A visit with Lee Hurley

[Plechtan]

For those of you who don't know, Lee Hurley is the owner of HESCO ( Hurley Engine Service Company ). He has made and still does make most of the Jeep performance parts for Mopar Performance. I Stopped in Birmingham on my way back from Florida to picked up the Aluminum Cylinder i had purchased from Hesco. The head has has larger valves in it and some additional work done to it to flow better. The Stock aluminum head is great for a Stroker or other performance engine, but We are really pushing the envelope with the Bonneville motor, so i decided to have additional work done. The head has such high flow now that it would not perform well on a street vehicle.

Lee was kind enough to give me a tour of the shop, and i was surprised to see how much work he does that is not Jeep related. The company has 17 employees, and one large building. Cars and trucks are everywhere. The place is more like an old time speed shop then a company that just sells Parts. They do engine swaps, tuning, build motors, develop products etc.

One thing i saw while i was there was a supercharger on a V6 JK. I asked Lee about his supercharger kit for the 4.0, I said i though he didn't make it any more, He said " well i do and I don't" Translation: if you want one call Lee.

The Engine dyno had a 4.0 set up on it, The Chassis dyno had a car on it as well, can't remember what though.

I talked to Lee about tuning the strokers, and of course he can do that in his sleep. I asked about just retuning the factory computer, He said he could do that, but the factory CPU was slow. He said the Unichip was about 10 times faster then the factory CPU. He custom programs them per customer requirements.

I saw some EF kits he was putting together for Mopar, they were using the 95 style intake. I asked Why don't you use the 99+ intake? The answer was that any change would have to go through Chrysler engineering. Lee does just sell the wiring harness, so you could buy the harness and get the rest of the parts from a bone yard if you wanted to put a 4.0 into a YJ or vehicle.

[Plechtan]

Part 2

Lee was telling me about a project he just finished for a customer in Texas. The customer wanted his Durango to be able to go toe to toe with almost anything on the road. So Lee put a 392 hemi ( the new mopar performance one, not the one from the 50's) put a couple of turbos on it, tuned it. It produces over 800 HP. It went through over $70,000 worth of transmissions. It finally ended up with a specially built 4L80E. So think about, putting a GM trans behind a Chrysler Motor and having all the electronics work.

Lee also works on Diesels, Exotics, Classics, hot rods and anything else people bring him.

Oh, i forgot to mention, Lee was a little late meeting me, he was flying his plane back from Florida, where he dropped off one of his customers, and hit some bad weather.

Lee is very interesting to talk to and spent much more time with me than he had to. His engineering is first class and he stands behind his products. By the way, he can supply you with any size throttle body you want, and a modified intake as well. I was going crazy looking for a header flange, I asked Lee, he said " How many do you want?" He hooked me up with one and even moved the mounting holes so it lined up better with the ports in the head.

I was impressed, Hesco is first class, and now i know why they get a little more money for their products.

[seanyb505]

Its always good to know some of the great people who actually run the companies we buy from. Good to hear hes down to earth it sounds like, and that his doodoo smells just like everyone else's.

[Katiek]

Yes you are right.... Have some pics to show Hurley visits...