356 Race Car

[vicpolky]

I saw this at the Volksworld show this weekend, a lovely car and very purposeful looking.

[Phil Parry]

Yep, great stand at the Volksworld Show Steve. Well done for making the effort and sneaking a 356 into the inner sanctum. The car and the van looked great. I did try to introduce myself and then realised you were a mannequin. Next time maybe.

There was a lovely black 912 just outside, opposite the main entrance. Red interior. Slightly lowered. Absolutely gorgeous. I'll buy it if the owner's reading this and wants to sell it!!

The Porsche Type 64 was also there. Having seen it at Hedingham Castle last year, I paid it a visit at the Prototyp Museum when I was in Hamburg in November. I thoroughly recommend a visit to anyone on DDK - a vast array of early Porsches, special bodied cars and early VWs.

[steve wright]

Thanks Phil. I'm not known for my verbal skills but I can usually muster more than a mannequin!

Volksworld show was great, probably one of the best I've been to in years.


But getting to the show was the main event for me, not the show itself.

Setting the deadline and having to keep the commitment meant all the niggles and development had to get sorted. This meant we had to get the 42 DCNF's, CSP Python exhaust and towbar on the bus, and the race car had to be presentable. It also meant I got a chance to tow with the new trailer and load up on my own which was good experience. I must thank Barry and Fabian for coming and helping out on the Friday afternoon, as their experience paid dividends. The bus pulls like a train and keeps up well with traffic - I even found myself overtaking a couple of lorries on the M25! It happily pulls the car and trailer at 55mph up hill and down dale, so we're sorted thank goodness.

I promised myself I wouldn't buy anything at the show this year, but blew that out the water with a stack of bits for the Okrasa Special and this:

Talk about lightweight!

The other developments so far as the race car goes was the MSA inspection to get FIA papers. A frantic mornings work by Ian (thanks again mate!) saw the fitment of the Solex P11's so they could be photographed for the paperwork:



We also fitted them to try and cure the misfire/poor running above 5,000rpm we experienced at goodwood but unfortunately it's persisted. The engine rev's more freely and there's more power, but we've still got the problem. Having now replaced the dizzy for a good, known one, replaced all the plugs & leads (putting hotter plugs in too), installed a new condensor and coil, and checked the valve train we're a bit stumped. We're running an early fuel pump so will try a electric version soon and replace the Sebring exhaust with a CSP Bursch version as we've got to reduce the noise level anyway.

I must thank Mike Smith of PRS at this point because he has spent an age on the phone to me answering all manner of questions. I've seldom experienced this kind of openness so freely when it comes to racing - thanks again Mike.

Anyway, the car passed the MSA inspection so another hurdle is over, and the car is also finally road registered (the DVLA didn't want to inspect the car which was a pleasant surprise!). I think it helped that I had a mountain of paperwork from the US.

Any advice on our misfire/poor running would be appreciated.

Cheers,
Steve

[911hillclimber]

I too have the very same situation with my Lola sports racer fitted with a 3.2 911 engine on PMO's.

I have changed everything you have and all to no avail.

When the plugs are new/cleaned it runs good and as carbon soot builds up (in minutes) the plugs are black with soot, insulating the spark gap and so the misfires begine but only under load.
This all happens on idle as the engine warms.

Advice from PMO is to fit hotter plugs to get the plugs to clean-off the carbon soot.

I'm on my third set of plugs....

I had a marginal improvement fitting the 12 years old dist cap in place of the new one!

My other thought is to find/fit the points cover in the bosche dist which tightens the fit of the dist cap to the dist body as it tends to float about a bit.
All this is very irritating, so i know what you are fighting.

[Rustbucket]

Does the misfire happen regardless of engine temp ?

[cubist]

I had a high revs misfire with the 60n in my coupe... tried everything electrical: leads, hotter plugs, 009 out for NOS 050 then NOS std etc, then carb settings, fuel pump, even gearing, with only marginal improvement until evesdropping on a US vw forum late one night and there was the answer... valve bounce. Replaced the valve springs with a new set of fresh but std (as opposed to empi and the like uprated which could easily damage the fragile 50yr old valve train) and it's magically cured itself it seems. Worked for me...

