Olsen Spec Projects

[olsenmotorsports]

Figured I would start a discussion around the projects, tools, business experiences, techniques etc that have given me lots of enjoyment and a head full of grey hair! We have a little workshop (7.5k working space and 3k storage) in the near western suburbs of Chicago. Specialize in Porsche. Have a staff of twelve. Sales team, mechanics (4) helpers, and marketing. We do 100% of our marketing in house, from SEO to media and video editing. Somehow I attempt at holding it all together but you are only as good as the people you have around you . Super blessed to have a lot of people working for me a hell of a lot smarter than me. On top of all of that, I am a stepdad to two of the greatest kids ever, devoted husband to an amazing wife and a full time Florida resident who owns a business in Chicago. To say my life is complete chaos is a complete understatement.

Cliff notes on what we do. Restoration, lots of it. Jam out repaints (outsourced), 5-6 engines a month, 10-15 sets of shocks a month (JRZ Techincal partner) and 2 fully custom bespoke cars a year. On top of that we do quite a bit of service. 85% of our business is out of state, and all of our revenue comes from Instagram/Youtube.

Let me know what you guys want to see and I will do my best. This will just be myself on here, as my media team is flat out with their own projects. I have been wanting to do this for a while now!

For now, here is a brief shop tour.

 

[sqznby]

Beautiful shop and your fab crew's skills are incredible. That Targa is going to be a beaut when completed.

 

[olsenmotorsports]

Beautiful shop and your fab crew's skills are incredible. That Targa is going to be a beaut when completed.

Thanks! It’s a mess (my OCD is over the top) but hard to run volume and have it perfect. Always a line I am tiptoeing with the staff.

Speaking of the targa. Thank you!



We got the rear done early in the week. Alex welded it in and hammered everything into shape. Crazy reverse curve. This car is for an owner who is a huge blue angles fan. So we are incorporating some of the jet like shapes into a round curved Porschy body. Fun times making that look good!






Later in the week we got started on the front upper bumper profile. Made some dies for the Pullmax and whipped this shape out in no time.

 

[Scuderia-F1]

Awesome initiative to start this thread.
The Olsen YouTube & Instagram are great, but following your personal posts will be even better.
’is the Naples location a thing of the past?
Looking forward to following this thread.
Olsen Motorsports is and always has been a big inspiration for my own little shop.

 

[Steve from Socal]

Very nice shop/work.

Any connection to Merlin Olsen?
Merlin was an L.A. Ram in the 1960's and had the Porsche dealer in Encino, Ca.

 

[olsenmotorsports]

Awesome initiative to start this thread.
The Olsen YouTube & Instagram are great, but following your personal posts will be even better.
’is the Naples location a thing of the past?
Looking forward to following this thread.
Olsen Motorsports is and always has been a big inspiration for my own little shop.

Wow thanks! Really appreciate the support and the kind words. Yes pulled the plug there middle of Q1. Pretty simple reason why, money in VS money out. Gave it three years but the ROI wasn’t giving me the multiple that I was looking for. One of our core values is Grow or Die, you dont grow if you don’t try!

Very nice shop/work.

Any connection to Merlin Olsen?
Merlin was an L.A. Ram in the 1960's and had the Porsche dealer in Encino, Ca.

Thank you! No idea! You are not the first one to ask that exact question lol.

 

[olsenmotorsports]

Had someone take vacation last week so I got to pick up the tools Friday and build an engine.


Here is a before photo. Just a regular old 3.2 Carerra engine. Do a ton of these. This one is special as we are going ITB and Motec with a 3.7L. This photo is from a couple months ago. Engine has been at the machine shop getting bored etc. Parts take a bit on these when they are custom spec’s


Thursday I spent the day getting everything laid out how I like it. Dry assembled and measured my deck height out, double checked my bearing clearances then tore it back down and had Jeff run it through the cleaner one last time. For cleaning we have a Vixen Vapor Blaster, a Magido HP 30 and a Pro Ultra Sonic 60 gallon hot tank. All amazing machines and huge money makers. It is like having a couple extra staff on hand with those machines. Love em.

