The fascination with all mechanical things is not new for Evan. In fact, my entire life has centered around all of the neat mechanical stuff this world has to offer. I feel that I’m innately gifted with my mechanical abilities; I can’t imagine doing anything else. I am very fortunate to have such passion for both my hobbies and career!
I’m pretty sure I was born with this. My first memories have mechanical stuff in the picture! And my parents were both fantastic parents, introducing me to the mechanical world and providing me with the elements needed to grow! My father wasn’t around as much as could have been in the later years of my adolescence, but he did, he absolutely did show me what I really needed to see, from the very beginning. DAD was the BEST! He showed me exactly what I needed to see!
Of course this aut
obiography can’t possibly be accurate without mention of my fantastic mother! My MOM made things happen! She saw the obvious, she saw that I was totally drawn to mechanical stuff. She nurtured this, she worked hard to put stuff in front of me that could satisfy my deep curiosity.
When I was very young, probably 4, my mom found a ‘Black Cat Clock with swinging tail’ at a garage sale. I sat in a small closet and completely disassembled it, like gears all over the place! I spent the longest time figuring it out and actually getting all of the parts where they belonged and was about to put the end plate on. Mom came into the closet and said, 
“let me see!” She “accidentally” bumped into it and my hours of hard work were again scattered all over the place. Right then, I KNEW that she did it intentionally and I understood why. I’ll be damned if I didn’t do the whole thing all over again! And the clock worked when I was finished!
Years later, mom was really pissed when my father bought me a brand new 1972 Suzuki Trail Hopper while she was out of town. And that was only the beginning, the “motorcycle seed” had been sown for life! By the time I was 15, I had already owned 13-14 motorcycles. I was quite the entrepreneur! I was cutting deals left and right, buying busted bikes, fixing them, reselling. I was THE most wrenching little kid anyone has ever seen! I was tuning up our family cars and plenty around the neighborhood. Once the Santa Claus deal was out of the bag, I was really busy before Christmas, assembling stuff for the dads in the neighborhood. I rode minibikes all over the place. I would wheelie my Schwinn StingRay (with banana seat and Cheetah Slick) for miles! I had the best childhood ever!
One day we were returning from my grandparents’ house in south Houston. Stopped at a stop light, I saw a totally trashed old jalopy-of-a-car sitting on the corner, at a dirty, greasy old gas station. It was a 1927 Model T Ford, with a “For Sale” sign on it. I pointed it out and mom pulled right in there. Of course I was totally interested! Mom went home and informed my father that we were buying that very car! Mom nurtured and facilitated my passion, joy, and future! That’s the car you see on the home page. I can drive a Model T, you probably can’t! Brake on the right pedal, reverse on the middle pedal, clutch/low gear/high gear on the left pedal. Throttle and spark timing are levers near the steering wheel.
All through high school and college, I was an auto mechanic. When I turned 16, my mom again stepped up to the plate. I found the coolest little car, a 1967 VW Karmann Ghia at a nearby exotic car dealer. My MOM went home and informed my father that he was buying me this super cool car. I modified it heavily. Cerwin Vega woofers in a bass cabinet, I even painted it twice. Huge engine modifications. The red Ghia pictured is my car with my paint job. I did a fantastic job and went on to paint maybe half a dozen cars, all gorgeous. Mom was the best mother a guy could ever have! I really miss both of my parents! They surely upheld their end of the deal! I ended up working for the dealer a good bit, then went on to work for a Mercedes Benz dealer. I was the top producing technician. After high school, I had a thriving business servicing Mercedes Benz cars, exclusively. I had 10-12 clients who loved 
my services. I was fully funded in college, but developed this horrible DRAG RACING addiction! I was drag racing a 
VW Rail and the parts were very expensive. It was a BADASS little car that wheelied in every gear and ran 11:40’s in the quarter mile! The Mercedes work funded the drag racing habit!
After college (BS Mech Eng Tech, University of Houston, 1986), I went to work for Southwest Research Institute, in San Antonio, Texas, where I conducted hardcore engine research. While working for SwRI, I got a brand new MasterCard with a $9,000 credit limit and MAXED it out the first day I had it! I ordered
up a milling machine. I taught myself machining with both lathe and milling. Soon, I was staying home and designing AND building super neat stuff for SwRI. I hadn’t purchased the machines with any sort of business in mind, this was strictly to build neat stuff for my jet skis and drag racing car. The green jet ski pictured was one of my first major machining projects. I designed and built the most outrageous engine ever! The thing screams! Before long, I was off on my own, self-employed. I’ve been self-employed since 1991. I guess I can do this! And I owe enormous credit to my fantastic friend and the best engineering mentor in the world, Glenn O’Neal! We met in 1986 and have best of friends ever since! Glenn is the coolest guy!
Since about 1986, I kept hearing that the DoD really wanted “heavy fuel engines” for all of their engine inventory. It makes sense, use a common fuel for all defense engines, namely JP-8 (jet fuel). There were a couple of areas where this has proven hugely problematic. One such area is UAV’s, unmanned aerial vehicles. During a brain
storming session with a company, I presented my ideas on how to design a heavy fuel engine that would have very high power density (the problem with heavy fuel engines for UAV’s). My idea was discarded in favor of their ideas. So I suggested a friendly competition: I would design and build my concept and they would do their own engine with their very different ideas. I worked incredibly hard at this for years! I tried dozens of complex designs and FINALLY nailed it! I won our friendly competition! The engine that I’m working on in the picture is all of my design. I mounted it to the Merlin UAV and have demonstrated successful heavy fuel flight on 3 occasions.
I then designed and built engines to fulfill a need. Unfortunately, the market just wasn’t ready for this and no engines were sold. Today, 15 years later, it’s still a big problem! I’m back on it! Nowadays, you hear about or read about UAV’s (drones) every day. I believe it’s time to readdress the heavy fuel engine topic.
My current hobbies and interests include heavy fuel engines, running, cycling, 5am gym, eating natural foods, jet skiing, and recreational motocross.
AND I even had a great opportunity to drive a Ford Model T, 39 years after that first picture was taken! Here, check it out: