1965 RHD 911 restoration started

[MT]

I have painted the front suspension components and Chris Flavell says he can put new Silentbloc bushes on the torsion arms for me using reconditioned outer shells and leaving the original inner sleeve in place. Anyone had experience of such a set up?

Ian

Hello Ian. I did the same thing with Chris for my 66swb. Worked fine up to now!

You probably are well aware .... But you've got to top coat the POR with their Chassis Black on the suspension etc. POR 15 rust encapsulator is uv sensitive and degrades without a topcoat..... Bit like me in the wind and rain!

Great progress on the car by the way.

Mick

[DEEMAN]

Good to hear that re bushes Mick.
I have used POR Rust Preventer and Chassis Black before but I decided to try their Blackcote - cos I like glossy paint on some parts and Chassis Black tends to be matt/silk.
All I can say is that it is just as impressive and its glossy man, like glossy....
In this case the parts were shotblasted, then primed and I went on from there. It doesn't seem like you have to use the Rust Preventor with Blackcote as long as the surface has been properly prepared.

I'm always interested to hear what other folks have found good.

[DEEMAN]

Seems a long time since I did an update but all progressing well with the lower front left and right hand sections having been repaired. The inner front A arm supports were replaced and a new front tank support panel that I bought years and years ago was welded in.















The next major repair was the left hand turret and A pillar areas. Part of the turret had just rotted away due (I suspect) to the electrolytic action of the negative battery earthing through the body. Does that sound right? I think I know what I mean!! The left hand side of these earlier cars always seemed to rot more than the right. The turret area was repaired from scratch neither easy or straightforward.





Remember the nearside front accident damage? It looks to have caused the left hand door to open and over-extend damaging the bodywork in front of it. Weak door-lock mechanisms was a fault with the earlier car so maybe it was not surprising this happened. The hinge pillar had been pulled back to somewhere near to the original position but not a pretty sight! Only made worse by the Rotworm.
The door had been replaced due to the damage (with an earlier door stamped 60 - from where? The mystery still haunts me).





John cut the whole A post area from the Yellow Canary complete with wing joining plate and blended it in perfectly. Easy to write this and it only took me a few seconds but the work involved for John was considerable - note the brace to keep all in register.

OMG, the skill of it!! I stand back in admiration.

[murph2309]

This is such a cracking resto - your poor car....but it's going to be fantastic when it's done, a real survivor! Keep on updating.

R

[DEEMAN]

I can't believe it has been over six month since I did my last post!!

Well, things are still progressing albeit as a slow pace. I collected my engine and box from MB and Mike was good enough to take many excellent pictures during the strip-down and rebuild. If you remember, I had the original and a '68L engine that was to be used to rebuild one good road-going motor. That '68 engine proved to be a godsend as the crank in the original engine was past redemption. Mike also used the half-time gear and some other parts too. I won't go through all his pictures but here is a selection to start with.











One of the most interesting details that emerged were the casting dates. The cases - a matched pair- had a left hand side dated April 1965 and the right hand side June '65. The heads are dated January, March and April '65. Chain cases are dated May and the cam boxes are dated June '65. All original and interesting as the car was not completed until 17th September '65. A model year 1966 car with early 1965 components!

To be continued showing some of the 'orrible bits that needed replacing.

[redrobin911]

HI Ian - good to see work continuing.

Porsche date numbers on engine / transmission parts is still a great source of amusement to me - god only knows what they were doing "back in the day"

Keep up the good work!

[DEEMAN]

Thanks Robin for the encouraging words. These cars were really hand-built as I will show later in my pictures on the body.

As Mike B took the motor apart he found some other not-so-quite right components. It would seem as though someone had been into it before and started to rebuild but quite how far they got is uncertain. Not quite right by any means.
The crank, as I said, was up to the maximum o/s that you can get shells for so I was so pleased to hear that the other engine crank had standard shells so it could be re-ground.
These pictures show a bit more of what was found.









I am not an engineer so I am not going to say too much. Mike rebuilt the engine for me renewing all parts that were needed and fitting a 3.2S oil pump ( thank you Ritchie996).

So, one or two pictures of the start of rebuild.







And so many small pieces to rebuilding one chain tensioner



More anon

[DEEMAN]

So the assembly began...'



The pistons and barrels.....



