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So a little while back I posted pictures of the D'Andrea boring head, but I realized that I never posted pics of the sort of work it does. Sure, it's accurate, but that's not the entire reason I bought it. I also bought it because it creates an unparalleled surface finish.
Surface finish is important mainly because hard working people are giving me their money, and the product needs to look amazing even though most of the stuff we spend our time on will never be seen on the outside of the motor. Still, the cylinder spigots are a big part of the visuals of seeing a naked case half so we decided to make them look really pretty. There are two pictures here. One of them shows the cylinder spigot as done with an ordinary (but very expensive) end mill. The surface finish is acceptable. Its as good as or slightly better than OEM.
The second is what the boring head does....it's like a mirror. My finger is in there so you can see the reflectivity. It's really an outstandingly smooth surface that at the very least will help airflow tremendously. I am not saying it will make more power, but it can't hurt!
Lastly, I have heard a rumor that Porsche is considering or already in the process of selling the 993 and 3.2 cases new again. I have no idea whether this is true or not, but I actually hope it is. To Porsche, I say bring it.
Their OEM cases never achieved anything even close to resembling accuracy as I have found on this long journey. Their materials are mediocre, and their machining even more so. I am fairly confident that regardless of whether they re-launch their 993 and 3.2 cases, they will never, ever meet the standard of my case.
Oh, and you'd still need to send a Porsche case out for extra machining for 109 spigots, O rings, extra squirters, shuffle pinning, boat tailing GT3 Pump clearance, and more. Yeah, bring it.
You know...Porsche works with a LOT of suppliers to arrange to supply "classic" (out of production) parts. They don't do it all in-house. Mercedes-Benz has gotten into the same thing.
If they're actually interested in making air-cooled cases available again (and they should!) I wonder if there's an argument for just making Taormina the factory approved supplier. Yeah, it's not a factory-original looking case, but for a high-performance manufacturer like Porsche, the improved consistency seems worth it. I really believe this case is going to be far less prone to leaks, and a customer spending thousands on a new-production case sourced through the dealership would rightly be PISSED to rebuild his engine and find any leaks 10,000 miles later.
I don't think we would be building them to the price point Porsche is after. They will probably sell for a similar price as mine, but Porsche will make them in Spain or Eastern Europe and they will have a much lower unit cost to Porsche than mine because Porsche will probably make 2000+ at a time.
I don't think we would be building them to the price point Porsche is after. They will probably sell for a similar price as mine, but Porsche will make them in Spain or Eastern Europe and they will have a much lower unit cost to Porsche than mine because Porsche will probably make 2000+ at a time.
I have to admit quality of what I see lately from the OE suppliers is not close to being what it was. I have a relatively new set of cast 996GT3 plenums and they are full of porosity and core ****s. They didn't clean their cores well either. But for the $$$ what do you expect? For a more critical part like a case I hope they have minimum standards and QC in place but the question is how high is the bar and clearly you are trying to raise it.
I might have missed it but how did you plan to maintain traceability to production and process dates? I'm assuming they will be marked and documents retained?
Each case will have two serial numbers. The first serial number is in the conventional location. This is reserved for the owner, who can put whatever they like in this spot. The second serial number is actually our serial number, and will be located on the case elsewhere. That is the number that will correspond with the foundry's records and inspection records.
Simply amazing. Fantastic work - many thanks for taking up the challenge!
Thank you very much! My project has been more or less fueled by posts like yours. I'll pass it on to Harman the machinist who deserves much of the credit!
One of the cool things on my case is what I call an "Integrated Squirter". It must be relatively cool because it was patented, and it's essentially a barrel-less squirter wherein all the internal geometry of the squirter is contained within the main webs of the case, with nothing required to be pressed or hammered into the case. Oh, and a side benefit of all this is 100% knowledge that you can clean out or inspect your oil passages at any time. No Stomski tool, no fancy crap, just unscrew the cap and take a look. Why didn't Porsche think of this?????
So we are at a kind of exciting phase after all this time. It's time to start prepping the mule to accept the Taormina 3.6 case! We are almost there folks, after approximately 3 years of development. Harman is cleaning up programming for case half left while we get ready for what we call the "combo op" in which we line bore both case halves.
After that, however, we need to put my case into a running car, and for that, we will need the services of Da Mule.
So with that, allow me to introduce Da Mule. She is a 1973 Carrera RS clone that has:
- A 3.6 with a G50 already
- 996TT brakes front and rear
- Modern width rubber
- a half cage
In short, Da Mule is the perfect test bed for the Taormina 3.6 Case because she already sports a 3.6 and is set up to do so, as well as being smog exempt here in CA. Stay tuned as we put my motor in this car starting week 2 of June!
On this Memorial Day lets take a moment to reflect upon our brave soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines who gave the ultimate sacrifice so that we could have the freedom to dawdle on things as trivial as Porsche motors while most of the world is filled with violence, misery and starvation.
And on a lighter note, let's look at the tired old turd of a motor that gave up it's life to supply the inner components to the prototype Taormina 3.6 Engine case. Oh, and I reserve the right to make military jokes because I did 9 years in the United States Military so if anyone found that last little bit of humor in poor taste, please reply with your own military record :-)
I have done more engine teardowns than I can recall, and they are all miserable. They are filthy, nasty jobs that take a ton of energy to undertake. Fluids always leak, bolts are always frozen. A bolt that might take 24 foot pounds of torque to install might take 100 foot pounds to break loose.
Why do we do this? Because Porsche cases are valuable, and there aren't many of them. We have to scavenge these valuable dead bodies to undertake another build.
I am trying to change that. I am trying to make it so that the teardown of a core motor IS NOT the first stage of an engine build. I believe you should be able to open a box, pull out a brand new case, and build a motor from new parts. I am trying to make a paradigm shift in the Porsche world quite frankly.
There will always be matching numbers motors that will need to be rebuilt, I get it. But I want to stop someone from buying a nasty 3.0 or 3.2 and spending time fighting it and tearing it down and then measuring all the greasy nasty parts to make sure they are in spec. I want someone to seriously give thought to skipping the teardown!!!
Does anyone actually have one of these cases yet?
I see the constant updates by the vendor to keep the thread fresh, but wasn't sure if there were any actually in circulation yet?
04-11-2019, 09:38 PM