[911hillclimber]

Interesting indeed.
My pops-n-bands occure only under load and above 3500 though.
It's been on a rolling road session for 6 hours and no probs doing power runs to the top.

[steve wright]

Well after a day playing with most things the car is sorted. Ian replaced the dizzy and timing (static and running) and had already replaced all the other electrical items such as condensor, etc. He swapped to an electric fuel pump to get a constant and known 3.5psi and checked the voltage and contacts everywhere, and then went with his gut feel that the engine was just strangled and reamed out a spare set of main jets from 115 to 135 and bang it suddenly pulled like a train right the way round to 7,500rpm so we have a car we can go racing with! I have a sense the Zeniths on the car had just been installed to sell it as there is no way it would've been raced (other than very slowly) with this set up. It was worthwhile going over everything else though - installing the fuel pump revealed a split fuel line under the tank that would've completely gone on the first run over the curbs.

I have a list of almost 20 things to finish sorting, but the main things are done - we've just got to get a seat installed and replace the exhaust to get the decibels down. phew. It's been a long road to get this far, and this has been with a turn-key race car. Thank God I didn't start with another project to go racing!

[steve wright]

I thought I'd list the work we've done to the 356 since purchasing it to give an insight into what it takes to do the first sort of a car for historic racing. Bear in mind that this was a car I purchased that was already running in the US SCCA series, albeit not recently. It's worth noting that while most of this might be specific to this car you would have to do all this in a ground up build and even a turn-key requires checking, updating and fettling. Anyway, take a deep breath and read on:
- Purchase car! Easier said than done, especially a good base car
- Ship it to UK, clear customs
- MOT car. To do this we had to: sort out the indicator wiring, replace the headlamps with RHD versions, rebuild the front king & link pin as it was knackered, and adjust the drums brakes to pass, but realise we need to re-line front shoes
- Register the car with the DVLA, filling in a multitude of forms
- Send away for licence plates
- Figure out which trailer was suitable and buy it, including winch, tie-downs, etc
- Purchase FIA compliant boots, gloves & balaclava (I already had a helmet & suit)
- Buy new Dunlop racing tyres, fit & balance them
- Sort a spare pair (in case of puncture)
- Do a full spanner check and realise the Americans don't use torque wrenches
- Do a full service (engine & gearbox oil, filters, timing, plugs, tappets, etc, etc)
- Replace all the flexible brake pipes & thoroughly bleed the system
- Purchase a new second set of brake shoes in case we cook a set at the track
- Break 5 foot breaker bar trying to take off rear axle nuts. Get big impact wrench from Paragon and use fancy language to remove. Fit new split pins and torque correctly....
- Check the suspension alignment (toe, camber & castor)
- Fix an exhaust leak by filing the flanges flat and replacing the gaskets
- Clean and grease the gear linkage
- Rebuild Solex P11-4 40mm dual throat solid shaft carbs
- Replace Zenith's with Solex P11-4's to cure misfire/poor high-end running
- Replace everything else (condensor, coil, dizzy, fuel pump, etc) when P11's don't cure it
- Re-jet the P11's and we suddenly have a quick car
- Replace the split main fixed fuel line under the tank when installing the new electric fuel pump: fractured along the seam, it wouldn't have lasted 10 minutes punishment over the curbs....
- sort throttle linkage to take up slack and also get full throttle. sort accelerator stop so we don't bend arms & linkage when the right foot is welded to the floor...
- Replace original steering wheel with smaller Speedwell version to quicken steering
- Fix the check straps so the windows seal properly
- Remove bonnet lock and a host of other non-essential bits
- Corner weight car: comes in at 791 kg's, well within the minimum limit of 780 for a 356A Super. Realise we have some work to do moving weight forward and to right hand side though - we'll leave that to another day
- Sort a set of tools and spares for the racetrack (thanks to PRS for the latter!)
- Buy and install the MSA race stickers

Still to do:
- Purchase new fire extinguisher (old one is out of date...)
- Purchase lightweight jack, axle stands, oil, brake fluid, etc
- Purchase CSP-modified Bursch exhaust to improve performance and reduce the noise level. The Sebring really is awful on both counts!
- Sort the rear towing eye
- Buy and fit new 5-point harness (old one was out of date...)
- Make up templates for the newly purchased ally Speedster passenger seat
- Buy and fit a modern race seat

And this is before we've really turned a wheel in anger and broke something! Ah well that's racing...

