by John Glynn | Nov 29, 2009 | Classic Porsche Blog, Project Cars
My project this month is to sell some cars, so I’ve got to MOT my LJ70 Landcruiser, the 2.0 8v Volkswagen Corrado (not due but I just sold it subject to a fresh test), LandCruiser 80-series, Orange 1976 Porsche 911 Carrera 3.0 and the blue 1983 Porsche 911 SC.
The Landcruisers will hopefully pass their MOTs easily enough. The Corrado is going to need at least an exhaust repair, the Varmint (my Porsche 911 SC that has just arrived at Tilbury Docks) is unlikely to need much sorting for its first registration MOT as is early 1980 so predates fog lamps, and the rest is fairly good. That just leaves the Carrera 3.0.
The list of work to do on the juicy little 911 is getting longer by the day. For the test it needs tyres, a new steering rack and alignment afterwards. For use now it needs the window seals doing (all need changing as they are all leaking – see leaky front screen below after rush job to fit something), I want to wire up my heated front windscreen and am hoping to get some additional lights set up on the front. No idea quite what I am doing there yet but I will figure it out.
I have a very nice Stebel compact air horn to replace the Noddy horn I was left with, when the ally bracket holding one tone of the twin tone set up went crash, bang, wallop, and threw itself onto the M40 a year or so ago. I am also thinking about swapping the original gauges back into Orange until I sort this new airbox arrangement to run the twin front face vents. No good having freezing cold air coming through from the luggage compartment.Then I have some carpets to fit in the rear, and a list of maybe 30 mini-projects that I’d like to crack in to sometime this winter.
So while this week is all about chasing the stuff I am getting out of, I will also spend a day getting some bits ready for the orange car and reminding myself why I bought it. I’m going to hold off taxing it for a while yet, until we see what the weather looks like for the first part of December: no point paying out for tax, MOT and insurance when the roads are too salty to go anywhere. But it will definitely be legal for the IB “Avoid the Family” Christmas weekend drive on December 27th.
It’s hard not to look at this picture above, think about how few miles I have covered in that car this year and wonder two things: why I am hanging on to it if it’s not being used and why we don’t all move to California and take it with us. It is the perfect California car!
by John Glynn | Oct 25, 2009 | Classic Porsche Blog, Project Cars
Our recent features trip to the US was the out-and-out scene on many levels, but one huge plus was the success of my first US-bought 911: the Varmint SC.
Buying a Porsche 911 in the USA
Varmint is an 1980 911 SC Coupe that I spotted on Craigslist in Berkeley, California. The same guy had owned it 20 years, commuted in it for a long time, so cranked up some huge miles (2ooK or so) and rebuilt the engine with euro pistons and cylinders a few years back but then not used it much afterwards. We’d eventually come to an agreement on price, I’d sent the cash and he’d dropped the 911 down to a buddy’s place near where he was.
If you’re not a 911 guy, then there is nothing special about this car. Even if you are a 911 guy, you might still look at it and think I’m nuts for buying it. Most of my buddies did, and maybe still do. But, when you see what you’d pay for a rusty, right hand-drive 180bhp SC in this country, versus what the Varmint will owe me landed and registered in the UK, you have to ask: who is the bigger nutter? Me buying the well-worn but comfortable old bus that goes like stink but hasn’t an inch of rot on board, or the guy who buys his supposedly cheap UK car and then is landed with at least the same again in bodywork bills? I think I’ve done OK.
Using Varmint in the States was brilliant. Before we got there, I spent $900 with John Holleran Porsche in Pinole, having it fitted with new turbo tie rods and then 4 wheel-aligned, some clutch cable/arm clearance issues addressed and an attempt made to seal the weepy nose bearing (was successful for 100 miles or so but then failed), as well as a few leaking exhaust gaskets and oil seals (crank seal & inter shaft seal).