 

[olsenmotorsports]

Friday was busy. Marketing department wanted me to do a one day build (no easy feat there) on time lapse so I got after it around 9:30. Every Friday AM we have staff meetings with the leadership team, planning out the next week and forecasting out the different departments for the month ahead.




First order of business was stud assembly on the cam towers and heads. Mind numbing process. Having the right tools to do that job makes or breaks you for sure. 127 studs make up a Porsche air cooled engine. Installing them all takes about 2 hours with the right tooling.



Next up sealing the block. Made some media on that which always does well. We use Wurth DOS flange sealant and a Continental #2 silk thread. Never had a leak since we started that procedure a few years back. Then on to everyone’s favorite getting those circlips in (said NO ONE EVER)


Everyone does it different at our store but I finish everything on one bank before going to the next. Saves probably a half hour of moving back and forth etc. In this photo the other bank doesn’t have cylinders etc installed. I set initial cam timing and everything then move to the other side.

Got bank two all sorted with pistons and cylinders. This was around 2pm by the time I had full sub assemblies installed. Then on to rockers and starting to dress it all out.



Long day but by 6:30 had it all sorted out. Had to stay an extra hour late but got the one day build executed! Now I want to sleep for a week

 

[olsenmotorsports]

I forgot to show our ring filing setup. Used a bunch of different setups over the years. But IMHO the ABS Products setup is the BEST. Really well built. It’s accurate and repeatable. Only complaint is on the top rings the sanding disks are pretty much one ring use. But other than that wow what an amazing tool. 24 rings took an hour to clearance VS doing it by hand etc. Highly recommend.











ABS also has a ring centering tool. Has three adjustable feet on it for any size. Helps sit it straight. Used to use a piston upside down till we found this handy tool. Feel like tooling is a NEVER ending money ****! But you gotta have the right stuff for production.

 

[36truck]

Very nice set up. Attention do detail is amazing.

 

[olsenmotorsports]

I am trying to get out of town on Friday (need to watch my days in IL as i am a FL resident) Spent some time with the Ferrari today. It is running and driving. What a mess that car was. It got built by another shop, and they installed a mega squirt ECU. Barely even ran. As soon as key was turned on the injectors were on Kill. Don’t know why that System even exists. Anyhow no Motec config exists for a 348, so we had to build the file from scratch. It runs, idles perfect and drives around the block well. Just need to get it on the rollers and sort it out. Couple of issues need to be sorted, especially with the Crank trigger. Also need to sort out the tach as it isn’t registering. Can see the wave form with the scope on the Motec output but that data isn’t getting to the cluster.


This was the original builders fuel solution. Straight out of Autozone fuel pressure regulator and good old badly installed Errols stuff for lines.


We changed it out for a Waterman regulator and Goodridge line. Set to 45 PSI.


New Sakata Harness installed and everything tidied up. The IAC block we wanted to make the lines out of Hardline, but it wasnt in the customers budget to do that, so we plumbed it with solid core vacuum line. Does the same job, just isn’t. 100% Olsen Spec. We have new velocity stacks that we had machined (cannot wait to show them off) but they are still at Chicago ANO getting plated. Should have them this week.


Out on its Maiden Voyage for a quick shakedown around the block.

.

Ran into an intermittent no start issue. Randomly the car would not start. We will probably need to machine up a new Crank Reluctor Wheel.. Here is some scoped data showing the issue. Engine must be pretty high compression. The red trace is Crank trigger, and the red circle is actually the crank speed slowing down at TDC. It’s got a 72 tooth reluctor wheel on it. It’s 10 MS in between the TDC slow down and the gap on the wheel (green circle). becomes more evident as battery voltage drops. Kicked our *** for almost an hour before we figured it out. What a head scratcher. Might remove a tooth and re do the math on the config, or just make a new wheel with less teeth.

No way you would ever find this without a good scope! Be chasing your *** for days Grateful to have it and be proficient with it.

