1973.5 US 911T restoration

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Gary71
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Re: 1973.5 US 911T restoration

Post by Gary71 »

That front end is dreadful, but it’s one of those things, if there was lesser levels of rot in all those panels (which there usually is) you’d still end up cutting it all out.

Onwards and upwards! :)
911hillclimber
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Re: 1973.5 US 911T restoration

Post by 911hillclimber »

My 73T I re built in 1988 had a front end worse than that.
It had (has) rock solid rear seats and shelf, totally rust free then and now. Under the rear torsion bars was evil, sills were just shattered etc.
They all go in much the same places to some level or another.

Overall a good shell you have, get the panels and press on! :alien:
73T 911 Coupe, road/hillclimber 3.2L
Lola t 492 / 3.2 hillclimb racer
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PMNorris
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Re: 1973.5 US 911T restoration

Post by PMNorris »

I hope your rust issue is isolated, but it doesn't look pretty.... It looks worse than mine was: https://www.ddk-online.com/phpBB2/viewt ... 1&start=30
I ended up with almost a complete rebuild from the bulkhead forward!

Paul
1970 2.2 911 T / Ex RS Clone, now more original looking, with 1979 3.2 SS engine
1988 3.2 Carrera Commemorative edition (sold)
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Re: 1973.5 US 911T restoration

Post by Flat 6 »

PMNorris wrote:I hope your rust issue is isolated, but it doesn't look pretty.... It looks worse than mine was: https://www.ddk-online.com/phpBB2/viewt ... 1&start=30
I ended up with almost a complete rebuild from the bulkhead forward!

Paul
Paul - thanks for that link, you have dealt with some similar issues there! I am hoping at the moment that my front inner wings are repairable but will be at the point very soon where I need to make that call.

Next instalment to follow shortly.

Cheers,

Al
DDK#732

1981 SC Coupe, now in Dublin
1978 SC Targa, now in Aberdeen
1978 SC Coupe, now in London
1983 SC Coupe, now in London
1973 2.4T...under restoration...VERY slow restoration.
Flat 6
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Re: 1973.5 US 911T restoration

Post by Flat 6 »

So I spent most of yesterday up with my 911 while the bodywork guy went off with his family for the long weekend. Great to be able to spend some time reacquainting myself with the work that has been done and what remains.

The photos below are really to demonstrate a few other places where the car is actually really good! Again, I’m trying to balance restoration versus renewal and am determined to keep not only original metalwork but also original finishes. So, I intend not to remove stonechip where I don’t need to. This does mean that the shell will never be completely bare metal and any blasting that gets done will have to be carefully kept to localised areas.

My reference for this project is an almost identical car on BaT that was sold in the US some years ago. Thankfully the photos are all still up there! https://bringatrailer.com/listing/1973-porsche-911t-5/

Much of my engine bay, rear underside and rear wheel arches are in similar condition so I intend to keep them but I will probably paint – haven’t decided yet and will do more clean-up first.

Here are a few shots of the engine bay…

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Apologies for the state of the car in this ‘episode’. It had been under cover in the workshop but dust from paint prep on other cars has found it’s way everywhere – this is after a quick hoover! The eagle eyed among you will already have noticed that there are signs of some new panels in the above photos – more to come on that.

I am also pleased to say that the rear arches, kidney bowls and sills appear to in generally good shape, albeit there may be some surface rust at the back on the b-pillars (no such thing I hear you say!!) and the rear edge of the rhs kick plate needs repair.

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And the underside of the rear floor is also sound.

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And thank goodness also those dreaded rear torsion bar areas!

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Not great photos but I got my endoscope in there and all is well.

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So, as I said above, my current plan is to keep as much of this original stonechip as possible. I’ll clean it up more and have a think - I guess we will have to apply some new paint otherwise it will be badly mis-matched to the sections of the car that have been/will be replaced.

More to come later.
DDK#732

1981 SC Coupe, now in Dublin
1978 SC Targa, now in Aberdeen
1978 SC Coupe, now in London
1983 SC Coupe, now in London
1973 2.4T...under restoration...VERY slow restoration.
Flat 6
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Re: 1973.5 US 911T restoration

Post by Flat 6 »

I’m going to jump ahead a bit here to the present day because I am at the point of removing everything from the centre tunnel. At least I assume I need to remove everything – the interior of the car and the underside of the new rear seats and parcel shelf are due to be blasted along with most of the front end.

I think I am pretty much ready to pull the loom etc through the tunnel. I have some wire cored washing line to pull through which should guarantee there is something there to pull in the opposite direction however hard the blaster goes in.