The clutch action is still jerky with a high bite point, first gear synchro is a little worn and the shift could be smother (just needs stripping and sorting) but you are used to all this after a few miles so no big deal, though that clutch does kill any chance of spinning the wheels on take-off. It also has a sticky brake caliper on the right rear.
As the miles went on, it did start to suffer from what felt like a timing problem but I eventually traced it to blocked fuel tank breathers and sorted it temporarily – I’ll fix it properly when it gets home. I’ll also have to do some wiring, as there was a lot of melted stuff headed to the clock and elsewhere behind the dash too. Pulled it all out but I need to look in more detail. I tidied up what I could get to and also rewired some of the fusebox while we were there. The fuel pump wiring was hilarious – NOT.
The interior has had its day: ain’t no beauty contest prizes coming here. It’s all still perfectly functional; the thick-rimmed wheel feels great, still has the proper shift knob and the dash is in great condition, sunroof and windows work, radio works and so on. It’s just worn: sand-blasted windscreen, missing door pocket on driver’s side (just missed one on eBay – grrrr), no rear seat backs, oddball centre console stuff and slightly mangy carpets. Neither did it come with a jack, toolkit or any service history at all. The backdated heat is disconnected, few bulbs out, old-ish tyres, no front compartment carpet either. Plus – I forgot about the bodywork – the paint is shot. But I’m not bothered by any of this.
What mattered to me from a buying point of view is that it was reliable, ran hard and was rot free. As far as those criteria go, I reckon I scored three out of three. At the price I paid, with the fun I have already had out of this car, and with the happiness it has yet to offer, you can’t say fairer than that.
Varmint’s ETA in the UK is at the end of November. More news as it happens!
by John Glynn | Sep 20, 2009 | Classic Porsche Blog, Project Cars
I collected my ‘new’ classic Porsche 911T project this weekend. Worked out quite well as the seller (good friend and superhero, Mr Bosman) was coming over for the Goodwood Revival, and offered to trailer it across on the ferry for me. Here was a kindness I could not refuse.
We met early today and I borrowed Bos’s trailer to bring the car to a buddy’s secret storage yard, where some nice project cars are stashed in sea containers. I wanted the T out of the way for a few months, while I get finished with the projects I have on the go, pay for this new one and get my garage building moving on apace. Once I have a better grip on my to do list, I’ll drag this out again and get properly stuck into it as a spare-time R Gruppe build.
The easiest thing for me to do (to get this back up to speed fast) would be to buy a bodily ruined SC, break it and put all the mechanical bits into this after a refurb, and I’m pretty sure that’s how I’m going to go. Rusty SCs are getting ever more common in the ‘States now, so it should be easy enough to find something mechanically sound that would otherwise be on its way to a breaker. I will put my hot rod 3 litre motor into this one – not the tired original from a scrapper.
This T is in good condition to look at, but it’s not perfect. It has serious paint issues in the luggage compartment for example, where the painter has simply painted the whole thing rather than taking stuff out. It’s not a big deal for me, as I am ripping out all this early stuff anyway (hate fiddly twin batteries and that messy-looking fusebox) and reworking the loom to run an in-dash fusebox. I will also bin the early dash column switches and run IB stuff. Same with engine bay wiring etc. Also same with suspension and brakes, though I will not run a servo. Oil system will be bespoke: a front nose cooler with a relocated tank – things like that. The oil tank that came with this is one step from scrap anyway so that has to go somewhere else.
None of this is said against my buddy, as it comes to me almost exactly as it arrived at Bos’s place from Canada. He started doing stuff, saw the work involved in getting it nice and it was just not a project he fancied finishing, so it has come to me instead. I have wanted to try early car ownership since driving one of Tuthills early rally cars many moons ago, so this should be fun to play with. I don’t want to build anything remotely factory original: it is hot rod all the way, with no “bolting back to standard” in this car’s future.
by John Glynn | Sep 15, 2009 | Classic Porsche Blog, Project Cars
Having diagnosed the source of the torrential cabin leaks on my 1983 Porsche 944 Restoration (rotten battery tray), it was time to extract the damaged interior and get the car dry. I started by taking out the front seats.