 

[richfinn]

Figured I would start a discussion around the projects, tools, business experiences, techniques etc that have given me lots of enjoyment and a head full of grey hair! We have a little workshop (7.5k working space and 3k storage) in the near western suburbs of Chicago. Specialize in Porsche. Have a staff of twelve. Sales team, mechanics (4) helpers, and marketing. We do 100% of our marketing in house, from SEO to media and video editing. Somehow I attempt at holding it all together but you are only as good as the people you have around you . Super blessed to have a lot of people working for me a hell of a lot smarter than me.

Cliff nots on what we do. Restoration, lots of it. Jam out repaints (outsourced), 5-6 engines a month, 10-15 sets of shocks a month (JRZ Techincal partner) and 2 fully custom bespoke cars a year. On top of that we do quite a bit of service. 85% of our business is out of state, and all of our revenue comes from Instagram/Youtube.

Let me know what you guys want to see and I will do my best. This will just be myself on here, as my media team is flat out with their own projects. I have been wanting to do this for a while now!

For now, here is a brief shop tour.

Awesome Facility look forward to following this thread

 

[loganb]

Looking forward to following along and thanks in advance for sharing the beautiful builds! Great location...I used to live about 3 miles east of your shop and always enjoyed walking the lots of the exotic dealers there on Ogden Ave!

 

[scooby074]

Nice work,nice shop!! Subscribed!

 

[olsenmotorsports]

Awesome Facility look forward to following this thread

Thank you!

Looking forward to following along and thanks in advance for sharing the beautiful builds! Great location...I used to live about 3 miles east of your shop and always enjoyed walking the lots of the exotic dealers there on Ogden Ave!

Thank you and thats great! Assuming that was Westmont area? I’m just east of there in Hinsdale.

Nice work,nice shop!! Subscribed!

Stay tuned!

Very nice set up. Attention do detail is amazing.

Appreciate that!

Give me some feedback on what you everyone want to see/discuss!

 

[loganb]

Thank you and thats great! Assuming that was Westmont area?

We were right on the border of Westmont/DG but were on the DG side. Wife took Metra out of the Fairview station downtown for work so location was great as she could walk....but I normally dropped her off and indulged with a morning bakery treat from a shop in Westmont on my loop back to the house.

 

[olsenmotorsports]

Love it. That’s a great rail to live on - super quiet and close to everything. We love it here.

 

[loganb]

Love it. That’s a great rail to live on - super quiet and close to everything. We love it here.

Absolutely...easy to get east or west on rail and 2 weeks of parking fees downtown more then pays for an unlimited monthly train pass(or did when we left). Equal distance to both airports, not hard to hop on interstates to go north or south and a ton of stuff close by that doesn't take much of a drive to get to! We enjoyed our 5 years there, wish we would've seen more things...but we're an easy days drive away so as the kids get older we'll be back for sure. And being able to buy basically any car under the sun short of the rarest of supercars on that 3 or 4 mile stretch of Ogden is kinda cool

 

[Boosted1]

Wow! Very nice shop. Organized and clean. That says a lot imo about the attention to detail and quality of work.

 

[olsenmotorsports]

Today was Media Monday. Busy day. Staff meeting 7-7:15 then weekly planning meeting for next week 8-8:30. Filming started at 9. Got the wrap up details shot on a 3.8L we did for the 964 RS America car.. Sweet little motor. Has a Motec M150 in it (I know overkill, but we needed the extra outputs as this one is getting converted to Drive By Wire)

What a mess this motor was when we tore it down. But it is piece of art now. This is our highest engine package from a dollar amount. They really rip

I got the rails and the ITB’s locked down

Those drive by wire linkages on the kinsler injection are really nicely done. Only complaint I have is that the ITB’s are not studded or keenserted, will address that so the future serviceability is nicer for the next guy



My boy is looking on like he's bored out of his mind LOL.



All wrapped up and ready to go into the 964.

 

[olsenmotorsports]

For the Targa I really want to do some modern seats. The client is bigger and had back surgery so comfort is key. I pulled the seats out of my RS5 just to see if they would fit. Super comfy seat with a lot of bolster that isn’t invasive.





Well they fit, but going to be heavy fabrication to get them mounted as we need to rework the inner sill, as well as the center tunnels. Not that big of a deal, but $275 an hour fab rate adds up in a big hurry, so not sure that the squeeze is worth the juice. Might just source some 650 seats and fit those. Kind of cool to use the RS5’s though.