My rear cross member where the wiring etc emerges looks like this:

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My reading is that most stuff pulls out the rear. The only thing I can think of where that won’t work is the wire for the heater valves which is a single piece. Presumably you pull this forward?

I’m off to do some more reading because I might tackle this tomorrow. If anyone happens to have an easy writeup of this or can point me to the right point in a thread please feel free to point me at it.

Cheers,

Al
DDK#732

1981 SC Coupe, now in Dublin
1978 SC Targa, now in Aberdeen
1978 SC Coupe, now in London
1983 SC Coupe, now in London
1973 2.4T...under restoration...VERY slow restoration.
Flat 6
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Re: 1973.5 US 911T restoration

Post by Flat 6 »

OK, so the post above was supposed to be sent yesterday but looks like I didn’t click the submit button…

So today I had two helpers and we managed to remove the loom and most of the other control stuff that runs through the tunnel.

Spent a bit of time wrapping the loose ends of the front end of the loom and that seemed to work well.

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Most of the stuff came out very easily.

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And then the main loom – took a fair bit of pulling in places but all good in the end. One thing that caught us out was the short wire that comes out of the tunnel just ahead of the access hole for the gear change knuckle. I’m assuming this is a handbrake switch? I’ll have it written in my notes.

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That sorted (had to cut the connector off) and a few good tugs and the loom was out!

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The only things we didn’t get removed were the heater cables. Can someone tell me how they are removed? Will the ends that connect to the flapper boxes fit through the tubes?

Anyway, happy enough with that days work.

Al
DDK#732

1981 SC Coupe, now in Dublin
1978 SC Targa, now in Aberdeen
1978 SC Coupe, now in London
1983 SC Coupe, now in London
1973 2.4T...under restoration...VERY slow restoration.
Gary71
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Re: 1973.5 US 911T restoration

Post by Gary71 »

That’s a long day of work!

Easiest way to get the heater cable out is to cut the loop at the handbrake end and pull them out from the engine bay.

You have to buy a new cable but it’s only a couple of quid and by the time you’ve detached the folded ends from the heater box it will ready to snap anyway.
Flat 6
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Re: 1973.5 US 911T restoration

Post by Flat 6 »

OK so back to the original chronology of this project, some time in 2015…

To make some early progress, we decided to leave the front end for a while and get stuck into the ‘easier’ parts of the project. By this stage I had already done a lot of research and identified what panels were best from which suppliers. So we ended up with rear seat bases from Restoration Design, rear parcel shelf from Danske and a complete front floor from Retroline. I was a little nervous of the last one but it turned out to be a very good fit.

I don’t seem to have a photo of the parcel shelf cut out but it came out cleanly and allowed us to check the condition of the metalwork between the rear screen corners and the engine bay. Both sides were holed but cleaned up well and we got some new metal in there.

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The rear bulkhead between the seats and the parcel shelf was assessed as sound so this was left in place and the rot cut out above and below. The parcel shelf panel went in first, but not before we had carefully removed all the welded on brackets etc from the old panel and attached them to the new one. There was a lot of careful measurement here so hopefully when the car is rebuilt that will pay us back!

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The bodywork pro was pretty pleased with the fit of the Danske panel. We were then faced with the challenge of the filler piece between the parcel shelf and the lower edge of the rear screen. Fortunately, by this stage I was part-way through a bodywork restoration course at the local FE College so I had weekly access to free metal and all sort of bending and shaping equipment. After a few goes I ended up with a panel that I was very happy with – this was a complex piece with curves and folds plus vertical indents to match the original.

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We then also had to deal with the gap between the new parcel shelf and the top of the rear bulkhead.

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The original design is that the rear bulkhead actually turns backwards and overlaps with the front edge of the parcel shelf to create a sort of box section. This was a much simpler panel to fabricate that the rear infill and we soon had this in place.

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So that was the parcel shelf area sorted. Next to come were the rear seat bases and front floor – watch this space.

Al
DDK#732

1981 SC Coupe, now in Dublin
1978 SC Targa, now in Aberdeen
1978 SC Coupe, now in London
1983 SC Coupe, now in London
1973 2.4T...under restoration...VERY slow restoration.
Flat 6
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Re: 1973.5 US 911T restoration

Post by Flat 6 »

So on to the rear seat bowls. The Restoration Design panels were nice to work with but came in two pieces so again there was a lot of measurement before these were brought together and then all the different mountings were welded into their correct locations.