The heads....



The camboxes complete with the refurbished centrelube camshafts and rebushed forged rockers....



And the rebuilt later type chain tensioners. Strangely enough both engines had ONE very early open cup tensioner in them (now binned)



So easy for me to write but many, many hours of careful work by Mike.
Forgive me if I don't go through the work on the gearbox but the time spent doing this engine piece is doing my head in [*]

Next time it is back to the body. It's taken a back seat for a while now for reasons I will explain, but is now under way again.

[AndrewSlater]

Thanks for the updates Ian, it is all looking very impressive - I'm very envious.

All the best
Andrew

[DEEMAN]

Thanks Andrew, good to hear from you. Hope all is going well with you and yours.

So, to pick up on the bodywork. All was going well on the nearside front quarter...



Then John 'the Builder' had a major incident. It resulted in him having four stents inserted and a few weeks recovery. I am so pleased to be able to say that his recovery has been just fine and he is back working on Blue Belle.

Bit shattering for a guy who never smoked, drank little and was very fit!!!!

So the rear nearside quarter was next to be reworked. Remember the idea through-out this exercise was to keep as much of the original metal where possible.
I am not mean, I am not even a fugal Scot, I just want to retain as much of the original car as reasonably possible. Anyway you can't buy the b...dy wing in any case - not for that year.

The remaining section of the original wing (the red bit!) was offered up and tacked in place. A replacement Dansk front section was modified (heavily) to blend in.



You can see how bad some parts of the original wing were.



I had bought, in the mid '80's at Husbands Bosworth Jumble Day a couple of LWB wing part-off when someone had put on RS flares. The idea was that the torsion bar apertures would be useful. So they were.



Careful patching and the mosaic is almost there!



The new Dansk (again) lock panel was modified to take the early Engine Lid pull recess - no mean job in itself - and mated in.



Finally, the rearmost section including the light-box, off the 912, was blended to the wing proper.



Bit more to do but she is looking good.

[misteralz]

Looking ace, Pip. Got a wee box for you in the garage. Drop by soon, okay?

[DEEMAN]

Thanks Al, that was a really nice surprise.

A few more pics to show progress. The outer rocker is now in place and the door fits fine except we have decided to replace the skin as this is going to prove easier than reworking the existing panel. I should point out that the door we are using is from the 912 as the 911 one is so rotten along the bottom edge. Like this...





That door incidentally was not original either and actually came from an even earlier car than BSC 3B. The inner actuating rod was made of twin wire cables(a la VERY early 911).



The door bore the stamping 60. (Just two numbers and not the normal three.) 60 is positioned much further back. All I can say is it looks original.





My earlier thread mentioned this ( viewtopic.php?f=2&t=40898 ) but I never got to the bottom of where the door had come from the replace the original which was damaged in a crash sometime in the late 60's/early 70's.

The drivers door has the right number in the right place.



The section in front of the rear lightbox was replaced to eliminate thin metal and a largish panel was inserted in the centre section to make amends for a 70's bodge job.





The rear bumpers are original but needed the inner supports replacing as they were in poor condition and they came from the 912. I couldn't simply replace the whole bumper as they had been ruined by cutting a chunk off!!



Lot of work.

Finally the original front wing was mounted (this had been replaced after the crash) and seems to fit OK. The headlamp bowl and the lightbox need replacing and the Yellow Canary volunteered the components.



Lots and lots of work going on at base. Cleaning, collecting together and renovating. The latest job has been to rework the front and rear sidelight clusters. The originals are quite good chrome-wise on the edges but the insides had deteriorated. I glass-bead blasted them and then used some chrome-effect paint before bonding on new lenses using clear sealant. Seems to have worked well. I am pleased with the result.
I'll post pictures next time.

[redrobin911]

Ian - coming on nicely. What chrome paint did you use for the indicator reflectors? Was it any good - i need to do something similar but was gong to use a chrome self-adhesive vinyl.

[DEEMAN]

I'm pleased with it Robin. Paints have come a long way and the finish is quite impressive. I'll need to see how it lasts but...it's a lot better than it was. I thought of putting foil on the bulb reflector panel but it was a disaster as I could not get it to lie without creases.
Pics next time.

I used Holts Simoniz Chrome paint.

Ian

[sladey]

Nice work Ian