Took the opportunity to condition them and clean before install with Leatherstar. What an amazing product.

 

[Xti04]

Love those vintage Porsches. Started in a Porsche dealer in 2002 and fell in love with those air cooled cars. Still want one bad to this day but I see so many selling for what they cost new it makes it hard to justify. Amazing attention to detail there.

 

[olsenmotorsports]

Going through some photos from yesterday. Guys got the front fascia cut out yesterday for the targa. Metal shaped it and welded onto the car. I’m pretty sure it got hammered out from the photos.



Pretty talented these guys are. Tack everything into place and then one pass weld. A lot of people hate it when we do that, but if you can keep your heat consistent and your fit perfect its actailly much faster on the finishing side as there is less warpage to deal with and its a lot more uniform


Crazy what you can get accomplished in a day if you get after it! We are 4 weeks out from paint as of this week so it is going to be a grind to the end.



The transition to the fender turned out nice. Edges are tucked nicely and all the lines match. We dont like to use rubber in between our body line seams (I like to call that hiding your edges when you need a rubber)



Another batch of plating came back today. So blessed here in Chicago to have so much manufacturing close by. This stuff got dropped off Friday and is already plated and baked. We use Uber Connect for all of our shipping in the city. It’s great, dont need to hire a driver and keep a company delivery van etc, saves us so much time and money using Uber for everything.

Thanks for following along!

 

[zmotorsports]

Excellent workmanship. Thank you for showing.

I noticed that you have an AGA Tools powertrain lift table. How do you like it?

I just purchased one a few weeks ago and have only used it once thus far, but it seems like a nice quality piece of equipment and the guys at AGA Tools were great to answer all my questions. Even over the 2-years it took me to make up my mind and finally pull the trigger.

 

[olsenmotorsports]

Excellent workmanship. Thank you for showing.

I noticed that you have an AGA Tools powertrain lift table. How do you like it?

I just purchased one a few weeks ago and have only used it once thus far, but it seems like a nice quality piece of equipment and the guys at AGA Tools were great to answer all my questions. Even over the 2-years it took me to make up my mind and finally pull the trigger.

It’s a great table and very reasonably priced - have two of them - one has fixtures for the Cayenne and Panamera and the other one is fixtured for the air cooled. IMHO they are a great buy as they are half price of the OEM Porsche tables. My only complaint is they are a bit wobbly at the high end of the lift when you get an engine and full subframe on it, and it has a hair trigger!

They also have a lot of nice BMW tooling (no experience with those as we are Porsche specific)

 

[zmotorsports]

It’s a great table and very reasonably priced - have two of them - one has fixtures for the Cayenne and Panamera and the other one is fixtured for the air cooled. IMHO they are a great buy as they are half price of the OEM Porsche tables. My only complaint is they are a bit wobbly at the high end of the lift when you get an engine and full subframe on it, and it has a hair trigger!

They also have a lot of nice BMW tooling (no experience with those as we are Porsche specific)

Thanks for the response. I'm looking forward to getting more time with it as I've only had it a few weeks and have only used it once. I can already see multiple uses around the shop more so than just powertrains. Fuel cells, axles, etc. will all be removed with mine going forward. I've already fabricated a set of axle saddles for removing solid axles in Jeeps, etc.

We must be on opposite sides of the spectrum however. You say very reasonably priced while for me it was a huge investment and one that took a reasonable amount of time "mulling it over" and justifying. Granted I don't work in the volume you do as I'm only a one man shop.

 

[richfinn]

For the Targa I really want to do some modern seats. The client is bigger and had back surgery so comfort is key. I pulled the seats out of my RS5 just to see if they would fit. Super comfy seat with a lot of bolster that isn’t invasive.





Well they fit, but going to be heavy fabrication to get them mounted as we need to rework the inner sill, as well as the center tunnels. Not that big of a deal, but $275 an hour fab rate adds up in a big hurry, so not sure that the squeeze is worth the juice. Might just source some 650 seats and fit those. Kind of cool to use the RS5’s though.





