to run std front springs (not my own, yet) as I’m doing this on a budget to sort of prove what can be competitive. So a quick call to my friend and compact spares hoarder Anthony Newton and he dropped over a pair of std front legs.
Cut the saddles off and had a rough guess where they needed to sit. Fronts done.
New h/d outer ball joints and m3 rear wishbone bushs, z3 rack (Anthony again).

Rears, std rear springs, grp4 es**rt rear shocks nothing trick and works well.

Diff, 4.45 4 plate l*d I happened to have 🤣

I changed the gearbox to something else, that one is my secret sorry 😘

While the box was out I fitted an m20 flywheel which isn’t as light as usual but an upgrade and a cheaper option than ttv but obviously no where near as good.

A f**k load of welding, sump guard etc

I did put some cams in it, but honestly on a std head it’s really not worth it and I wouldn’t advise it either. I f**ked with the cam timing loads but could get the benefits I wanted to see with out one of my heads.

Yes I know, so wiped the head off and gave it a bit of a dremel yep you’ve seen the results 😘 got rid of the abs while the head was off, it’s just easier.
Std cams back in, cam timing change, jobs good enough for now (cams are inevitable at some point 🤣)
Oh and made a new exhaust for it 🤣

So good handling, stops good, pulls from 2700 to 7200 let’s see what the goblin car do.

The event, multi venue targa by Chelmsford Motor Club new event so no advantage for anyone.
18 tests, mixed surface. Teamed up with my great friend and top nav Ian Collings from Retro, Race & Rally again.

A load of last minute panics but all sorted thank to, yes, Anthony.

I’m not going to give you a blow by blow account of the epic event, but it was epic in every way 5th o/a at lunch. A little mistake in the afternoon dropped us to 9th. Then half way through test 18 a rock decided to give a fuel filter a whack and we spend 14 mins sorting that out mid test with no fuel pipe and limited tools to work with so we could finish which dropped us to 31 o/a.
But it didn’t detract from the fact, we laughed, had the best time in a pretty thrown together low spec (in my eyes) compact. It sums up everything I stand for in motorsport. I’d do it all again tomorrow.

Yep that was a bit of an essay, but you are all up to speed now 😘
Didn’t get many pictures at the weekend though but Ian sent me a few, thank you my friend.

Last post till next week, yes I’m trying to post some stuff for you all to read and maybe learn some stuff 😘 So the cam ...
04/09/2026

Last post till next week, yes I’m trying to post some stuff for you all to read and maybe learn some stuff 😘

So the cam timing, lift at tdc, 1.8 mm inlet 1.4 mm exhaust. Not easy to set up on an m44 with hydraulic tappets. So on the bench while assembling the head, I fitted one solid adjustable tappet I’ve made for this job.
Got the desired lift, zero a degree finder on the flat on the back of the head. Then put it on the flat on the back of the cam, write down the degrees advanced or re****ed. Then you can fit the head, zero the angle finder on the back of the head and adjust the cam to the desired lift at tdc by the angle finder 😘
Your welcome 🤗

Oh I’m sure I’ve told you about the front cover before, it’s on slots, when you fit it you have to lever it down from the holes in the front of the cams so it’s flush with the top face of the head, tighten it up, all done.

Have a great weekend, I’m going rallying with my mates ❤️

Just got home from a looooooong day trying to get the green goblin ready for the Chelmsford Motor Club dengie targa on S...
03/09/2026

Just got home from a looooooong day trying to get the green goblin ready for the Chelmsford Motor Club dengie targa on Sunday.

This build was handed to me as a job lot almost, but good spec, bds head, 34mm invites 1mm longer valve geometry correction valves, k20 pistons which are becoming the norm now a bit. So 86mm bore making it 1940cc running big cams, 280 degree with 11mm of lift.
Had an issue with the cams being tight in the head, so had the spend a lot of time sorting that and getting them turning as they should.

But this post is a bit of info about head gaskets, I’ve had a few erling gasket failures. So I’ve now gone over to v/r gaskets and bolts, also now I use permatex spray a gasket which I use on every head gasket now. I’ve noticed other well known engine builders saying the same thing.
It’s not cheap, but neither is taking the head off after a failure….
Night all 😘

I said earlier about the exhaust manifold, pretty self explanatory to be honest. They are welded from the inside, it’s r...
31/08/2026

I said earlier about the exhaust manifold, pretty self explanatory to be honest.
They are welded from the inside, it’s restrictive, weld around the outer fl**ge, get the dermal out 🤣 and grind that weld away.

Word of warning, if you don’t wear eye protection you will be making a trip to the hospital and they WILL be poking about in your eyes with a needle ….. it’s stainless steel, yes even the weld and those little bits you are die grinding off get everywhere.

Another follow on from yesterday, yes I’m at work 🤦‍♂️ So finished port, new valve guides with tapered ends. I said we’...
31/08/2026

Another follow on from yesterday, yes I’m at work 🤦‍♂️
So finished port, new valve guides with tapered ends. I said we’d gain a few cfm didn’t I ?
A nats c**k off the roof, the ports are to wide any way so if you go any wider on std valve size you loose every thing you are trying to gain.
Think of it like c**k size, big ain’t always best and too small is next to useless 😉 but no I’m not telling you how big any thing is. I need to keep some secrets 🤭
So the result speaks for its self really.

Exhaust ports you’ll have to buy a flow bench and find out for yourself 🤣

Exhaust manifold next, I’ll tell you everything you need to know about that, it’s a f**king hateful (but necessary) job and you are more than welcome to do that yourself 🤣🤣🤣🤣

Have a good day people, hope that taught you something.

Much love ❤️

Following on from yesterdays post, the first three pics are the port as it was yesterday on the bench. Burr finish and a...
30/08/2026

Following on from yesterdays post, the first three pics are the port as it was yesterday on the bench.
Burr finish and as you can see (shock horror) I’ve only touched the floor of the port. A big no no in all those tuning books you’ve read. Raise the roof is a common saying, well if you had a flow bench you’d see the port speed where I see it, the roof it’s slow as f**k up to 8mm of lift, so sorry the floor is where I’m at, shape is more important than finish, we’ll get a few more cfm yet but ultimately I’m not after numbers over 11mm of lift as the cams I use are just short of that and lift is the limiting factor with m44’s.

The next few pics are the next step finish wise, 60 grit and wouldn’t use anything finer. Still not touched the roof and there’s more reasoning behind that……

Just a relaxing Saturday…. 7.5% increase in flow is not to be sniffed at, this is the set spec of my targa heads. Very n...
29/08/2026

Just a relaxing Saturday….
7.5% increase in flow is not to be sniffed at, this is the set spec of my targa heads. Very noticeable increase in torque, power and drivability.
Feels like a mountain to climb with work in general, but I still love it, every day.

Happy m44 Friday
31/07/2026

Happy m44 Friday

Seem to be m44/42 mad at the moment …. Lots of heads, new cams in the design stage with Piper Cams for the m44. Update M...
11/07/2026

Seem to be m44/42 mad at the moment …. Lots of heads, new cams in the design stage with Piper Cams for the m44.

Update M44 FTD new front brakes, air filter set up (remember all that testing 😉)
Std ratio 4 plate l*d fitted (yes I did have one just kicking around) and a pair of 270 cams as I’ve never tried them with a std head and this car is all about testing.
More soon then …

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Cross In Hand
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