From: CARLTONGHOLT@aol.com
Message-ID: <55.2ef913a.25f4881b@aol.com>
Date: Sun, 5 Mar 2000 23:03:39 EST
Subject: Eagle 540
To: brent@regandesigns.com
CC: lancair.list@olsusa.com
Mime-Version: 1.0

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Its odd that you anser email addressed to Van Grouw.  According to Eagle 
Oshkosh 
show leader Samkanon (sp) he was an owner of the company along with Van Grouw 
and Marshall Michaelian, the president (who often writes to the list).  
Michaelian and now Van Grouw write to the lancair list about the Eagle engine 
as if they are completely unrelated to the company.  I find this rather 
devious. I can only guess that the intent is to appear as unbiased endorsers. 
 But I have noticed Michaelian has written some extremely rotten person 
accusations about other engine company's staff in the list from this same 
"just a casual observer", "unconnected to Eagle" stance.  I guess that is 
part of a disinformation campaign against other companies. You an owner, 
subcontractor, partner of Eagle too?

All of that weird and behavior aside - you avoided the thrust of my eail.  
The assertion by Van Grouw and Eagle is that the engine was "scratch built" 
and "not an auto conversion".   Sharing some similarities in bolt patterns, 
etc. does not make it a Chevy but when 99% of the pieces match to the 
thousands it is is baloney to make such claims.  If it walks like a duck.  
The similarities do not make it a bad engine, just two deliberately false 
representations by the owners of the company - which was my point.  The Eagle 
is absolutely not scratch built.  It is only and just a GM 502 with 
aftermarket parts except for two changes of the oil pump driven by the cam 
and the boat water pump driven by the crank.  If you want to sell me a duck 
than its fine that you try to convince me that its the worlds best duck, but 
don't try to convince me its an eagle.  If you do then it smells strongly of 
fertilizer.

Look at other engines in the market that share GM similarities.  An Orenda is 
similar to a 502 but it does have a non GM crossbolt block of own design, non 
intake/accessory drive/drives/, drives the cam off of the flywheel end of the 
engine and has dual plug heads and a non GM bell housing bolt pattern.  The 
ZEHRBACH-LPE engine has the features of the Orenda but is a very non auto 650 
to 750 ci engine running only 2700 rpm with no gearbox and runs inverted to 
boot.  Those engines seem to have done what you suggest to have taken the 
best of the GM and made it better.  They sure are not copies.

TEC (Stewart 51) is almost identical to the Eagle and they gladly admit to 
being an autoconversion. (The Eagle might work in the Stewart as they claim 
to need a heavy engine for balance) Why pay $100,000 for an Eagle 
autoconcersion if I can buy two tEC engines or two non auto Zehrbach or 
Continental engines for the same price as an Eagle or an Orenda for the same 
price.

Talk apples and apples.  I wrote that the weight of the Continental was 597 
with one alternator. You wrote back adding the baffling and all hoses to make 
the engine seem lighter in comparison.  We should then add the weight of the 
radiator, all hoses, lines, etc to the Eagle weight whcih makes it even more 
ponderous than the 225 lbs over the Continental that I figured.

In regard to TBO i would have expected that the company owners would either 
test through a TBO like Orenda or Zehrbach or at least esimate and then use 
that as the guaranteed warranty number upon which customers can base their 
expectations.  In direct conflict with your representation in point of fact 
there is no warranty mentioned in any of their brochrues and the Oshkosh crew 
said they had none.  Please refer me to the warranty document that you wrote 
about and were it is available.

It is the misrepresentations on the Eagle engine, very odd concealment of the 
company ownership by the writers to this list, while being simultaneously 
relly nasty to other people about their products that give me real pause 
(along with the whopping weight, huge belly pod, company in a closet, huge 
price).  If I put myself in the position of a would be customer after 
watching the type of behavior I can only extrapolate negatively to how I 
would be treated to - not well at all.  Kind of like a guy trying to sell you 
a car that he claims has no rust and has never been wrecked - who blows up 
and throws you off the car lot when you pull out a magnet and find the 
buckets of body putty and point out the bent frame.

Carlton.

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