Took the opportunity to condition them and clean before install with Leatherstar. What an amazing product.

Love the colour of that RS6

 

[olsenmotorsports]

Thanks for the response. I'm looking forward to getting more time with it as I've only had it a few weeks and have only used it once. I can already see multiple uses around the shop more so than just powertrains. Fuel cells, axles, etc. will all be removed with mine going forward. I've already fabricated a set of axle saddles for removing solid axles in Jeeps, etc.

We must be on opposite sides of the spectrum however. You say very reasonably priced while for me it was a huge investment and one that took a reasonable amount of time "mulling it over" and justifying. Granted I don't work in the volume you do as I'm only a one man shop.

I didn’t mean any disrespect by that trust me! The Porsche world is its own animal trust me! Case in point, my snap-on Verus was 10g’s, but the Porsche Piwis is 15g, plus 10g a year for the license. They get you any way they can in this business. The money we spent annually in tooling, dies, licenses, consumables etc would go a long way for a lot of people. Terrible business to be in from a cost perspective. Ive got millions invested unfortunately. Like I said terrible business to be in!

Love the colour of that RS6

Thanks! One year color run unless I am mistaken. Looked forever to get the spec we wanted.

 

[olsenmotorsports]

Few pictures from around the shop today. Guys got the pullmax fired up and made the transition piece for the left side from the fender to bumper. Crazy thats one piece believe it or not.



Incredibly blessed and skilled this kid is.

Started hammering and making noise on the left side to finish it off.

 

[zmotorsports]

I didn’t mean any disrespect by that trust me! The Porsche world is its own animal trust me! Case in point, my snap-on Verus was 10g’s, but the Porsche Piwis is 15g, plus 10g a year for the license. They get you any way they can in this business. The money we spent annually in tooling, dies, licenses, consumables etc would go a long way for a lot of people. Terrible business to be in from a cost perspective. Ive got millions invested unfortunately. Like I said terrible business to be in!

Oh, don't worry, I took no offense to it. I completely understand your position. In a business where you are doing the volume and have multiple mechanics busy bringing in revenue it makes perfect sense to have multiple of a tool that sees steady use and increases productivity.

I was just making that observation in a different way, meaning for me being a one man shop it was hard to justify one, let alone two. That was all, I didn't take offense to it by any means. The sheer scale of your business to my shop is obvious, millions invested to a couple hundred thousand is a vast difference, but then you employ multiple people and do millions in revenue annually so completely different worlds for sure. My hat is off to you, that is not an easy lifestyle and comes with its own challenges and stresses that most people who punch a timeclock will never understand.

 

[olsenmotorsports]

Oh, don't worry, I took no offense to it. I completely understand your position. In a business where you are doing the volume and have multiple mechanics busy bringing in revenue it makes perfect sense to have multiple of a tool that sees steady use and increases productivity.

I was just making that observation in a different way, meaning for me being a one man shop it was hard to justify one, let alone two. That was all, I didn't take offense to it by any means. The sheer scale of your business to my shop is obvious, millions invested to a couple hundred thousand is a vast difference, but then you employ multiple people and do millions in revenue annually so completely different worlds for sure. My hat is off to you, that is not an easy lifestyle and comes with its own challenges and stresses that most people who punch a timeclock will never understand.

I actually applaud you for having that table in your home garage. It is a nice luxury. I am all about having the right stuff to do the job. Good for you!

 

[olsenmotorsports]

I am going to try and show some of the chaos that is a day in the life of Olsen Motorsports. We run 4 day work weeks, and so much has to go perfect to execute that and pull it off, still hit our KPI’s and maintain our workshop.



The 77’s interior was started on Tuesday (glued in the sound deadening and carpet last week). It is almost wrapped up, and simultaneously there is an alignment going on. Love these 3.0L cars, this one is all original paint and still has the original OEM Turbo graphics on it. What a gem with the Jubilee inserts.



The 3.0L Carerra engine got torn down and all the parts sent to the machines to get cleaned. This one is getting a top end reseal and will get wrapped up in the car next week. We do 3-4 of these type of jobs per month.


