DDK - Die Deutschen Klassiker

Looks fab. Like a new car build

Lovely to see such careful work...

Looking good, Gitesh. And by employing the services of a professional it appears you have thoroughly overtaken me. Reckon yours will be on the road a long time before mine.
Well played!

Thanks guys.

Hi Richard - I don't have your experience or expertise so I had no choice but to hire a professional. One advantage of DIY is that you can do it at your own pace and to your own choice. I liked the brake pipes you constructed but Gary chose to use copper piping instead, which is not original spec but it will be corrosion resistant unlike the original steel pipes:























Kind regards
Gitesh

Wiper Motor

One of the perils of buying a 45 year old RHD UK car is just how much corrosion there is, even beyond the bodywork. It is crazy and here is yet another example. Gary advised that the wiper mechanism had excessive play due to corrosion so he asked me to source a replacement. Figuring that other used units of the same age would be in a similar condition, we opted for a new replacement instead. This part is NLA so I had to go with one from a slightly later model.





The main difference between the mechanisms is that the original had a bracket to hold the wiper motor. Gary fabricated a bracket and originally planned to weld it in place a la original and spray the mechanism but to save cost, and since it won't be seen, he attached it with a bracket instead:





Kind regards
Gitesh

911GP wrote:Hi Richard - I don't have your experience or expertise

Hi Gitesh,
Given that I have very little of either, I doubt that's true. But you may be lacking my misplaced confidence, in the face of various evidence, that this stuff is not really very difficult if you choose your battles.

It does, however, seem likely that the professional is going to create a better car than the idiot amateur. The good news for me, I guess, is that I will have 300-odd hours of labour costs to spend on something else (probably something unwise).
Of course I should acknowledge that I have devalued my car by going DIY on the reassembly, so it probably works out level-ish in the end.
DIY rebuild is fun, though. Really good fun.

Thanks for posting the pictures, keep them coming!
Cheers, Richard.

Heating

The heating control unit on the dash was ornamental: the fan did not operate and the levers did not move. I expect the latter was due to very rusty heater control boxes. We cleaned up the components and replaced some of the parts: a pair of control boxes, a new fan and a broken heater box base (the ones Porsche now sell are from a latter model and have flanges so I sourced an original without flanges and then later found out that Carpoint sell repros of this original type ).

Gary carried out the necessary repairs to the rest:












A nice job:




Kind regards
Gitesh

I had a look around your car this week Gitesh....

.....just WOW!

Thank you, Darren.

Rear Lights

We cleaned all the dirt off the original rear light units and they were in ok condition surprisingly. We refurbished the wiring harnesses and Gary gave the units an overhaul.





He repainted the inside white:





The outside were not originally painted but we chose to paint in a matching colour to give them some protection:











Once assembled, he applied a clear wax protection to the outside:




Assembled and ready to install:






Kind regards

Gitesh

Front indicator units

Unfortunately, the condition of the front indicator units were far worse and the front left unit had a gaping hole in it:





At the time, metal repro units were out of stock everywhere I looked so I tried to source a used unit (the bottom one in the photo above), which was kindly offered to me by Mike (210bhp) - thank you, Mike.

Gary had the units lightly blasted, which revealed some damage:







He repaired the damage with metal filler, which worked well:







As you know, the brightness of lights is partly due to the reflective quality so Gary had the units sent off to have vapour deposited aluminium applied (what you see on the reflector for torches). They came back looking brilliant:





Gary refurbished the side light reflectors:





And here's a final photo of them reassembled and wax protected. When we were cleaning the units, the off white covers you see below were so badly covered in dirt that at first I thought they were a smooth finish!





Kind regards
Gitesh

Headlights

I bought new headlight bezels since the one of the old ones had a dent and I figured it was easier to buy a new set than get the old ones repaired.







Gary was assembling the units when he noticed that the reflectors were corroded:









So he sent these off to be blasted and have the vapour deposited aluminium treatment and they came back looking like this:





Apologies for the piecemeal updates. There are a lot of photos to sort through but I'm getting there.

Kind regards
Gitesh

Those indicators look amazing. Would you be willing to share the cost of the coating process on the inside? Definitely something I’d be interested in to replace the aluminium tape inside mine.

Hi Gary,
Certainly. I'll take a look at my invoices and send you a PM. Just FYI, The coating was applied to the inside and outside.
Kind regards
Gitesh

Oddly, doing my light today, rears all restored and ok, but fronts to do this weekend, might be tricky..
Can't you buy chrome paint in a rattle can?

Hi Graham,
We chose this material because of the reflective properties. I can't see why a spray wouldn't work but try a test area first since the chrome spray may not be as shiny as they state on the can.
Kind regards,
Gitesh