1974 Carrera Coupe - RHD, UK car

[Ferry Man]

The correct shape for a smugglers box lid.
Smaller and lighter than the LHD version.

[Ferry Man]

A dog guarding a duck.

[Ferry Man]

[Ferry Man]

Beautiful curves.

[Ferry Man]

I ran my hand over that wing. It was silky smooth.
And my hand was then covered in white powder.

[Ferry Man]

Getting close to needing that Lime Green.

[sladey]

Very nice

[markm]

It does look like its coming on a treat. I bet the lime green will look nice on it

[Ferry Man]

Very nice

It does look like its coming on a treat

Thanks Gentlemen.
Yes, I'm happy with progress.
The car looks good, my finances less so...

[Ferry Man]

OK, we'll leave the body for a while (give Nick time to thoroughly stir the paint).

[Ferry Man]

I'm doing my best to restore the car back to standard specification and one important part of that was to make sure the car rides and handles like it would have done back in 1974.
So I wanted to configure the car with original dampers and suspension.
A large part of the handling characteristics and the general 'feel' of the vehicle would come from the rubber bushes.

The car will ride on genuine Porsche bushes throughout.
And that proved to be particularly expensive when buying the bushes for the rear because I needed to buy the complete arm at a cost of nearly £350 per side. In that instance I bit the bullet and purchased from my local OPC.

But there was one area where even I baulked at paying Porsche prices and that was the front A-arms.
Now I already had those re-furbished and ready to go. They just needed bushes.

However - like the rears - the proper Porsche rubber bushes are bonded on and you can only buy the complete metal arm with bushes in place. At a cost of approx £750 per side!

So, that wasn’t going to happen.

[Ferry Man]

Now I already had the A-arms re-furbished and ready to go. They just needed bushes.

[Ferry Man]

[Ferry Man]

the proper Porsche rubber bushes are bonded on and you can only buy the complete metal arm with bushes in place

I set about researching alternatives.
There’s been much discussion on forums like Pelican and the considered opinion is your best bet is Elephant Racing.

However, don’t be misled, I wasn’t looking for an upgraded high performance ‘race’ spec, merely standard road trim. And – along with their familiar polybronze bearings - Elephant do produce bushes that mirror the standard specification.

You can buy polyurethane style bushes from many other sources but they don’t accurately replicate the rubber ones as fitted by the manufacturer.
Poly bushes work by sliding within the steel housing. Friction can build up and - unless lubricated - squeaking can result.
The original Porsche rubber bushes are different in that they work by deformation and the rubber twists within the mount. The bush doesn’t turn on the shaft.

[Ferry Man]

In researching the forums the consensus seemed to be that of all the various options, the Elephant product - whilst expensive - offered the highest quality solution and the nearest match to standard road spec.
Nobody appeared to regret buying the premium product. And it was still much cheaper than the Porsche parts.

So, I ordered a pack direct from Santa Clara.