crags' rather old, rather orange 911

[cragswinter]

despite being a long time poster on pistonheads i've never put any of my cars on the readers cars section, though to be honest only because i didn't realise this great little section was here. i love reading about peoples p&j's no matter what they've done to them, some people don't like certain makes & models, some don't like the fact that people modify what they see to be "holy grails" but me, i just like to hear about other petrolheads that blow inordinant amounts of money on what swmbo's can never understand!

so with that in mind i'll post up a little history & the sequence of events that led to a young man like myself to blow his lifes savings on a 30+ year old car

having been into cars all my life & being lucky enough to own some real beauties over the years(lots of rs fords in my late teens/early 20's) in my late 20's i returned from living abroad to a new carreer & no no-claims bonus. a cheap to insure but fun car needed to be had & after being turned on to the writings in evo magazine i decided upon a mk3 mr2 spyder. what a car! it taught me the fundamentals of mid engined/rwd handling to the point of drifting almost every corner, damp weather permitting!

after a while more power was needed & after setting up my own business the funds were there, what followed were pretty much some of my "most wanted" of modern cars, & great they all were (m3 csl, megane r26.r, 350z, exige), but my self defined "end product" had been set, & if i'm honest it always had been as i have a bit of a confession to make:

i have always wanted a porsche 911.

there's no rhyme or reason to it, but the martini sponsored cars of the late 70's & rothmans sports cars of the 80's probably had something to do with it. in fact during the 80's carlisle had it's own motorshow (yes really) & despite being allowed to sit in a road homologated rs200 (i guess that might have resulted in the ford rs fixation?) my most prized possetion became a mid 80's porsche brochure. they still make some of the best brochures (like little books really) out there & this one was no different, i studied that thing for years & vowed one day i'd own one.

fast forward a couple of years & i finally got my hands on one, a gorgeous my1998 carrera4 that came from new with a full rs bodykit, special chassis option & loads of other goodies. it was mega!

so after all that time i finally got my 911, driving it back from edinburgh was superb, a summers night, tom petty on the stereo, i don't mind admitting i got the car in the garage cracked open a few cans & just admired it-talk about a happy man

or so it seemed for a while, before long i was posting on forums about how i was having second thoughts about tracking it, what with it being so mint etc etc then as often happens someone got in touch off pistonheads......long story short, i sold it.

now, i'm not that pragmatic about cars, i love them but they are just cars, & especially over the last few years i've had some of them a matter of months before moving on but swmbo declared i'd regret this one-& she was right! so i was then on the search. my basic idea, although not written in stone was to buy something cheaper, something i wouldn't be too precious about! i had grand schemes about building a 73 or 74 rsr replica (see below)

or perhaps an early narrow body hotrod but the right car just never came up. 6 months later & with nothing but a saw bench & a honda lawnmower in the garage i was starting to wonder if i'd ever find anything, i even started looking at gt3's again & came close a few times!

so, perusing the usual porsche forums i spotted a fantastic looking impact bumper model in a very fetching orange. no harm in asking i thought so i emailed the owner asking who had carried out the work & what exatctly the car was, with the idea that if i found a suitable base car i could use some good contacts to carry out similar work.

julian got back & gave me the complete run down of the car, he'd done exactly what i wanted to do. buy a good base car & build essentially a new car out of that. our dialogue went back & forth until julian, sensing i didn't want an unending spend on building the car, suggested i might think about buying his. after spending so much time & money building the car his situation had changed & he no longer had anywhere to store the car, in fact faced with leavining the car out for the winter he had the it put in a local car museum for the winter.

so, me & swmbo made the long journey down to brighton from carlisle with the intentions of taking a look at the car & deciding if it was something we actually wanted. tucked in amongst some very nice exoctic classic cars was the orange 911 behind the velvet ropes, i'm sure guys who buy exoctic classics go through this all the time but it sure was a random way of viewing the car! in amongst me crawling underneath it with a torch & pulling verious trim panels out to inspect the nooks & crannies we had paying visiters stoppping us & asking questions about it, the posative reactions we recieved when we told people we were looking at purchasing it were encouraging it to say the least.

