Anyhow,  you didn't come here to read my rantings,  you wanted to see some nice pictures.
These Photos were shot at the 2001 Laughlin tandem wing fly-in.

 

The Warp Drive propeller in this photo was installed for this photo opportunity, courtesy of John Moyle, fellow Corvair engine builder (but not this engine)  and aircraft designer.

This view shows a bit of the extruded aluminum roller rockers,  chro-mo valve springs and the titanium valve retainers. The roller rockers are a product developed by and sold by Mr. Bob Sutcliffe of  SC Performance. I purchased the springs and retainers from him as well.

The intake manifold runners are made from mandrel bent 6160 aluminum tubing, which I cut and had TIG welded for me by a local sprint car builder. The tubing is available from Burns Stainless in Costa Mesa, CA

Although I'm not building a Pietenpol,  I left the logo on this valve cover to show off Todd Miller's work. Tod is a Pattern Maker, and he produces this cast aluminum valve cover, which actually weighs less than the stamped steel stock valve cover with the hold down clamps installed. Todd sells them for $60 plus shipping for the pair. I took the other valve cover (not shown) and removed the cast Aircamper Logo and actually saved 70 grams!  That cover was also polished.

This is a great shot of the top cover and my prop hub spacer. Also highly visible are the 8mm Moroso spark plug wires  recommended in William Wynne's Manual.

The underside shows the stock steel pushrod tubes which have been cleaned up with a wire wheel, and temporarily installed.  I will be installing aluminum PR tubes as soon as they are either available, or I just go out and finish making my own. I started making a set some time back, and although my prototype is quite light, the OD is just too large, and will probably be too close to the exhaust. I need to get some thicker walled material so I can thin down the center section to clear the exhaust stack. More on that later.

Ted Hansen was kind enough to give me this aluminum plate,  cut to size, with the holes already drilled. It was a bit thicker than what I was planning to use, but this gave me a great opportunity to have some CNC milling done in it. I was initially going to mill some cooling fins on either side of the plate, but I decided to get a bit artistic instead. With the help of a local sign shop, we came up with this design.

I made sure to keep the CorvAIRCRAFT logo small enough to leave me some room in the top cover to have the oil filler / breather welded to the underside. I also needed room on the plate to bolt the rear attach for the starter housing, which I've still not done. But the space is there. The threaded nipple on the side of the filler neck will have a hose attached to it, and routed to a oil separator. In the future,  I'll be offering this top cover to those who would like one.