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For those of you who have converted your aerovee to a Force 1 crank/hub, who did you use for machining of the case? I was just going to send it to Great Plains and have them do the machining but I can't get a straight answer out of them on how much it will cost and how to go about paying for it / shipping it / etc.

Keith
#554

Keith,
Not much help from me, but when Jay Gibbs had the Force One hub/bearing/crank installed in the Aerovee that is now in my plane, I believe he had a well-respected VW engine shop near him (vic Ft Worth, TX) do the work. If you can do the same, obviously you'll save some money in shipping and can talk directly with the person doing the work to get feedback on general engine condition, tolerances, etc.
I would think the instructions provided by GPAS with the Force One would provide all the info that a shop needs.
Another option would be Scott Casler at Hummel engines. He installs these in all his 2180cc and higher engines, and certainly knows about VW engines in airplanes.

Thanks. I emailed Scott from Hummel Engines and got a reply from him almost immediately. He does offer case machining for the force 1 hub.

Keith

Shipping a case to the mainland from Hawaii would not be cheap, but luckily we got the local VW shop to do it for us. They seemed to have done an OK job, there was a little binding in the bearing but the crank also had about (if I recall correctly) .002" of runout at the bearing so it's not clear which was the dominating factor.

I'd assume any shop that can align bore a case can do the F1 bearing, too.

My "go-to" machine shop had no problem at all enlarging the hole in my aluminum case to accommodate the Aerovee prop hub.

I still have a new-in-the-box Aerovee case for sale if anyone is looking.