we then took it out for an extended test drive, & although trying to keep a straight face the car started work it's magic on us. the thing with old cars is they're so light compared to moderns, with no central locking, electric seats, no abs or traction control the way in which a relatively modest power output can fire you up the road can't help but put a smile on your face.

so a deal was done there & then, money transfered, insurance paid, & one very bright orange my1981 911 3.0 SC was mine, along with a couple of ring binders full of invoices, details, magazine features & various other bits!

being at the other end of the country i didn't want swmbo to have to drive her beetle all the way home on her own so i left the car with nick moss' Early 911 garage with a view to getting a couple of jobs done. over the last few weeks nick has sourced & fitted a new ducktail rear engine cover & front lip spoiler to give it a little more high speed stability & now she's ready to pick up.

so tomorrows the day, train ticket booked, sat nav packed & copy of my classic car break down recovery ready to hand! setting off early doors from carlisle so it should be interesting to say the least, will a 30 odd year old car make it back? place you're bets gentlemen....

[cragswinter]

so what have i bought? i'll try & enlighten some of the none 911 aficionado's amongst you out there....
basically it's a 911SC, more specifically a B series high compression engine from the 1981 production year.

back in the late 70's porsche had a wonderful idea, essentially as noise & emmisions regulations were becoming ever harder for the air cooled engine to pass they would kill it off. ever since the passing of the legendary '73RS the cras had become heavier with the introduction of the impact bumper cars though to compund the problem, the cars became less powerful as the engines were strangled by emmisions regulations in porsches incredibly important american market.

the writing was on the wall, the 911 would have to go & the future was in the water cooled models that were coming in with the 924 & 928 series cars. all of this would have come true had the porsche family not had an about turn & got rid of the then current ceo. replacing him with the american Peter Schultz. this guy knew the 911 & knew it held the key to the companies future. a rapid redevelopment then resulted in the my1981 B series high compression 3.0 SC. at last the car had it's legs again. 204 bhp & the first volume production 911 to get under 6 seconds to 60 & knock on to 150mph.

still based around the motorsport derrived flat 6 the car has what i consider to be the best of both worlds, the impact body design, the quick revving 3.0 engine & best of all the legendary build quality that became porsche hallmark ever since.

so what of this car? well after being owned by a solicater for the previous 20 years & looked after by one garge over that period it came in to the hands of the last owner as his project. we'll get on to the mechanicals later & concentrate on the body for now. the colour is the limited edition porsche colour 8C6, more commonly known as the colour of the 997.1 gt3RS. as well as replacing any rotten panels (surprisingly few) the car has been taken back to bare metal & the following replaced
Stripping down and removing all old, rusty or tired panels, seals and body parts. Car has been garaged most of it life – impressively sound bodywork
Replacing all parts with Porsche original parts including:
Full bare metal respray to all metal bodywork and parts
New front wing.
New engine lid as per original
New sill covers
New torsion bar cover panels
New impact bellows, rubber impact strips, headlight seals, headlight surrounds
New indicator lenses front and rear
New windscreen wipers
New flag mirror cams and washers
New sunroof seals, door seals
New drivers door electric window cradle
New carpet grip strips and threshold plates
New rear window metal insert
New body panel seals all round
New front bumper side inserts
New front valance (to balance without spoiler on rear)
New rear quarter window rubber seals and cover plates
Replacing all seals, rubbers, trim and mounts to as-new condition.
Restored and renewed sunroof components to 964 stronger spec.
Car fully under sealed and all nuts and bolts, clips, etc renewed

pictures to follow

[cragswinter]

[cragswinter]

[cragswinter]

[cragswinter]

[url]|http://thumbsnap.com/Yo5uFC3S[/url

[cragswinter]

thanks for all the kind comments

i'm currently sat on the train to london en route to picking it up so i thought i'd upload some more of the shots. they were all taken for the article in the previous issue of classic porsche magazine, issue #7 i think?

i can't wait to see what it looks like with the ducktail & front lip fitted, i haven't seen any photos yet so it's going to be the first time i see it this afternoon.

next job will probably be a slight lowering & corner weight/geo set up, at present i think the car sits just a little too high. then we're into the interior, with recaro's (trimmed in the orig pascha material of course), rear seat delete, rear rsr replica cage etc etc

oh & probably something a little more advanced that the 1980's cassette steroe that's currently fitted! looking at options for that but it seems to be hard to find a retro style radio that also does DAB & ipod connection, any ideas greatly recieved!

