Our Services

Opening Hours

Mon – Fri: 8.30AM – 5.30PM

Sat: 8.30AM – 12.30PM

 

Contact Us

Call: 01404 812 091

[email protected]

Visit Us

The Tipton Garage,
Tipton St John
Near Sidmouth,
Devon
EX10 0AF

Servicing & Maintenance, Diagnostics, Tuning and Engine Build Services

 

Servicing for Your Car

At highly competitive rates, a routine service to the manufacturer’s schedule at the Tipton Garage is backed by the teams’ specialist engineering knowledge, bringing additional value to the maintenance of any modern car… and especially when expertise finds solutions to those ‘hard to solve’ problems that sometimes occur.

 

Rolling Road & ‘Dyno’

The Tipton Garage’s MAHA four-wheel drive rolling road can cope with engine outputs as high as 350 bhp per axle and is in regular use for fine-tuning competition, modified road and sports cars.

Any vehicle can benefit from tuning under simulated road conditions within the controlled environment of the rolling road. The dynamometer provides an efficient way of monitoring the effectiveness of engine improvements, enabling final adjustments and ‘fine tuning’ to be carried out without having to leave the garage.

An hour’s work on the rolling road costs little yet can bring huge benefits in fuel savings and performance.

Our rolling road is integrated with SUN testing equipment which, as well as being essential for modern MOT testing, is used to ensure optimum results are gained from modifications.

All the work on the rolling road is recorded by computer for printing and future reference.

Other diagnostic and tuning tools include a Bosch KTS diagnostic platform, Hanatech, Sykes Pickavant and ASNU injector cleaning equipment.

Head Cases

Repair

Damaged cylinder heads, even those which look at first sight to be well beyond recovery, can be expertly repaired. This can enable rare and cherished engines to be kept running and can also prove to be considerably cheaper than buying, or in some cases even re-manufacturing, a new head.

New

Complete engines can be hand built to an original specification or to improve performance, using some or all of these specialist techniques. We have built modern and classic engines, for both road and track use, ranging from Sunbeam, Austin Healey 3000 and Sprite to BMW M3 and Mercedes.

Re-build

We undertake complete vehicle rebuilds, and past restorations include an MG Midget to ‘better than ex-works’ concours condition and a 1275 Mini Cooper ‘S’ Mk 2, restored to its original condition. This can be carried out either on an entire project or ‘budgeted stages’ basis.

Valve Conversion

Cylinder head valve conversions for unleaded fuel is the only truly practical solution for extending the life of older classic cars in regular use and also eliminates the need for expensive leaded fuel or additives.

Fitting ‘modern’ valve seat inserts is a skilled task and we have invested in specialist equipment from the leaders in this field, SERDI. The existing (‘old’) valve seats are machined out and the head is then heated (to expand it) whilst the new valve seats are cooled in liquid nitrogen (to ‘shrink’ them).

The ‘frozen’ valve seats are then inserted into the close-tolerance machined recesses in the head. When all items reach a uniform temperature the inserts are immovable within the head. Each valve seat is then carefully machined on the SERDI machine so that the seats, valves and guides are all precision engineered.

The head is now ready for thousands of miles of trouble free motoring on unleaded pump fuel.

Modification

Our expertise with this machinery can also be applied to the modification of cylinder heads for increased power and efficiency. Combustion chambers can be shaped to provide more ‘squish’ and improve the efficiency of combustion burn and the capacity of all chambers can be balanced. Ports can be reworked and polished for improved gas flow, often in conjunction with fitting larger valves to improve power further.

Our special gas flow bench enables the flow of the combustion mixture into the chamber and its exhaust to be optimised and balance achieved between each of the chambers.

 

Performance Gains

We can also lighten and balance components, improve exhaust manifolds and set-up carburation – call in and talk to us about your requirements.