The Little (and Big) Engines That Could…(and the Machinist Who Makes It All Possible)
by: vicque fassinger
Whether you:
use a John Deere row crop tractor with a 400 engine HP on your farm,
have a KEM Equipment’s 5.7L industrial engine providing power for your facility’s equipment,
venture off-road with your Kohler-powered ATV, like to travel to town with Fido in your 1955 Chevy 3100 5-window pickup truck with its 235ci 16 engine, or have a handful of bulldozers for your construction company, there will come a time when your gas or diesel-powered vehicle or machinery is due for a preventive maintenance check, some repair, a rebuild, or a total remanufacture. Even if you’re mindful about how you operate your various equipment, you feed them clean fuel, and you keep them from overheating, everything mechanical eventually needs the attention and finesse of an expert to keep it running (or to get it running again for thousands of more trouble-free hours).
Enter Randy Adair.
An Automotive Service Excellence (ASE) Certified Master Engine Specialist, Adair is a quiet, reflective, and unassuming individual who has built a decades-long, well-deserved, and impeccable reputation in the automotive machining industry as the “go to” automotive machinist throughout Ohio and the neighboring states.
It’s not every day you come across a person who absolutely loves what he does for a living, has a wealth of knowledge that can only be acquired through years of real-world, hands-on experience, has the natural ability to inspire others through his work ethic and service-centric disposition, and has been steadfastly interested in his chosen field before he was even old enough to drive. Yeah, that combination of passion + expertise + inspiration + commitment is truly a rare and wonderful find these days. To all his individual, one-time, loyal, or corporate clients, Adair is that diamond in the rough amidst all the oil and grease and pieces and parts that are ever present at any busy machine shop.
While it seems as if Adair could easily repair a gas or diesel-powered engine with his eyes closed, it’s his work in rebuilding and remanufacturing engines that gets him up before sunrise everyday like a kid on Christmas morning – excited, curious, and anxious to get inside each engine and spend uninterrupted hours focused on the projects before him. “There’s a lot of hours of skilled labor involved in rebuilding an engine,” explained Adair. In addition, rebuilding an engine requires taking the engine out of the vehicle, machinery, or piece of equipment in order to work on it. Adair’s been there and done that, too. Safely and properly removing a heavy, complex, and expensive engine from its impossibly-cramped niche is an art and science all its own.
Years ago, Adair regularly called on the owner of a local auto service in southern Ohio when he needed an experienced crew to remove and then reinstall his clients’ engines. In 2010, as the demand for his engine work continued to skyrocket, Adair partnered with the owner of that local shop to launch and run A&A Engine Installers — a full-service, high-volume, engine repair shop specializing in the removal, rebuild, remanufacture, and (re)installation of gas and diesel powered engines (and employing 20 dependable, experienced, and skilled engine shop workers).
While owning and running a busy repair shop for ten years, Adair regularly had a waiting list of customers for his engine remanufacturing projects. Like rebuilding an engine, remanufacturing one also requires its removal from its source and, when remanufactured by Adair, the end result is the same thing as buying a brand new engine (except not as expensive). “When I remanufacture an engine,” explained Adair during an afternoon interview at his busy shop in Ohio, “I tear it down completely. I thoroughly clean the blocks, heads, crankshafts, and connecting rods. I inspect every component of it, machine the parts to the exact tolerance, rebore and hone the cylinders to exact specifications, precisely reassemble it to manufacturer’s specs, and then live-test the engine.” It’s no surprise that when customers, colleagues, confirmed gearheads, farmers, engine fanatics, or anyone else who wants a trustworthy, professional, and matter-of-fact opinion about the current state of their particular gas or diesel-powered engine, they turn to Randy.
Within just a few minutes of talking with him, you immediately get the sense that you’ve (finally) found a machinist who really does know what he’s talking about and that he (really) can rebuild your engine and make it as good (if not better than) brand new. What’s more, he makes you feel like the quality of workmanship he will perform on your engine will be of the same caliber that he would do on his own machinery, vehicles, or equipment. And that says a lot about Adair.
“Sure I want my customers to be happy with my services, but the most important thing for me is their safety,” explained Adair. “It doesn’t matter if the project is on an engine for a recreational vehicle, farm equipment, or someone’s daily-use vehicle, I want my customers rest assured that my work is never going to leave them stranded somewhere or cause an incident while they’re operating it because of slipshod work. Not on my watch,” Adair said adamantly.
Randy Adair’s work ethic, expertise, and skills stem from countless hours that turned into days that seeped into years of tinkering around engines with his dad. “My father was really very mechanically-inclined,” shared Adair. “It was my dad’s love for drag racing, engines, and all things automotive that just naturally became my world, too. Being at my dad’s side from such a young age, I was fascinated by how things worked, how they were assembled, and how I could take them apart, fix them, and put them back together. And often times,” continued Adair,
“putting them back together better than how they were!”
Before working full-time in the engine-machining world. Adair served in the United States Army as a Light-Wheel Vehicle Mechanic and then went on to serve in the Army Reserves. With his obvious passion for and knowledge of engines, he was in high demand at both local repair shops and established corporations. He worked as a Cylinder Heads/Blocks Machinist for five years at a Columbus-based machine shop and then ran a Crank Department as the lead Machinist at a welding corporation.
After operating his own 5-bay, 20-employee engine installation and rebuild/remanufacture shop for a decade, Adair embraced the opportunity to set up and run Adair’s Repair Shop ~ an 8,500 sq.ft. automotive and industrial engine repair shop specializing in all facets of rebuilding gasoline and diesel powered engines for a diverse portfolio of customers with agricultural, industrial, recreational, and/or daily-personal-use vehicles and machinery. He provides all the specialty, detailed engine-repair-related services that local service centers and general repair facilities are not able, qualified, or equipped to perform.
Adair consistently maintains a superior standard of workmanship in all services performed ~ remanufacturing or rebuilding each engine into a high-quality finished product that “meets or exceeds the industry standard” and that always surpasses his clients’ expectations.
While strolling alongside him through his facility ~ a pristine place filled with a well-organized cool collection of engine parts, pieces, and components, a local farmer and long-time loyal client stopped in and asked Adair, “My tractor’s engine is down, do you think you can get it up and running again for me, Randy?”
“I think I can!” Adair chuckled confidently as they shook hands and Adair assured him he’d call him later.
