Engine Builder Software

My Shop Assist at a glance

Engine builder software tracks precision work from the moment a core arrives to the moment it ships: tagging the part, recording every spec, signing off every step, and pricing from what the work really takes. My Shop Assist was built to run a shop like that.

Price: $199/month or $1,999/year. Free 30-day trial, no credit card, no contract. See pricing.

Included in every plan:

• Unlimited users, customers and jobs
• Custom project types so each job is tied to the engine block, cylinder heads, crank or transmission on your bench, not a year, make and model
• QR codes and zones to tag every core and move it through teardown, machining, assembly and dyno
• Custom forms and SOPs for blueprinting sheets, inspection sheets and sign-offs
• Groups and packages for the builds and processes you run over and over
• Time tracking with task history for pricing repeat work
• Live pricing and ordering from Turn14 and your connected suppliers
• Progress billing for long builds, manual or automatic
• Two-way text messaging and a customer portal for status and photos
• Card payments through 360 Payments: in person, virtual terminal, text-to-pay
• QuickBooks Online, QuickBooks Desktop and Xero export
• iPhone and iPad app

Optional add-on: MOTOR labor times and OE parts for general repair, $200/month.

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Track the part, not a car

Most shop software assumes every job is a vehicle with a year, make and model. An engine or transmission shop usually isn't working on a car at all. It's working on a block, a set of heads, a crank or a transmission that showed up on its own. Custom project types let you set MSA up around those parts instead. Create a project type for engine blocks, cylinder heads, crankshafts, transmissions or whatever else crosses your bench, with the fields that matter for each one, and every job is tied to the actual part you're building instead of a vehicle record that doesn't fit.

That keeps your history clean too. Look up a customer's block and you find the block, with every job it has been through, rather than a made-up car entered just to satisfy the software.

Tag every core the moment it hits the bench

A block, a set of heads, a crank — in this business the work often shows up as a bare core shipped in with little more than a name on the box. QR code tagging means you print a label and put it on the part the second it arrives. From then on anyone can scan it to pull up the job, the specs, and exactly where that core is in your process — so there's never a question about which bare block on the shelf belongs to which customer.

Organize the floor into stages

Teardown, inspection, machining, assembly, dyno, ship. Set up a zone for each stage of your process and move jobs across the board as the work moves through the shop. Sort the work into departments so a machinist and an assembler each see only what's theirs, and tell at a glance what's waiting, what's in progress, and what's ready to go out.

Build your repeatable processes once

A balanced rotating assembly, a stage-2 head package, a common rebuild combination — the builds and process steps you run over and over shouldn't be rebuilt from scratch every time. Groups and packages let you bundle the tasks and parts for a process into one package and drop the whole thing onto a job in a single click, with the labor and parts already attached.

To see how a working engine shop writes its builds down as checklists and bills of materials, listen to episode 213 of Do It For A Living.

Blueprint the build and verify every step

Build a task with a checklist and a description and you've turned it into a blueprint. Lay out the steps that have to happen in order, and require the checks to be signed off before the job can be marked complete.

When a checklist isn't enough, build the real thing. Custom forms let you create your own blueprinting sheet — bore and stroke, bearing clearances, ring gaps, deck height, torque values, every field you actually record — and attach it to the task, the job, the customer, or the vehicle. Your assembler fills it in at the bench as the engine goes together, so the numbers are captured where the work happens instead of on a clipboard that gets transcribed later, or not at all.

The same tool covers the rest of your process: teardown inspection sheets, core evaluation forms, check-in and check-out procedures, and customer waivers. Write the standard operating procedure once and it lives on the job — which means a new hire runs your process the way you run it, without memorizing it or interrupting someone to ask. Nothing ships until the build sheet says it's done.

Get sharper on pricing with every build

Every time you track time on a process you run often, MSA keeps that history — and surfaces it right in the add-task screen when you're building the next estimate. Instead of guessing what a balance job or a valve job takes, you quote from what it has actually taken you, again and again. The more you build, the more accurate your estimating and pricing get.

Run jobs for customers you'll never meet

A lot of this work arrives by freight — you never shake the customer's hand. So authorization and payment have to work at a distance. Send authorization requests and build updates by text or email and let the customer approve remotely, then request payment with text-to-pay or email-to-pay links before the freight heads back out. The whole job can run start to finish without the customer ever setting foot in the shop.

MSA wasn't adapted for engine and transmission work after the fact. Core tagging, blueprint checklists, process packages, and historical time data are in here because builders asked for them — and because the people who built MSA come from this world.

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Questions shop owners ask

What does My Shop Assist cost?

$199 a month or $1,999 a year, with every core feature included and unlimited users. There's no contract. Start with a free 30-day trial, no credit card needed. MOTOR labor times are an optional $200/month add-on.

Do I have to enter every job as a vehicle?

No. Custom project types let you track engine blocks, cylinder heads, crankshafts, transmissions and any other part you work on, each with its own fields, instead of forcing them into a year, make and model. Vehicles are still there for the jobs that are whole cars.

How do I track a core that shows up in a box?

Print a QR code label and put it on the part the moment it arrives. Anyone can scan it to pull up the job, the specs and where that core is in your process, so there's never a question about which block belongs to which customer.

Can I record blueprinting specs like clearances and ring gaps?

Yes. Build your own form with every field you record, like bore and stroke, bearing clearances, ring gaps and torque values, and attach it to the task, job, customer or vehicle. Your assembler fills it in at the bench as the engine goes together.

How do I price a rebuild I do all the time?

Track time on the process every time you run it. My Shop Assist keeps that history and shows it when you build the next estimate, so you price from what the work actually takes instead of a guess.

Can I bill a build in stages?

Yes. Progress billing invoices the customer for the labor and parts logged in a date range, and automatic progress billing can create those bills for you on schedule.

Does it work with QuickBooks?

Yes. Finished invoices export to QuickBooks Online or QuickBooks Desktop, with parts, labor and tax mapped to the right accounts. Xero is supported too.

How hard is it to switch?

The free trial includes setup help: remote training, adding your users, importing your data and connecting QuickBooks.