[Mike Smith]

Steve,

That`s about normal for some of the cars that we get where the owner states that :-

"shes running great but pulling a bit to the left, the horn comes on when I turn right and shes a bit of a devil to start - probably only needs an oil change and a bit of tweek"

Well done Steve - I`ve enjoyed the chats and we NEED more 356`s out on the tracks

[MdR]

And this is before we've really turned a wheel in anger and broke something

But the good news is you haven't broken anything. Except maybe the bank.

[sladey]

That's his day job isn't it?

[steve wright]

My day job is tinkering in the workshop now! Left the City last week and now on gardening leave, which has proven a godsend given the amount of time I'm having to put into the 356 to get it sorted. Okay, today I fitted the new harness and fire extinguisher, removed a host of unnecessary and weighty items (like the cigarette lighter ), sorted the Hazet toolbox with spares and tools, got a towing eye fixed up for the rear, and mocked up the ally passenger speedster seat. The wood in the footwell is to help in mocking up the drivers seat which I hope to purchase tomorrow. And the final photo is my entirely lame attempt at making up an ally gear linkage cover! I'll leave the metal-bashing to Barry I think!

[neilbardsley]

Have you seen this about sports exhaust?

http://porsche356registry.org/resources ... ffler.html

[steve wright]

Hi Niel,

thanks for the reference. Interesting perspective from the author but it's quite narrow in my view. I've spent many years in the VW scene, which has been hugely influenced by drag-racing, and has had 50-odd years of performance development, most of it constrained around a magnesium case and hence a limited capacity. This led to an incredible amount of development of small capacity air-cooled boxer motors and while the Porsche factory did a great job of putting in a decent exhaust that met the many challenges for a road engine (noise, power, torque, mpg, etc) it's a complete compromise for a race engine, so I'd take the authors view with a pinch of salt to be honest. Ian and I are working with one of the VW performance companies to develop a few 356 racing products which we're going to test on my car, starting with the exhaust, the first iteration of which should arrive tomorrow. We needed to do something as the Sebring that is one there is pretty rubbish and horribly loud.

So, the build continues... Thanks to Mark Sumpter who owns Paragon, I've managed to land two seats to try. The full-on race seat I've decided to leave for the moment, because when I get into it it squashes my testicles up to my tonsils: it's beyond uncomfortable! The second seat is out of a GT3 and is simply perfect, so we're going with that. Unfortuantely Barry has had to spend an entire day getting the seats mounted, it proving to be quite a job, but one I didn't want to compromise on as comfort and seating position is pretty important.








As you can see there's quite a lot of trimming and fettling to get this right: rake, position, strength, etc all have to be factored in, so it's pretty important to get all this right as the last thing you want to be is uncomfortable or to have concerns about the strength of the mountings.... Thanks again to Barry for spending an entire Saturday doing a shitty, fiddly job - without his expertise this wouldn't have got sorted. Edit - I must point out that the bits in the car are templates Barry made up, not the final versions that are being welded in, that are obviously a whole lot more substantial, before anyone thought we were bolting the seats to a 0.5mm bit of sheet steel!!!

I spent a useful hour putting together the mounting hardware for the alternative front sway-bars so we didn't have to do this at the track. It became apparent doing it in the workshop that this would be a shite of a job to do at the track actually as the rubbers need to be pressed in. So we now have at least some legitimate adjustment to the front set up, especially when it's wet and we can soften the front up. Thanks again to the guys at PRS Services for having (literally) everything I asked for, despatching it the same day, and then answering dumb questions about how the bits fitted together!


My spare brake shoes arrived which also gives us some options should we cook a set at the track - at least then it's a simple job to swap over the shoes and get racing again:


And finally I purchased the transponder. Bloody hell that wasn't cheap. This is the little black box they use to monitor your lap count and times. It cost an arm and a leg (£350!) and has no more computing power than my wifes blender, so I've no idea why it costs so much, but it's bought and installed, so it's another thing ticked off the list.

Anyway, our first race is coming up (19 May) so the list continues to get ticked off!