looking for information on Raby type one

Danny Piperato has a Raby T1 in his Spyder.  For a while the Beck folks at Special Edition were using them.  Contact Kevin or Carey Hines at www.beckspeedster.com.

I read here or SAMBA that he left the T1 scene several years ago due to fact that quality parts for a T1 were too difficult to obtain.  Seems everything is marked CHINA or EMPI now.  Even the Brazilian stuff was higher quality. Believe he still makes the T1 high flow shroud.

Do you have one of his engines, Doug? If so, message me. Don't think he is involved any more with type1, parts are not what they used to be, like Wolfgang said.

I've never seen anything published, and since just about everything he does is specifically for a customer I'm sure no 2 are exactly the same. If you've bought a car with one of his motors in it I think he'd give you the specs if you had an invoice #, date or the original customer's name. It's not much, but I hope this helps. Al

Danny's Spyder is the fastest car I've ever been in.  He never says much about it but is is actually frightening fast.  Feels like TWO engines in there.

Wolfgang is correct, Jake concentrates on Type IV and Suburau engines these days.  He also has a big business with his patented Porsche IMS bearing repairs.  Porsche dealers used to just swap out an engine with an IMS failure but now they can be repaired.  Jake also trains Porsche factory techs and others to repair those failures using tools he developed to perform the repair. He runs a school in a classroom at his facility.  Check out Jake's ads in 'Excellence Magazine," 

He's super busy but never too busy to call or email to ask how my Type IV is performing.

Serial number is stamped at the base of the alternator stand.  What did you need to know about it?  I kept all the original order sheets on the motors and I also have partial files on basic info.

I do not want to mess anything up on it and I am not what you would call mechanically inclined

I have some leaking pushrod tubes and ordered the jaycee replacement that you do not have to remove the heads  While searching the board I saw some one said Raby says no to these on a type four engine so how would I know what can and cant be done also is it ok to just do  the side thats leaking and save the other side for when and if ?

Doug-have gone to or joined any of Jake Raby's forums? From what I've seen Raby's answer (fix) may not be what you want to hear, but it's probably the best you'll get.

Doug, on a type1, the STOCK pushrod tubes require the heads to be loosened for replacement. Aftermarket two-piece tubes are available that DON'T require head removal, they either have springs or threads. I prefer the spring type. Obviously, you need to remove the pushrods and rocker arms, but that is a lot less work than removing the heads. You can do this with the engine in the car. PM me your phone number, I can talk you through this.

On a type 4, the head pushrod opening is larger than the case opening. Stock pushrod tubes are the best and can be replaced fairly easily.

I appreciate the offer of help  I am having Austin Vee Dub Garage do it  My plan is to learn how to work on the car myself at some point.  I have a small B&B and we are going into our high season so I am busy now so it will be the emptying out of the pockets for awhile.

Thanks for the replies,

Doug

raby had some issues with the type 1 motors, the china engine parts are fine for the most part,the type 1 owners are cheep assed people for the most part.thus he exited the type 1 seen. the jcee tubes are great, I have  used 3 sets of the empi knock offs.the scat big mouth tubes are also a nice part,I have them on my 2028 in my bug and just got another set(new & cheep,hey theres that cheepassed guy!! Im not realy what you should call cheep, but when you find something for 1/2 price and you know you will use it get it.) I will never use or install another stock type pushrod tubes ( weather steel or stainless steel)on any thing.... execpt for possiably a harly.

   my friend with a raby motor said raby didnt know what was in the motor, and I have heard that from others too. remember he stoped the vw stuff a long time ago(typ1). I tryed to get him to do some machine work(balancing) and he wouldnt, and told me he had problems with balancing a type 1 motor.what that means I dont have a clue, he just said it wasent working.Ive balanced a few hundrad motors, there not all dont the same, but the typ1&4 should be the same.oh well.that was when he was exiting the seen. for the most part I thing it was just part of his evelution and a wize $$$ choice to do so.after all ga isant cali.

Not that long ago. He was still making them in 2008, he did a bunch for Carey Hines that year and I think 2009.

And I know my motor is balanced(built in 2002), it sounds to me like he didn't want to do it for you Mark. Like you said, he was getting away from them.

this was back in 05. I know he was still doing motors for his clientes, but for the advrage vw guy he said no more.I dont know if he did have a balancing issue or not, but thats what he said. I had just left the performance machine shop I ran for way to long& nolonger had a balancer.he also said he was using dpr cranks& the balance was dead on with them, so how did he know??? thats when I figured it was just getting away from type 1 like he said he was.

We never had "issues". Unlike others in this industry I did not compromise the breed just to build engines. When the components became compromised we decided not to waste our lives doing the same thing that everyone else does, expecting a different result.

Type 1 engines have been compromised by the industry, plain and simple. Its a shame, because I love their character, simplicity and effectiveness. Now thats all in past tense.