"K-Roll-PorscheTamer" (k-roll390)
05/30/2014 at 11:44 • Filed to: Porsche 911
6
15|
"K-Roll-PorscheTamer" (k-roll390)
05/30/2014 at 11:44 • Filed to: Porsche 911 | 6
| 15 |
Previously, on !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , Karl described driving his dad's 911 for the first time; this time, he recounts the events leading up to and of his first time underneath the car!
It's now been almost a month since that first drive, and each one has been a very fun, exciting and scary learning experience at times. I'll admit that I think this car is perfect for me in just about every way; but the more I drove it, there more something didn't seem right.
I had said that "The 915 trans is very, awkward. It didn't have much feel to it while shifting gears, sometimes I was worried that I'd put it in 4th rather than 2nd. I didn't mind the shift travel but there was no real feel to it overall IMO.", and on one of my regular Porsche forums, Rennlist in this case, I commented on how "...the brakes didn't seem to bite until near the end of the brake peddle's travel.". I had simply written those off as characteristics of the car and went about driving it, but then while cleaning the car up a couple weeks back, something hit me.
There was something wrong with the car! THE ENGINE LID WOULDN'T STAY SHUT!! Trying to be resourceful, I tried working on it myself, to no avail. Yes, this was a problem, but not the actual one that I had remembered; the one that I actually remembered was an unusual Intermittent idling problem. In the winter, when I had warmed the car up to full temp.(In this case, starting it up and letting it run in the garage for 40 minutes) it's idle which was normally around 1100rpm, would randomly jump up to 2100rpm and never go back down, as demonstrated by these clips I shot back in the "Hellstorm Winter of 2013":
(On this clip, I had the hand throttle up/on, which is used to give the car more gas and increase the idle, and the rpms were stuck at 2100rpm and the only way to fix it was to turn the car off.)
(On this clip, the hand throttle is down/off, I gave the car some gas, and as you can see, the idle was stuck increasing and wouldn't go down.)
What was I to do in this situation?!? Luckily, I remembered that I had met a Porsche mechanic at a relatively close-by Porsche/Euro-cars shop, Munks Motors, a couple weeks earlier when he had given me a ride in his very nice 944(which you can briefly see at the end of my video) while I was out on Woodward, so once again I grabbed the keys and made the 25 minute drive to Munks!
But halfway along the drive, I discovered a third problem! It was unusally hot in the car, as if the heater was stuck on high and none of the controls did jack(I'll be honest, I haven't a clue how to use these HVAC Controls...)
When I arrived, I explained the engine lid and heater problem and received an estimate on how much it would be; unfortunately, there were no slots available for my walk-in and as I toured the garage all, of the slots were full so I scheduled to come back the following Wednesday to have the work done. It definitely wasn't a wasted trip because I saw this: HRRRGGG!!
Finally, that Wednesday came this week and as I made the same drive again, I decided to film it with my iPotato 5 for you all to see and it's actually not that bad!
When I arrived, the procedure was rather different than before. This time, I handed the keys over to one of the mechanics so he could take the car for a test drive to see if there was anything else wrong with the car that I didn't know about; and frankly I'm glad he did, because being new to this car, I wasn't and still am not sure how the car is supposed to feel at peak efficiency.
As before I was allowed to walk around the garage and talk with mechanics and touch the cars as if they were my own(which means very very gently like a baby) but I didn't touch any of them; but I did snap pics of all the cars I could see for you all, so here ya go!
(THE THING!!)
(944 and 944 S2)
(VW Scirocco, unmolested)
(A 928)
(There is much "soon" in this pic.)
Finally, my car was pulled into the garage and prepped to be put on the lift, while I observed the very careful prepping, I went over the test drive with the mechanic.
He told me that the car was an good example and in very good condition for it's age, minus the dings, scratches and such. The engine felt great and power was very good(The engine was rebuilt once within the last two decades or so).
Now for the problems; remember when I had said the shifter had very little feel to it, well that was because it was loose! There was a good two inches of movement in each gear because of worn out bushings. To give me an idea of how it was supposed to feel, he told me to sit in this 930 Turbo with RUF wheels......HRRRRGGG!
The shifter felt much better, the throws were solid and confident!
The suspension was worse; with much vibration, alignment, wheel shake, loose and crunching front and rear suspension! :(
And here's the killer, quite literally. There is heavy vibration from braking from highway speeds and efficiency was very low, not to mention that every time I drove it, there was only 4% brake fluid left in the car! :(
For more specific details on the car, I point you to the notes I've got from the invoice on the work:
Yeah, there's actually a lot of stuff that needs to be taken care of...in time, it will get done! :)
Now on to the fun stuff, getting underneath! The car was lifted and I took some pics. It was interesting, I was expecting it to look bad, but it's actually in very good shape! The factory anti-rust coating is still pretty decent:
FLYING 911!!
The side of the engine
Oil residue on the trans from when the oil pump blew last summer...YUCK!