These are proper Recaro sports seats, so I was hoping to save them. No chance – they are ruined. One front runner bolt on each had to be assisted in release with a crowbar: classic 944 front seat mischief.
Front seats out, you can see how different the footwells are. On the left is the swamp. On the right is dry and lovely. I am so disappointed that someone didn’t do more to save this car early on. The trim is a very nice combination and works well with the white. Must have been a great looking car back in the day, especially as it’s such a lightweight thing. It wasn’t owned by a cheapskate either: I pulled a nice-spec Pioneer DEH-700 out of the dash. Shame no face but the chassis is rusted away anyway.
Front seats out, I started slicing carpet and rear seat squabs. Took a while to get that done and mop up the water (both sides), then I took out the rear seat back before sorting out a cover of sorts for the front glass. This will keep the worst of the rain out of the cabin until such time as Rob Campbell at Racing Restorations – UK Porsche Rust Repair experts – has an open space in his diary to weld up the battery tray, nearside sill and the front seat mounts – might as well be done while everything is apart.
I also replaced the rear lid latches and pins and adjusted the whole thing – such a lovely job using good parts taken from last year’s breakers. Must break a 911 sometime, see what that’s like.
Has returned to the farm for now. We should be able to get back on the case in October some time.
by John Glynn | Sep 12, 2009 | Classic Porsche Blog, Project Cars
As the 944 Turbo is sold, I was keen to move my other 944 project along; get it MOTed and then either start using it or get shot of it. It has to be MOTed to get the number plate off, so that’s a no choice thing.
Anyway, I collected the Porsche 944 from Midlands Car Storage and hooked up the A-frame. Towing with the Landcruiser is a dream, so we had a good run home, where I put the kettle on and wondered what to do next. I decided to start by getting the boot open.
The way a 944 tailgate works is it has a pin in each rear corner which locks into a recessed latch. To open, the key pulls rods inwards to slide the latch plates and release the pins. There are sponges (I kid you not) between the car body and the latch recesses and then the latch bodies have little reservoirs underneath, which collect the water which runs down the pins, and drains it out through the boot floor. It is convoluted but I think fairly clever. However, it is a bugger if the latches are not used regularly.
I bought the white car knowing it had sat unused for ten years in a leaky car port in Chichester, right by the sea – the house was a street away from the Channel. Imagine the steel pins and steel latches submerged in a salt bath for ten years: they seize solid and need smashing off. Smashing off window locks in a cramped greenhouse, in 26 degree heat, while lying on a floor and working over your head (in a car thick with mould) is a lovely job. I eventually got it all apart, opened the lid and checked out the boot. Dry and healthy and no rot anywhere, except the locks and the number plate lights. I have new ones of these so they’ll go on tomorrow.
I’d stuck the battery on a boost charge, so decided to try some electrics next. The door mirrors worked in 2 out of 4 directions – nice. The pop-up lights did pop up and made me want to keep the car. I love pop ups! The rest is fairly basic: this is mostly a manual car, which is great. The carpets on the drivers side seemed not too damp but the other side was soaked. I pulled the bonnet catch and noticed a lot of rust on the fusebox, the sort of rust that doesn’t happen with leaky rear window seals which is what I though I had. This had to be a hole in the battery tray over the fusebox pouring water straight down.
Battery out and project brakes on! A huge hole right across the front of the battery tray is just pouring buckets of water into the car, every time it rains. That has to go off and be fixed before we do anything else – have booked it in with Rob Campbell at Racing Restorations for some TLC next week. I’ll get the bit on the sill done done at the same time.
Getting the rest of the trim out should be fun – the front seats are seized on the runners which makes removal a job and a half. Will do what I can before the GP tomorrow.
