Kyle Boatright
Well Known Member
One thing I've found is that a friendly phone call will get you into a lot of interesting places. I've been on tours at Boeing, Lockheed, General Dynamics, Raytheon (ooh, laser guided bombs!), Legend Cub, GEC Avionics (a big HUD manufacturer years ago), plus a few more aviation related businesses based on a phone call or having a personal contact.
Since we planned to be in New Braunfels, TX for Thanksgiving this year, I reached out to ECI/Titan which is nearby in San Antonio and asked if I could tour the factory while I was in town. They graciously accepted and we worked out that I'd drop by the factory on the day before Thanksgiving. It was understood that the factory would be in the process of winding down for the holidays when I arrived.
For background, ECI produces a number of PMA'd parts which will fit Lycoming engines. They also manufacture the Titan brand of parts and a variety of engines for the uncertified Lyclone market. One of the nice things about the Titan brand is that it offers a number of options you don't have in certified parts. Tapered cylinder fins, flowed heads, stroker cranks, etc. A buyer can choose a stock configuration or a "trick" configuration - it is up to him (typically). Prior to the recent buy-out by Continental, ECI manufactured PMA'd replacement parts for Continental engines. That product line has been discontinued.
ECI's campus (the shiny new signs on the buildings say "Continental Motors") is located in an industrial area adjacent to the main commercial airport in San Antonio. The campus consists of 4 or 5 buildings, each dedicated to specific manufacturing processes. Big picture, ECI is a machine shop. They bring in forgings and castings made to their specifications. Subsequently, those chunks of metal are taken through a quality control process, warehoused, and ultimately machined into cylinders, crankcases, crankshafts, camshafts, etc. We didn't have an extensive discussion about which of the smaller parts (lifters, rods, etc.) they manufacture for the PMA or experimental markets, so I can't say much there. I was told they outsource most (not all) of the gears for their Titan engines.
During the tour, I saw cylinders being assembled (a hot aluminum head screwed to a cold steel barrel, with a shrink fit to hold it together.) I was surprised at how easily the head screwed onto the barrel. The cam grinding process was running, but there wasn't much to see - the cutting fluid obscures everything.
A number of the manufacturing cells were down for the holidays, which was good and bad. I couldn't watch the equipment run (bad), but on the good side, the noise level was down and I was able to get closer to the equipment than would have been possible otherwise. The equipment for crank grinding, cylinder machining, case machining, cylinder honing, etc. was all there to reach out and touch. The CNC machines which mill crankcases have auto-change carousels housing roughly 150 tools, all of which are necessary to machine a case. Pretty impressive and not something I'd seen before. In addition to their commercially purchased equipment, ECI has equipment of their own manufacture to perform tasks such as line boring crankcases.
Something that caught my eye was the work in process inventory in various locations throughout the factory. A dozen machined (but not polished) cranks on a custom rack over here, twenty cam billets over there, fifty cylinder forgings somewhere else, and shelves of finished components sitting in a climate controlled warehouse. If only they'd turned their backs for 5 minutes and loaned me a pallet jack. ;-)
While there, I heard an engine being run-in on their dyno in a separate building (access denied to non-employees). As described, their run-in process is to run the engine for an hour at very low power and low CHT's to polish the bottom end, then raise the power to seat the rings. They are only able to use the dyno run-in process on 4 cylinder engines. Six cylinder engines are run-in with a club prop at the New Braunfels airport. Oh, and before anyone asks, they explained that during the initial low power run, the temperatures are low enough that the cylinders do not glaze.
In addition to the machine shop, I toured their engineering spaces, quality control area, and engine assembly cells, all of which appeared to be well executed. It was a good all-around tour.
I've been employed as an engineer in a huge manufacturing organization for almost 30 years and have a pretty good understanding of how to organize and manage a factory, having done it once or twice. Based on what I saw, ECI has a well organized and capable operation. It will definitely be on the short list of vendors I consider for my next engine purchase.
Since we planned to be in New Braunfels, TX for Thanksgiving this year, I reached out to ECI/Titan which is nearby in San Antonio and asked if I could tour the factory while I was in town. They graciously accepted and we worked out that I'd drop by the factory on the day before Thanksgiving. It was understood that the factory would be in the process of winding down for the holidays when I arrived.
For background, ECI produces a number of PMA'd parts which will fit Lycoming engines. They also manufacture the Titan brand of parts and a variety of engines for the uncertified Lyclone market. One of the nice things about the Titan brand is that it offers a number of options you don't have in certified parts. Tapered cylinder fins, flowed heads, stroker cranks, etc. A buyer can choose a stock configuration or a "trick" configuration - it is up to him (typically). Prior to the recent buy-out by Continental, ECI manufactured PMA'd replacement parts for Continental engines. That product line has been discontinued.
ECI's campus (the shiny new signs on the buildings say "Continental Motors") is located in an industrial area adjacent to the main commercial airport in San Antonio. The campus consists of 4 or 5 buildings, each dedicated to specific manufacturing processes. Big picture, ECI is a machine shop. They bring in forgings and castings made to their specifications. Subsequently, those chunks of metal are taken through a quality control process, warehoused, and ultimately machined into cylinders, crankcases, crankshafts, camshafts, etc. We didn't have an extensive discussion about which of the smaller parts (lifters, rods, etc.) they manufacture for the PMA or experimental markets, so I can't say much there. I was told they outsource most (not all) of the gears for their Titan engines.
During the tour, I saw cylinders being assembled (a hot aluminum head screwed to a cold steel barrel, with a shrink fit to hold it together.) I was surprised at how easily the head screwed onto the barrel. The cam grinding process was running, but there wasn't much to see - the cutting fluid obscures everything.
A number of the manufacturing cells were down for the holidays, which was good and bad. I couldn't watch the equipment run (bad), but on the good side, the noise level was down and I was able to get closer to the equipment than would have been possible otherwise. The equipment for crank grinding, cylinder machining, case machining, cylinder honing, etc. was all there to reach out and touch. The CNC machines which mill crankcases have auto-change carousels housing roughly 150 tools, all of which are necessary to machine a case. Pretty impressive and not something I'd seen before. In addition to their commercially purchased equipment, ECI has equipment of their own manufacture to perform tasks such as line boring crankcases.
Something that caught my eye was the work in process inventory in various locations throughout the factory. A dozen machined (but not polished) cranks on a custom rack over here, twenty cam billets over there, fifty cylinder forgings somewhere else, and shelves of finished components sitting in a climate controlled warehouse. If only they'd turned their backs for 5 minutes and loaned me a pallet jack. ;-)
While there, I heard an engine being run-in on their dyno in a separate building (access denied to non-employees). As described, their run-in process is to run the engine for an hour at very low power and low CHT's to polish the bottom end, then raise the power to seat the rings. They are only able to use the dyno run-in process on 4 cylinder engines. Six cylinder engines are run-in with a club prop at the New Braunfels airport. Oh, and before anyone asks, they explained that during the initial low power run, the temperatures are low enough that the cylinders do not glaze.
In addition to the machine shop, I toured their engineering spaces, quality control area, and engine assembly cells, all of which appeared to be well executed. It was a good all-around tour.
I've been employed as an engineer in a huge manufacturing organization for almost 30 years and have a pretty good understanding of how to organize and manage a factory, having done it once or twice. Based on what I saw, ECI has a well organized and capable operation. It will definitely be on the short list of vendors I consider for my next engine purchase.
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