My new project ...

[Mick Cliff]

Photos don't do this car justice .... It's stunning and sits just right. For me it's the perfect 356

Thanks James

No need to be embarrassed by praise Andy....

IMO there are two constants on DDK - the quality of any car that you have been involved with (I've had 2 of your cars, so I'm biased!) and photos by Ferry Man (sadly not as prolific of late).

[Lightweight_911]

Thanks for the positive comments.

... I'm assuming (from your posting name) that you know the feel of an early 911. Are you beginning to have some thoughts yet about which gives you most enjoyment on the road.? Your 356 or a 911? I drive an (admittedly uprated) A, and am always struck by how delicate, yet powerful, it feels compared to my 911. Of course the 911 is more powerful, but it's really about what's more useable in the real world perhaps. The 356 is so light on the road, and gives so much feedback, that in most modern road conditions it's a complete joy. Any thoughts yet?

I've had quite a few early 911's in the past (most of which were uprated/modified) so have a reasonable amount of ownership experience to be able to make a direct comparison to a 356 but it's really too early to comment - I'm still getting to know the 356 (& it's 25 yrs since I last owned one - briefly).

It requires a different driving technique/style to an early 911 - at least in std form - as you need to 'read the road' much further ahead to minimise braking/losing momentum.

At the moment I'm quite happy with how the car's turned out - maybe a bit further down the line (if I keep the car for any length of time) I might be inclined to look for a bit more power (maybe a lightly modified 912 engine) - we'll see ...

[Bootsy]

James is right. You need to see it on the road and in your rear view mirror to appreciate how well it sits and how cool it looks driving

[Darren65]

.....You need to see it on the road and in your rear view mirror to appreciate how well it sits and how cool it looks driving

....very much hope to do just that in the near future.

There's always such very clear thought backed by a true knowledge and understanding of early Porsche's which is then perfectly executed that makes all of Andy's projects some of the coolest car on DDK imo.

Congrats Andy, stunning car

[Layercake]

Andy,

Are these yellow lenses acceptable legally in the UK?

I tried to place a picture of my car, but can't figure out how to attach a picture.

Eric
1964 356C Coupe

[KS]

Andy,

Are these yellow lenses acceptable legally in the UK?

I tried to place a picture of my car, but can't figure out how to attach a picture.

Eric
1964 356C Coupe

Yes they are legal. Headlights must be evenly matched and produce a white or yellow beam. My car was MOT'd with them - and I had already spent some time on-line on the VOSA/MOT sites to confirm their legality.

[Lightweight_911]

Thanks for answering Eric's question regarding the legality of yellow headlamp lenses Keith.

Just to bring this thread up to date - I have been in regular contact (via email) with the former (US) owner of my car & she agreed to send me any/all documentation that she had relating to it.

To recap, she (Shirley Smith) had inherited the car in 1996 when her partner Gerry Brown had sadly died. Prior to that, he had owned the car since the early '70's.

Here's a picture of Shirley with the car in '96 taken at Larry Markham's Porsche shop in Burbank where she left it for an engine rebuild:



- & here's a picture of Gerry (he sounded like quite a character !) wearing a rather fetching bonnet ...




It was taken in the mid '70's when he worked as a voluntary part-time ski patrol warden - apparently often using the 356 which was one of the few cars capable of being used in the snowy conditions.

I received the package from Shirley a couple of weeks ago & it makes interesting reading - including an unbroken run of annual registration cards dating back to 1973, receipts/invoices for parts & maintenance from the mid-'70's (including a full engine rebuild in '96 - only ~4k miles ago) & a thick folder of hand-written notes, technical articles, parts catalogues, etc.

All in all a great addition to the car's history.

[Lightweight_911]

The only addition I've made to the car over the past month is a grey stripe across the front wings/bonnet.

Chris Jury had used his photoshop skills to produce this shot of my car with a grey stripe :



- so I went ahead & ordered the grey vinyl (to match the other decals I'd already added).

Laid out on the car:



- & the final result after much measuring - not perfect, but it'll do:

[Layercake]

Really nice car Andy.

A bit of thinking outside the box with your style of decals.

Not sold on the stripe though.

Am I missing something, I can't seem to find a button to attach a picture.

[Lightweight_911]

Am I missing something, I can't seem to find a button to attach a picture.

There's no magic 'button' - the pictures need to be hosted elsewhere & a link to them posted here.

Read this explanation:

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=3864

[Darren65]

All in all a great addition to the car's history.

Great result Andy and a wonderful addition to an excellent car.

[bjmullan]

Fantastic Andy that you have the history for the car. Makes me want to find out more about my blue plate ex-Cal car.

Love the strip & can't believe it's not perfect

[Lightweight_911]

OK time for a bit of an update ...

Over the winter months I had a list of jobs that I'd planned to carry out but unforeseen events prevented anything other than very minor jobs from being carried out until early Spring.

First on the list was to try & fathom out why the speedo cable kept breaking - it first happened shortly after collecting the car from KK &, after installing a new cable (from Speedograph Richfield) prior to embarking on the trip to Spa last September, the new cable broke after ~ 100 miles !

Comparing the 2 broken inner cables it was apparent that they'd both broken in exactly the same place - about 18in from the wheel end.

This seemed to be approximately where the outer cable was clamped to the inner wing so a quick search on PET revealed that the cable should be secured via a fabric strap rather than the rubber-lined steel P-clip currently fitted.

You can just make out the P-clip (arrowed) in this shot:




& this is a picture of the fabric strap that I found on the 356 Registry:





So I used a piece of my 'faux' Elephant Grain leathercloth (double thickness - folded over & glued) to fabricate a suitable strap :




Once fitted, together with a(nother) new cable, it seems to have solved the problem (so far) ...


.

[Lightweight_911]

Next on the list was to clean/grease the front suspension, replace the front Koni shocks, remove/dismantle/clean/paint the front anti roll bar & refit along with new bushes & hardware.

Although the car seemed to hold the road very well & there was no indication (other than visual) that the Konis weren't working as they should, once everything was removed I decided to see if I could find a date on the shock absorber outer casing as I thought they might have been the originals.

I started cleaning them up & was quite surprised how easily they responded to a bit of elbow grease - not a great deal of time/effort was required to transform them from looking like this :







to this:





I was also surprised to find that they were dated 2009 :





Since the car had only covered ~ 1500 miles from Jan 2009 until imported in early 2014, I could have saved myself some money by just cleaning them up as they were still working perfectly ...

[Lightweight_911]

New wheel bearings had been fitted by KK so I just degreased them, checked/cleaned up the hubs & bagged them up ready to be re-greased on re-assembly.

The disc dust shields were cleaned, primed & then painted satin black:







- & the front anti roll bar & clamps similarly treated:





Unfortunately around this time, an unrelated (stupid) accident required a trip to A&E leading to minor surgery & 25 stitches in a finger ... this put paid to any further work on the car for several weeks.

.