Cobwebs.....and spider stuff......This ain't no Mazda! :P
These might be SSI Heat Exchangers, a very desirable part. :)
The work took about 45-50 minutes, they also checked the tire pressure, refilled the brake fluid to full, checked the battery, oil fluid, fan and AC belts and other basic things. I was able to help out to as per my request from my previous visit and pick up some nice pointers and advice; they've got a very nice and knowledgeable crew there! :)
With all that said and done, I paid for the work, and was later paid back by my dad, and was on my way! Aside from the fact that the car was now full of condensation(AC fixed this) from the pretty intense rain shower/storm going on outside, along with very deep puddles/rivers that the 911 just floated through; it certainly didn't help that I knew now what serious problems the car had either..Whenever it hit a hidden puddle/river, it would slide around a bit or recoil from the sudden impact of a large body of water(lightweight car problems I suppose). It was a great driving experience/nightmare from hell that just really goes to show the amount of skill required to drive these cars back in the day, And I loved it/was fearing for my life on the now 50 minute drive back home.
Luckily, I made it back without a hitch. Now the question is what to repair next! Luckily Father's day is coming up and my mom and I are planning on doing something with the car for him, I'm definitely suggesting a full inspection of every part/piece and replacing the pads and looking at the suspension first!
Hope you all enjoyed another story from my adventures! :)
George Costanza
> K-Roll-PorscheTamer
05/30/2014 at 12:51 |
|
Wow nice Porsche Mark 1 (just kidding)
Frank Grimes
> K-Roll-PorscheTamer
05/30/2014 at 13:00 |
|
seems like crap you coulda done yourself.
Vizzini
> K-Roll-PorscheTamer
05/30/2014 at 13:06 |
|
Pretty nice mechanic to give you that rundown and a handy checklist of tasks to work on. To start, fix the brakes ASAP. Since you are on Rennlist, you know there are a ton of DIY threads you can use to guide you through doing this work yourself.
And that Mk1 Scirocco ... yeah. I'm glad that's not local to me, or I'd likely do something rash with my checkbook.
|
K-Roll-PorscheTamer
> Frank Grimes
05/30/2014 at 13:20 |
|
Possibly. But even so, it was worth it to find out the other things I didn't know and I saw it better to have someone who knows the car take a look than me. In retrospect, however, if I could find someone else who has a 911 of this vintage, I probably would have asked them first. But sadly I don't, but I have no regrets about doing this.
|
K-Roll-PorscheTamer
> Vizzini
05/30/2014 at 14:41 |
|
Thanks! The brakes are certainly top priority right now, then I'll probably do the full car care report with that to see what else is potentially wrong with the car. Are you a Rennlister as well?
|
Vizzini
> K-Roll-PorscheTamer
05/30/2014 at 15:05 |
|
Yep, have been for 10 years or so. I did a bunch of relatively minor work on my old 993 thanks to the DIY threads and Robin Sun's indispensable site (which is 993-specific, so you probably haven't run across it). Despite being a long-time car enthusiast, I rarely actually worked on cars, so it was something of a revelation when I started taking things apart, cleaning, fixing or replacing parts and putting it all back together. It took ownership of the car to a much different level. Plus, it was a convenient excuse to buy tools, which is always a good thing.
Enjoy working on your dad's car, especially if you do the work together. You will learn a lot, you will make the car better, and you will gain an intimate understanding of just how much German engineers love to do things the hard (but correct!) way.
Lindell
> K-Roll-PorscheTamer
05/30/2014 at 15:22 |
|
Amazing car, but what's with that radio? It spites the fantastic design of the interior with it's silver and green glowing terribleness. You gotta go OEM with such a classic, or at least pick something more subtle.
|
Lindell
> K-Roll-PorscheTamer
05/30/2014 at 15:23 |
|
That Scirocco looks great though, I've always had a soft spot for the mk1 roccos.
|
K-Roll-PorscheTamer
> Lindell
05/30/2014 at 15:26 |
|
That was my dad who put that in... It'd be near impossible to find an original Blaupunkt head unit.
|
K-Roll-PorscheTamer
> Vizzini
05/30/2014 at 15:30 |
|
Awesome! I'll have to look for you on there sometime. :)
If you ever see me, I'm Karl_W944.
|
Vizzini
> K-Roll-PorscheTamer
05/30/2014 at 16:05 |
|
Very cool. 993Dave.
WhatDaFunk
> K-Roll-PorscheTamer
05/30/2014 at 16:15 |
|
What an awesome garage! Really cool that they let you help out and gave you some tips as well.
V8Demon - Prefers Autos for drag racing. Fite me!
> K-Roll-PorscheTamer
05/30/2014 at 16:18 |
|
Look at it this way, it's cheap undercarriage coating. I had a relatively small rear main seal leak on my old motor when I first bought my 87 Mercury Cougar. It never leaked onto pavement. Right onto the exhaust and when moving, onto the trans tunnel. After 2 years the entire trans tunnel had a coating akin to pickup truck bedliner.
|
V8Demon - Prefers Autos for drag racing. Fite me!
> K-Roll-PorscheTamer
05/30/2014 at 16:21 |
|
So this......gigantic muffler.... anything out there in aftermarket lannd that would improve upon it WITHOUT bankrupting small nations?
|
K-Roll-PorscheTamer
> V8Demon - Prefers Autos for drag racing. Fite me!
05/30/2014 at 16:48 |
|
Fabspeed bypass muffler would work. Not sure how much it is though. Look up some videos. Sounds lovely.