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Cutting the old metal out felt like removing half the car but at least we would be sure we had removed all the rusty bits. Also allowed us to put a coat of epoxy mastic on the top surface of the torsion tube, which was in good clean shape anyway. Looking at this now, I wonder how much I will regret not removing the heater valves when I had this unique level of access!!

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Again, with plenty of measurement, the whole panel was let in and seam welded. The rear seat backs were trial fitted at the early stage of this process to ensure correct positioning of panel and brackets.

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So overall really pleased with the work on the rear seats and parcel shelf. This will be media blasted before being seam sealed again and recoated with epoxy and nice Sepia brown 2-pack.

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That's enough for this evening - very time consuming this thread build!

Al
DDK#732

1981 SC Coupe, now in Dublin
1978 SC Targa, now in Aberdeen
1978 SC Coupe, now in London
1983 SC Coupe, now in London
1973 2.4T...under restoration...VERY slow restoration.
deano
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Re: 1973.5 US 911T restoration

Post by deano »

Nice thread this, thanks for posting and making it interesting. Your sill photos have confirmed the finishing details that I needed for my car (where the sill joins the A post), so it just goes to show that you are helping other people. Looks like a nice solid car, very very similar to how mine was.

Best of luck! :cyclopsani:
Dean
1973T Targa MFI 334 met blu- under restoration https://www.ddk-online.com/phpBB2/viewt ... 28&t=67060
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Re: 1973.5 US 911T restoration

Post by Flat 6 »

Thanks Dean, good to know it’s of some use!

So, the front floors were next to get the treatment. Again, some major panel removal needed, this time combined with a lot of spot weld drilling. I have to admit I left this lot to Terry who diligently worked his way around doing minimal damage to the sills and centre tunnel.

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And then for the Retroline front floor panel. These were the only supplier I could find who did a complete half floor. I guess they may be known as suppliers of cheaper Porsche parts but I have to say this panel was a surprisingly good fit and went in very well.

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There was even plenty of extra metal on the flange where the panel meets the sill and the dimensions were great. Guess we struck lucky with this panel – their tooling must be OK!

So that’s the main cabin space sorted. The front edges of the floor have been left unattached because there is some tidying to do at the back lower edges of the front inner wings and the lower bulkhead. This whole area is soon to be media blasted so I will be able to post some pics of nice clean metal then which is much more DDK resto! Then it will be seam sealer and epoxy awaiting final colour.
Last edited by Flat 6 on Thu Jul 14, 2022 10:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.
DDK#732

1981 SC Coupe, now in Dublin
1978 SC Targa, now in Aberdeen
1978 SC Coupe, now in London
1983 SC Coupe, now in London
1973 2.4T...under restoration...VERY slow restoration.
Flat 6
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Re: 1973.5 US 911T restoration

Post by Flat 6 »

This is a bit out of kilter chronologically but I forgot to post the essential shots of the engine coming out. Nothing new on DDK but always a big moment for the DIY’er.

In this case, I was helped a lot by having access to a ramp at the local Technical College where I was doing the Vehicle Restoration course. My tutor even volunteered to stay late and help me one evening when the class wasn’t on!

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It was a messy lump!

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The engine had too much variation in compression to be left and, with no real history, the only thing to do is a full rebuild. It did go well though, so much so that I took it to a local rolling road just to see what it was putting out. I was pretty surprised with the result – this is a 140bhp US T after all!

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The engine is currently being dismantled and I am wondering if there might be some hotter cams or something in there – surely it’s unusual for a tired 2.4T to still be pushing out it’s original power after nearly 50 years!

I’ll report back on the engine as the work progresses.

Cheers,

Al
DDK#732

1981 SC Coupe, now in Dublin
1978 SC Targa, now in Aberdeen
1978 SC Coupe, now in London
1983 SC Coupe, now in London
1973 2.4T...under restoration...VERY slow restoration.
rich73
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Re: 1973.5 US 911T restoration

Post by rich73 »

Great to see another restoration in progress although I did think I was looking at my car in some of your images, we have red over Sepia in common.
To avoid confusion the following image is my car.
Image2022-07-13_04-28-40 by richard cannings, on Flickr
Flat 6
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Re: 1973.5 US 911T restoration

Post by Flat 6 »

Spookily similar. I presume that is another US paint job with the usual care taken to avoid overspray?!
DDK#732

1981 SC Coupe, now in Dublin
1978 SC Targa, now in Aberdeen
1978 SC Coupe, now in London
1983 SC Coupe, now in London
1973 2.4T...under restoration...VERY slow restoration.
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