[cragswinter]

melvster said:

Superb write up, love the speed yellow 993.

You mention about the R26.R, any pics?? love those.

Here you go Melv
http://www.auto-journals.com/journals/Renault?mode...
I think there are some pro shots on one of the reports, if not I'll post some up later-fantastic cars

[cragswinter]

melvster said:

wow that is nice, only 4 in Blue i believe, did this go to Japan? i know of a Blue one which ended up there.

Cheers, no it ended up at the ring, I took a couple of Irish lads out on pax laps their who were learning the track in their 911. They saw what the car could do & offered to buy it off me, so it lives out there in Germany now & they fly over & drive it when they can.

But I digress! The car is back in Carlisle now, made it without missing a beat. I'll post up some pics of the ducktail tomorrow when I get a chance-swmbo is demanding we celebrate our new arrival & who am I to disagree!

[cragswinter]

right, starting with a couple from last month, this was us viewing the car in the museum it was being stored in...


& then after leaving it with nick moss at early 911 for it's session with the spoiler fixing machines



the start of the long drive home, which resulted in a much needed beer afterwards

[cragswinter]

rufusgti said:

What a stunning 911.
For me it hit perfection before the duckbill rear spoiler. I prefer the lines without it, seemed to show off those arches a little better. But what a lovely car. You must be over the moon.

totally understand on the ducktail, some do think it's an adittion the car didn't need but the reasons i picked it for make it the choice for me.

basically when you look at a 911 in profile the car is shaped like one big wing, this means that there is some lift created when driving, noticeable above say 80mph & particulary so into 3 figures.

to compound this problem it also makes the car pretty vunerable to cross winds at motorway speeds.

the effect of the ducktail, & indeed most 911 "spoilers" is to do just that, spoil the air low over the top flow of the wing, in this case the cars roof/rear screen. a ducktail does this perfectly (in fact there is a graph done by paul frere when at porsche that show the effects on lift of the ducktail, & whaletail that was also fitted), although to some to the detrement of style-or the classic 911 shape if you want. this is in conjunction with the front lip i've had fitted to lessen the air going under the car.

of course you could say that porsche themselves solved this themselves with the introduction of the retractable spoiler on the 964 series car & in fact some people do fit the retractable lids on the earlier cars & i can see why people like them-clean lines when stationary & reduced lift where you need it above 70mph.

however, me personally, i feel that with these spoilers, although you do get the reduction in lift you unfortunatly get a load of weight exactly where you don't want it on a 911-on it's arse!

the 80's whaletails are the same-they actually reduce lift by more than the ducktail but they also weigh a bloomin ton! so (if you're still awake)

flat back lid-produces lift across both axles

ducktail-reduces lift & weighs less

whaletail-reduces lift but weighs more

retractable spoiler-as above.

of course, none of this is really that important as the main reason i fitted the duck as because i love the look of it but it is nice to be able to baffle people with science though to be fair the car did have a new front valance fitted, & it had the mounting holes for the front lip in it already. the rear lid has been kept along with all fixings so if i or the next owner want to revert back to the flat back look it won't be much a of a job.

Beefmeister said:

Gorgeous.I would consider some period black P O R S C H E lettering either on the front or rear face of the ducktail too, that would look ace.

that does look fantastic beefmeister-like this below?

the onlything is i have the red reflector on my car & that has the porsche script across it:

(might be just visible in this photo)
i think it might look a bit daft repeating it. i do want to badge it up somehow though? any ideas fella's? this is the orig 911SC badge (with turbo tea tray spoiler):

not that i want to pour scorn on porsches design but i always just thought it a bit of a naff badge for some reason?

