REFLECTOR: Millin's engine in Kitplanes

[Jones Nick]

Congratulations, however, I think there is an error in the editors note at the bottom. ECI offers kit engines to the end user for assembly with a free workshop to assist in building the engine. I assisted a friend of mine who built an O-360 kit engine<http://www.eci.aero/exp/kitEngine_exp.aspx> from ECI for his RV-6A and has over 250 hours on it without any issues.

Nick.

From: reflector-bounces at tvbf.org [mailto:reflector-bounces at tvbf.org] On Behalf Of Reiff Lorenz
Sent: Monday, April 18, 2011 9:46 PM
To: reflector at tvbf.org
Subject: REFLECTOR: Millin's engine in Kitplanes


Andy,

Congrats on having your engine-building journey mentioned in this month's (June 2011) Kitplanes letter to the editor!

Reiff Lorenz

===================



Engine Guidance
I am currently at the stage of searching
for an engine for my Glasair III project,
so articles like the 2011 Engine Buyer's
Guide in the April issue are especially
interesting to me. I intend to power the
aircraft conventionally, with a Lycoming-
type IO-540. At this stage, I am
looking at all options from new to a core
that can be rebuilt. Recognizing the
obvious difference in entry fee, the core
option has greater appeal. There was,
however, a statement in your guide that
caught my attention as an additional
option: "Lycoming is continuing direct
sales of its Thunderbolt line of Experimental
engines, though the smaller
shops have been doing well selling versions
of Lycoming 'kit engines,' which
are essentially all-new engines delivered
in pieces and assembled to order."

How tantalizing. Which shops? How
much does this option cost? Can I buy
the box of parts and assemble it, or does
the "smaller shop" assemble it? Also what
is meant by "doing well?" I have looked
around on the Web and found only one
case of someone buying a box of engine
parts and building from scratch (search
for "Building an Engine from Scratch"
by Andy Millin). In the end, he didn't
recommend going this route. Are there
other stories out there? I cannot find
them. Any guidance that you can give so
I can research the details of this option
would be greatly appreciated.

Dan Brown


The Lycoming Kit Engine Program has
been around since late 2005, and does provide
an "engine in a box" for professional
shops to assemble. The benefit is that each
shop starts with all new components from
Lycoming-in essence, an entire engine
just not yet assembled. Currently, four
shops are approved as Kit Engine assemblers:
Aero Sport Power in Kamloops, British
Columbia; G&N Aircraft in Griffith,
Indiana; Teledyne Mattituck Services in
Mattituck, New York; and Triad Aviation
in Burlington, North Carolina. This
program is not open to customer assembly
of engine components.-Ed.
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