Back in beige
Posted: Sat Nov 10, 2012 8:14 am
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Hi. I'm here to renew my membership.
Some backstory: I found DDK in 2006 shortly after buying my first Porsche, a 1972 911T. I chanced upon the car whilst photographing a collection for a magazine and persuaded the owner to sell it to me. I thought the car was a scruffy beater, but it turned out to me anything but. I loved the car and used it whenever I could, but with value of the car increasing all the time, I got nervous about using it. In 2008 I sold it and learnt to fly.
Me flying Slow Wing, my Avid Speedwing, in Ireland: http://www.flickr.com/photos/namcys11/5937359505/
After a year or so I bought a Renault 8S, but it wasn't a Porsche and it only made me miss my old car more. I decided I wanted a narrow-body impact bumper car - this Targa being a particular inspiration:
It didn't take me long to realise that I wasn't going to find a nice one of these that was within my budget, so I kind of gave up the chase. Meanwhile, around mid September, we sold our house. Not wanting to be living with my or my girlfriend's parents whilst we waited for the next one to arrive (it still hasn't), I've been away continuously doing jobs abroad since.
I'm currently in San Francisco. Last weekend I met up to go driving with a friend called Hayden in his 912 and a 356. It was a beautiful sunny Californian day, and Hayden took us on a frantic winding route through redwood forest and out to the coast. We stopped for a pizza, before swapping cars and doing the same for the journey back. Hayden is a suspension engineer with some sound credentials, so the two cars were set up beautifully and what they lacked in power, they absolutely made up for in their ability to be slung through a corner in a way that would have resulted in me wrapping my old 911 around a giant tree. I hadn't only seen the four-cylinder-Porsche light, I proper wanted one - a lot.
Somewhere out the back end of California, sun, winding road, eight horizontal cylinders, total driving joy.
I'll admit that all the time I had my old 911, and most of the time since, I hadn't really understood the 912. The 356 is interesting. I think. Whatever - too expensive for me to think about that much. I search Craigslist and Pelican for 912s but even scruffy ones are too pricey, so I stop fairly quickly and resume normal operation of looking at aircraft (they're pretty cheap with the price of fuel and the recession and whatnot).
Two days later I am down in Fremont at tuning shop called Sharkwerks, photographing a story with John Glynn (of Impact Bumpers and Ferdinand magazine). John, doing his usual Talking Like a Madhead, learns that one of the Sharkwerks guys has a 912. Furthermore it's Standard California Beige (a perversion of mine) and he wants to get rid of it. After all, who could possibly want a taupe-coloured, four-cylinder Porsche.
Me.
So I buy it there and then.
I got it back to a friend's garage this evening after a few hours messing about with fuel pump issues. It drives great. There are a few bits of rust as the car was left sitting outside for three years - sills, front pan, one rear seat and floors. OK, lots of rust, basically anywhere water can, and did, pool. But the unrusty bits are solid as a rock. The paint is original, scratched, scruffy. Panels are dented, the ride height is US-spec nastiness. But... after four long years I finally have another Porsche - one that I can screw around with and drive as much as I like.
Hello again!
Fitting a get-me-home inline fuel pump to get the car to someone else's home.
Inter-Continental Beige Motorcar safely stashed in friend's Typical American Prono-Garage. The stack of deep-sixes in the foreground were included in the sale!
Earlier this year, Photobucket started charging to hotlink images from their site.
If you are seeing broken image links in this thread, download Google Chrome browser and install the extension 'Photobucket Hotlink Fix'.
***
Hi. I'm here to renew my membership.
Some backstory: I found DDK in 2006 shortly after buying my first Porsche, a 1972 911T. I chanced upon the car whilst photographing a collection for a magazine and persuaded the owner to sell it to me. I thought the car was a scruffy beater, but it turned out to me anything but. I loved the car and used it whenever I could, but with value of the car increasing all the time, I got nervous about using it. In 2008 I sold it and learnt to fly.
Me flying Slow Wing, my Avid Speedwing, in Ireland: http://www.flickr.com/photos/namcys11/5937359505/
After a year or so I bought a Renault 8S, but it wasn't a Porsche and it only made me miss my old car more. I decided I wanted a narrow-body impact bumper car - this Targa being a particular inspiration:
It didn't take me long to realise that I wasn't going to find a nice one of these that was within my budget, so I kind of gave up the chase. Meanwhile, around mid September, we sold our house. Not wanting to be living with my or my girlfriend's parents whilst we waited for the next one to arrive (it still hasn't), I've been away continuously doing jobs abroad since.
I'm currently in San Francisco. Last weekend I met up to go driving with a friend called Hayden in his 912 and a 356. It was a beautiful sunny Californian day, and Hayden took us on a frantic winding route through redwood forest and out to the coast. We stopped for a pizza, before swapping cars and doing the same for the journey back. Hayden is a suspension engineer with some sound credentials, so the two cars were set up beautifully and what they lacked in power, they absolutely made up for in their ability to be slung through a corner in a way that would have resulted in me wrapping my old 911 around a giant tree. I hadn't only seen the four-cylinder-Porsche light, I proper wanted one - a lot.
Somewhere out the back end of California, sun, winding road, eight horizontal cylinders, total driving joy.
I'll admit that all the time I had my old 911, and most of the time since, I hadn't really understood the 912. The 356 is interesting. I think. Whatever - too expensive for me to think about that much. I search Craigslist and Pelican for 912s but even scruffy ones are too pricey, so I stop fairly quickly and resume normal operation of looking at aircraft (they're pretty cheap with the price of fuel and the recession and whatnot).
Two days later I am down in Fremont at tuning shop called Sharkwerks, photographing a story with John Glynn (of Impact Bumpers and Ferdinand magazine). John, doing his usual Talking Like a Madhead, learns that one of the Sharkwerks guys has a 912. Furthermore it's Standard California Beige (a perversion of mine) and he wants to get rid of it. After all, who could possibly want a taupe-coloured, four-cylinder Porsche.
Me.
So I buy it there and then.
I got it back to a friend's garage this evening after a few hours messing about with fuel pump issues. It drives great. There are a few bits of rust as the car was left sitting outside for three years - sills, front pan, one rear seat and floors. OK, lots of rust, basically anywhere water can, and did, pool. But the unrusty bits are solid as a rock. The paint is original, scratched, scruffy. Panels are dented, the ride height is US-spec nastiness. But... after four long years I finally have another Porsche - one that I can screw around with and drive as much as I like.
Hello again!
Fitting a get-me-home inline fuel pump to get the car to someone else's home.
Inter-Continental Beige Motorcar safely stashed in friend's Typical American Prono-Garage. The stack of deep-sixes in the foreground were included in the sale!
Have fun with it!