Stay tuned for more from today

 

[olsenmotorsports]

Back on the targa, the left side drop down trim piece got made and tacked in to the bumper fascia. This front bumper will be made all by hand. I think the trim transition is a nice touch and turned out nice. Something we haven’t ever seen done before. What do you guys think??



Alex getting after it on the planishing hammer. Love watching this kid work. He is so talented at his craft.
Fascia is welded and planished. Tomorrow he will one pas weld in the transition and then its on to the bottom

 

[olsenmotorsports]

Update on the 964 RS America. Patrick got the 3.8L stuffed in it. Putting in the finishing touches on the IAT sensor while my Dog Cam supervises. It is such a joy having him around. I always say he has kept me from doing some really stupid things as a boss when I am stressed out. Just take him for a walk and calm down lol




Whipped up a bracket out of Carbon for the Autosport Connectors in the engine. Love using these for our looms. Kind of expensive (each side is $450 USD) but they make servicing really nice



Here is the engine side of the main loom connection. Two plugs with a quarter turn. Proper Olsen Spec



More to come!

 

[olsenmotorsports]

I took advantage of a couple hours of free time after meetings and put new windscreens in my daily explorer as well as one of my Raptors. Explorer had a crack and the Raptor was just destroyed from the years.








I also pulled a set of HRE’s out of storage off the Wife’s RS7 we got rid of earlier this year, Tried them on the RS5 but they are just too big. Was hoping I could just re barrel them but it needs new wheels. These also wont fit on her Gen one S7, but I am pretty sure they will fit an RSQ8 which I am going to get for her for the Chicago house next spring. The RS5 is going to the Naples house so we need to get the clear bra on it, do some Olsen Touch’s to it and order wheels before I ship it down in December. I’m thinking of doing black door handles, satin clear bra, paint the roof black, and do some HRE S204’s for it. Think that would look pretty cool.

I have a Bronco Raptor at the Naples house that I am going to ship to Chicago store and do some custom stuff to it. Can’t wait to get started on that!



That was some of the projects from today, along with some diag on some problem cars but thats too boring to show here!

 

[Boosted1]

Nice update. Body metal work if really nice.

 

[36truck]

I think you need a couple more light's on that Raptor. LOL

 

[olsenmotorsports]

Nice update. Body metal work if really nice.

Appreciate that and thanks for following along! I am incredibly blessed to have some talented, productive craftsman on staff! The old saying you are only as good as the people you employ right?

I think you need a couple more light's on that Raptor. LOL

Dude those Chicago city alley rats are NO JOKE! Gotta be able to see them coming!

 

[richfinn]

I took advantage of a couple hours of free time after meetings and put new windscreens in my daily explorer as well as one of my Raptors. Explorer had a crack and the Raptor was just destroyed from the years.








I also pulled a set of HRE’s out of storage off the Wife’s RS7 we got rid of earlier this year, Tried them on the RS5 but they are just too big. Was hoping I could just re barrel them but it needs new wheels. These also wont fit on her Gen one S7, but I am pretty sure they will fit an RSQ8 which I am going to get for her for the Chicago house next spring. The RS5 is going to the Naples house so we need to get the clear bra on it, do some Olsen Touch’s to it and order wheels before I ship it down in December. I’m thinking of doing black door handles, satin clear bra, paint the roof black, and do some HRE S204’s for it. Think that would look pretty cool.

I have a Bronco Raptor at the Naples house that I am going to ship to Chicago store and do some custom stuff to it. Can’t wait to get started on that!



That was some of the projects from today, along with some diag on some problem cars but thats too boring to show here!

Not boring for us, we would like to see the diagnostic stuff as much as the cool restoration jobs

 

[zmotorsports]

I actually applaud you for having that table in your home garage. It is a nice luxury. I am all about having the right stuff to do the job. Good for you!

Thank you, and I completely understand and agree with having the right stuff to do the job. Fortunately, I have a very understanding and supportive wife who allows me to purchase the tools and equipment I need to do the level of work I aim for. I think I had more buyer's remorse over that AGA lift table than she did.