[cragswinter]

ditchvisitor said:

might even have to sell the car soon to fund a house

Well I don't think mentioning that on this thread may be such a bad move & your car has generated some grate comments on the impact bumper thread in the Porsche section either. Lovely car mate, such a shame to have to move it on, I was actually going to use a picture of your car in a post showing the perfect flat back look.

I don't think I'd worry too much about the colour either-looks great in the classic White with red script

[cragswinter]

lift charts re. ducktails v's flat lids v's turbo spoilers

(yes i know it's sad-i think it's a porsche thing!)

[cragswinter]

MC Bodge said:

What would be a roughly typical price for an early 80s 911 SC in good mechanical condition with fairly good bodywork?...... How about the late 80s models?......

It's a difficult one really, you can get a good 3.0SC at a little over 10 grand if you're lucky, but from my experience you really would have to be lucky.

The problem with any 10 year old+ 911 is rust, there's a reason Porsche guarantee the bodies for that period only. The problem is worse with the air cooled models & really can only get worse the older the car gets (or more used if you like).

Compounding this problem is the 911s fantastic reputation for durability, they're known as the Supercar you can use every day & so most owners do, which means many have been used all year round on salty roads & left outside.

So many I looked at were owned by enthusiasts, pampered in double garages & owned by some well respected doctor previously, which is great apart from the fact the doctor used the car all year round & underneath the polished paintwork the car was rusting from the inside out!

But of course there must be great cars out there right? & to be fair there are, but people are waking up to them & realising what they might be worth. Buy a car that needs the usual rust traps sorted & you're looking at a + or - six grand bill so be careful, & that's before you take in to consideration any of the usual bills associated with a 20-30 year old car.

I'd say that a good budget for a great car is around fifteen grand, though obviously you could spend a lot less or an awful lot more! There aren't that many cars that are getting restored like mine has been, for too long the impact bumpers were the middle ground of 911s & as such have been seen as an "entry" into 911 ownership, a stepping stone on to other models.

Obviously this means more cars have been passed down the price chain when big bills have been necessary, why spend 6 grand on sorting out rust when you'll never see the money back?

Another problem (for the impact bumper models) has been the recent fashion for the "early look", when you're ripping all those rusty panels off why not replace them with the earlier pre-impact body work? So most cars that have been restored have been "back-dated" which is great, I love them as well & as I said fancied doing the same, but if you grew up in the 80's & want that impact bumper 911 there aren't that many top cars out there.

I was looking for well over 6 months (it was a running joke on the Porsche forum), scanning all the classic car sites as well as pistonheads & autotrader, specialist forums etc & I only saw two other restored impact bumper cars & there was one other that I missed due to being out of the country, one of these cars needed a complete engine rebuild as well.

But, not everyone wants or needs a restored car of course, & the ads are full of great likely candidates. It's really hard to not get in the mind set of how you search for modern cars, ie I want this spec, with that colour, this mileage etc etc I wasn't really after a SC, in fact I really wanted a late 3.2, but you take what you can get, I wasn't even desperate for a restored car but the more I talked to people who had done the work I envisioned, the more I realised my budget wouldn't cover it.

So, ten to twenty grand should cover it!

(seriously though if you do fancy a 911, feel free to pm me or post up on here if you need any help, they are superb cars & don't have to be money pits if you buy the right car)

[cragswinter]

epoch911 said:

Ant nice car! Looks like it has an interesting spec going by that picture alone-love the brumos stripes

MC,
In short, I'm not sure the going rate for a 73rsr like you pictured but call it roughly half a million?!

But, as a long term project it can be achieved for a fraction of that, if only in the looks department.

But they really aren't a fourth rd bridge kind of car, I suspect mine could now be driven, daily as well, for another good ten years like it will have been for IRS first very happy owner without serious expenditure.

If you can do some work yourself then you could be on to owning a very practical classic sports car.

The trick is finding a good one as I've said, but spend a bit of time reading the "pre89" section of 911s for sale in the ph ads & you start to get a feel for cars that have been looked after, people mentioning top end rebuilds, kidney bowls replaced etc etc

Try starting a thread in the Porsche forum, we love spending other people's money for them over there! Ask for any pointers re these cars & people will post up any number of cars that look good.

