Barnett Performance Engineering B.P.E

Barnett Performance Engineering B.P.E We are a small machine shop in the south east suburbs of Melbourne, mostly catering to the automoti

Pretty happy with how these turned out. Now for some proper spacers and studs to retain the coils.
01/12/2025

Pretty happy with how these turned out. Now for some proper spacers and studs to retain the coils.

Happy Friday! I'm just mucking about making some parts for a build. These are side plates to suit ls1 coils for holden 6...
28/11/2025

Happy Friday! I'm just mucking about making some parts for a build. These are side plates to suit ls1 coils for holden 6. Also a cam synchroniser. Dummy up is now done, ready for some proper studs and spacers for the coils.

Keep an eye out, as this one has so much cool stuff being made for it!

Enjoy your weekend!

Shane Barnett

08/10/2025

Up and running!

Lathe repair, part 2!Hi guys, after machining up the aluminium selector plate, I machined up some 4140 bar (58od) to mak...
08/10/2025

Lathe repair, part 2!

Hi guys, after machining up the aluminium selector plate, I machined up some 4140 bar (58od) to make new selector detent inserts. My reason for doing it this way is, the detent is a hard steel ball that locates in a position, eventually it would wear the aluminum significantly and create gear selection faults as the detent balls won't locate correctly.

Anyhow, after machining, the plate and inserts were assembled and then I positioned the old damaged plate over the new plate, locating it into position with 16mm bar in the bores (the bores are 16.02mm diameter). The original detents were then drilled through into the new plate, so their positions would be correct.

Then the fiddly job of installing the detent levers, balls and springs was all that was left.... after much swearing, it came together perfectly.

We then assembled the machine, which was also fiddly, but not difficult. We then wired in a VFD and hooked it to the original switches, after 5 mins of programming, the old Italian lathe is up and running.

It runs perfectly. Selects all gears as ig should and I'm really happy with how it turned out, needless to say, our friend who owns the lathe is stoked.

Time to make swarf!

Cheers,

Shane

Sometimes, things just don't go quite right. One of our good friends was moving a newly acquired lathe into position whe...
06/10/2025

Sometimes, things just don't go quite right. One of our good friends was moving a newly acquired lathe into position when it slipped off the machine skates and took a nose dive. Needless to say, he was devastated. The lathe was face down on his workshop floor, haemmorhaging its vital fluids.

Once he managed to get the 2t behemoth righted, the damage was clear that the feed gear selection plate had been smashed.

I got the call to have a look. We removed the plate and checked the gear train and worked out there was no internal damage to the machine, so a new selector plate was what we needed to get it back in action.

This is what I came up with. A new billet aluminium selector plate, the bores will have bolted in detent bosses for gear selection made from steel.

So far it's all progressing along well!

Enjoy your evening,

Shane

Hi everyone, Hope you are having a great weekend, I've just finished making these 1929 Chev grease caps, I'm pretty happ...
15/02/2025

Hi everyone,

Hope you are having a great weekend, I've just finished making these 1929 Chev grease caps, I'm pretty happy with how the turned out.

I hope the client likes them.

Anyhow, enjoy the rest of your weekend, it's time for me to get onto the next project!

Cheers,

Shane Barnett

Hi everyone, after a quick drawing change, these are now coming out really nice (if I do say so myself! Lol).Certainly s...
29/01/2025

Hi everyone, after a quick drawing change, these are now coming out really nice (if I do say so myself! Lol).

Certainly some bling for a 1929 Chev!

Hope your week is going well!

Shane Barnett

Hi everyone, hope you've had a great long weekend, I certainly have. I got asked to repair some 1929 Chev wheel grease ...
27/01/2025

Hi everyone, hope you've had a great long weekend, I certainly have. I got asked to repair some 1929 Chev wheel grease caps, unfortunately, they are not something I could repair. But, I told the client not to stress, as I can make new caps (from significantly better materials than 1929's aluminium!).

So I drew up a design as close to the original as I could and started machining.

The blanks were first roughed out on the manual lathe, bored to size (for a thread, last job on these) then into the mill to cut the nuts octagon the same as the original.

Then on the cnc, I loaded in a bit of scrap to test out the logo etching and see how it looked. While it is good, it doesn't quite look right. Hence why we sometimes test things before committing on the final piece.

Back to the computer, to enlarge the center logo a little and adjust the program and I reckon I'm good to go now.

Anyhow, hope you like the update, more fun stuff on the way as the weather permits!

Cheers

Shane Barnett

25/12/2024

Merry Xmas everyone! Hope you are having a fantastic day with the people you love!

Take care and be safe through the holiday season!

Cheers,

Shane Barnett
Barnett Performance Engineering

Doing a little engraving today for some of our friends, these came out nice! Costa Mastro Mastro Performance EnginesGrie...
28/06/2024

Doing a little engraving today for some of our friends, these came out nice!

Costa Mastro Mastro Performance Engines
Grieci Performance & Race Engines

Hopefully we'll see JETLNR into the 6's soon!

Another little mission completed. This is a tool setting micrometer for a line bore, I'd never seen one, but I had a rou...
08/04/2024

Another little mission completed. This is a tool setting micrometer for a line bore, I'd never seen one, but I had a rough idea of what I wanted and this is the end result.

It was a fun little job! The digital/manual micrometer head has a 1 micron resolution (in digital), which is plenty!

Time to give it a go.

Enjoy your evening,

Shane Barnett

Hi everyone, hope youve been playing in the shed over your weekend, because I have..... I had to block off some direct ...
07/04/2024

Hi everyone, hope youve been playing in the shed over your weekend, because I have..... I had to block off some direct injector ports on a vw golf head for another workshop. Fun stuff!

I made the blanking plugs to be an interference fit of 0.1mm (4 thou) on each of the stepped sizes. This was also put in with loctite 648 heavy duty retaining compound. The head was heated and the plugs driven in. Needless to say, they are in there for good.

The manifold face got a quick skim on the old Beavermill (1972) to be sure it's all dead flat.

I reckon it came out alright.

Have a great week!

Shane Barnett

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Melbourne, VIC
3000

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