If you're serious impact bumpers .com will give you an invaluable amount of advice, but start by asking if anyone knows or has viewed any good impact bumper cars on the pistonheads Porsche forum-we're mostly a friendly bunch

[cragswinter]

bit of a picture update

the car was requested for the launch of the new 991 series 911 at my local official porsche centre Kendal, great evening, champagn on tap & as many nibbles as you could chuck down your throat




lovely caymanR in mettalic grey, colour works really well with the silver highlights & this car had a sport design suede steering wheel-very nice
(still a list of over £57k though )



new 991 looked fantastic as expected, though surprisingly not as different in the flesh as it looks in the pictures some how? big noise was made of all the improvements but one fact they were extremely proud of & probably particulary relevent to uk owners was that although the car is bigger it's overall width reains the same. the interior really is a quantom leap in terms of quality & a gorgeuos place to be, up there with the best in my opinion. in fact it was interesting to view a 997 gt3 & turbo S on display, the new car made them look pretty low rent on the inside to be fair.

& speaking of the display........




meh they quoted my car as a 180bhp model instead of the 204 high compression engined SC it is







it was great to be part of the evening, getting a special mention off porsche uk for the car & having a craic with a lot of existing 911 owners who cut their teath on old impact bumper cars. they really made the history of the 911 a special part of the event. here's a pic of the stuff they gave you as gift, & another nice touch was the fact i'd enquired about getting a touch up paint pen for when i get the inevitable stone chips & they got me one in the correct paint code FOC in with my goody bag well done OPC Kendal

[cragswinter]

smileymikey said:

Have you thought about paying a couple of quid for an old 1970's number plate, not anything personalised just a bog standard one for a little finishing flourish??

hmmm i do have a bit of a thing for personal plates, but, the period correct plate would be an old w reg like :
XXX ###W
not really worth spending the money on in my humble, the plate that was originally on the car has been had away by one of the old owners & is still out there on something, the SIB plate is obviously a cheap irish plate, not the sort of thing i'd go for but it's on the car in the magazines it's been featured in so i figured it's now part of the cars history

[cragswinter]

ah right, i see what you mean, the look is 74 onwards though (the g series impact bumper cars) though strictly speaking i guess you could say with the ducktail & impact bumpers it really looks like a 74 carrera 2.7 rather than the 3.0 SC it is.

i did almost buy A11 RSR a bit ago but that wouldn't have went on this one unfortunatly, i think i'd only really bother to change if a really nice none dating plate came up that meant something to me.

[cragswinter]

cheers for the comments

i'm currently scouting for a photo shoot location similar to the one below, there's not much up my way but the orange go's really well with the grey industrial background i think



great photo thread i knicked the image off as well by the way:

http://btwl.tumblr.com/

some great desktops for everyone

[cragswinter]

cheers stiglet, nice to to the car popping up in the "what car have you been obsessing about today" thread as well!

a couple of things getting done over the xmas period as & when i get some apre time.....

1st things 1st, i've managed to get a stereo sourced for the car that i'm relatively happy with.

although it doesn't have DAB i figured that seeing as the switch over doesn't start until 2015 at the earliest it'll do for now. looks are subjective but ,ore than anything it has the features i want & the colours can be set to amber so at least it kind of fits in!


next big job is the seats, at present i have these:



they're great seats & really comfy but i fancied something a little more "race inspired" & i've always loved having buckets in my cars, so i've sorted out this pair:



now, whether i end up keeping the rears in or not (as i'm sure we all agree a rear cage in matching orange would look superb), for the time being i think i will. due to the fact they fold down to create a shelf they're handy for euro-hoons for putting extra bags, helmets etc on so, i managed to track down (after much faffing) the exact pascha fabric in black & silver grey that my car has:



the idea is to create a seat that looks like these:


these were done by tripe over on the impact bumper forum & are obviously in the houndstooth material that pre-dated my car but you get the idea. i'll be keeping the orig seats with the car so if the next owner wants to return them to tsandard they can, think it'll look good?