The Manhattan Project

[murph2309]

Yowch Andrew - that's a nightmare - poor you, what an absolute pi55er. Glad you managed to get it sorted though and thanks for sharing this - it's really valuable information for everyone contemplating a similar route to you.

Hope the rest of the build goes ok - when you're driving it, all this will be forgotten. Mostly

[Bootsy]

Sorry to read this but glad you're back on track. You didn't need the insult to injury episode either!

[inaglasshouse]

Thanks for the honest sharing, and well done for persisting.
Not in any way criticising your advice, but having seen plenty of shells, including ones that look good (including one that I own which looked quite good), being way out on Barry's jig...
for me, the only plan is: before spending money on paint etc, it needs to go on a Celette. And any serious metalwork needs to be done by someone with a Celette. Just my 2p.

Here's hoping for a smooth ride from here. Cheers, Richard.

[Gary71]

Agreed. It’s completely changed my approach to my car. Just such a shame you had to go through it.

[jb]

Wow
I did not expect that.
Very sorry to hear about the trouble that it has been.

[BILLY BEAN]

Thanks for the honest sharing, and well done for persisting.
Not in any way criticising your advice, but having seen plenty of shells, including ones that look good (including one that I own which looked quite good), being way out on Barry's jig...
for me, the only plan is: before spending money on paint etc, it needs to go on a Celette. And any serious metalwork needs to be done by someone with a Celette. Just my 2p.

Here's hoping for a smooth ride from here. Cheers, Richard.

Not trying to kick a man when he is down. I would endorse the above that a resto without a proper jig is not a sound idea. My ex Clalifornia1970 911 looked fine and appeared straight and only seemed to need outer sills, windscreen aperture corners and a left rear quarter (badly repaired ancient accident damage). Did not initially propose putting on a jig. Removal of the rear quarter suggested otherwise. On a jig the car was found to be 15mm high at the front and the rear engine mounts were over to one side by 25mm. John at Chesterton Coach Works told me that those measurement were not unusual. The current resto1972 ST rep was high at the front by 10mm and over to one side at the rear by 15mm.

[jtparr]

Hats off to you Andrew.....doing it right is hard sometimes but that is fantastic dedication.....

[AndrewSlater]

Thanks for the kind words hopefully the car is moving in the right direction and I am doing the right thing by it.

I visited the painters again yesterday and there is a small delay on final paint so it may be a little longer before I can post any photos.
I'm guessing Simply Porsche 2018 at Beaulieu is out of the question .

As for the foul up I don't blame anyone other than myself for this.

When I did my homework with regards to bodywork I was surprised how few 'specialists' actually had access to a Celette jig.
My first choice would have been Barry but unfortunately he couldn't accommodate me at the time.

The car had perfect gaps and no signs of accident damage when I got it mainly as a result of only being on the road for 10 out of the last 40+ years.
Once it was stripped even the strippers commented that it was one of the better shells they had seen with zero signs of accident damage.

So at this stage it never occurred to me that the damage was already done and that somewhere between preparing the car for the stripping process and the car returning from the stripping process so much distortion could have been introduced.

So in summary I would recommend that if you have access to jig then use it - and if your specialist doesn't have one ( then they are probably not a true specialist ). If you think your shell is straight then at least measure it ( it's not difficult ) before the expense of paint.

Sounds like Gary is doing all the right things ( you can't be too paranoid it seems ).

Hindsight is a wonderful thing - but on the upside I have had 5+ months of time to tinker with my 914 ( but that is a different story!).

Hope to post some photos soon and then we can get back to heated arguments over what to do about my carpet.
Oh and I'm sure the engine won't start first time ( but I'm trying not to think about that ).

[Gary71]

I’m sure it will start first time! No better feeling.

My plan evolves every day with every new person I talk to! All a bit premature anyway as I’ve got a few months yet.

[johnM]

Feel for you Andrew, thats some punch in the stomach.

Really glad to see you are coming through the turmoil and it looks like your car will be a thing of beauty once finished.

What doesn't break you makes you stronger.

[gtBen]

ooouuuuuch, such a nightmare to find out. I feel for you as well.

I hope my shell is ok, maybe I don't need to worry when it wasn't chemically stripped. But I didn't have the window frames in place when test fitting before paint!

Bengt

[AndrewSlater]

I've been singing the "it's coming home" verse with everyone for the last few weeks - and now it finally is.



Time to get a move on.

Now the first main job is to give it a bit of a clean to get rid of all of the workshop dust it has acquired over the last 6 months.

[jb]

Excellent
Must be a great feeling after so long
Does it run?

[Gary71]

Great to see

Ready to roll to catch the end of summer?

[AndrewSlater]

So now that the car was back, the plan was to get the car running before reassembling back to where I was previously.

Throughout the week we had been preparing for this.

First fitting the drivers seat so that someone could manipulate the pedals easily.
Then the fuel tank was slowly filled with 10 litres or so of fresh fuel checking for any leaks.
The battery was then fitted and the fuel pump wiring finally wired into the fusebox. The ignition was energised to prime the fuel pump running it in short bursts to prevent the pump getting too hot without any fuel to cool it. Eventually it quietened down indicating we had fuel in the pump.
The air pressure plate was briefly lifted on the fuel distributor to help prime it. Pulling out an injector showed we had fuel injection when the plate was lifted.

The next stage was to get some oil in the car and to try to get some oil pressure.
I had chosen to use Millers CRO 10W40 Running in oil.

The oil was slowly added checking for leaks and then left overnight. A small puddle under the oil tank drain in the morning showed it needed a little more of a tighten.

The fuel pump was disconnected again and the ht lead from the coil removed. After a few seconds of cranking the oil pressure light went out which was a good sign.
Up to this point so far so good.
So this morning with the electrics back in place it was time to swallow a brave pill and try and fire the engine up.

Today has been a bit frustrating and an anti-climax.

My first problem was that the 096 sized battery I had seems to be past its best. So in the short term I have been using a Bosch battery from my 914 which is smaller in capacity that the 096 one. At first I didn't see this as a problem but as the day wore on I wish I had ordered a new battery earlier in the week.

Obviously the engine didn't burst into life on the first try (or any other try today) which was a bit of a disappointment.
Every part is an unknown quantity to some extent and nothing has yet to be setup - so possibly that is working against me.

At one stage I was unsure if I was getting any fuel so tried starting it whilst hand operating the fuel distributor - again nothing.

I then pulled one of the spark plug leads and fitted a spark tester light and a spare spark plug - no spark or light.

The CDI has been whistling away merrily so I thought that should be good. In order to change something I swapped over to a spare CDI unit.

Again the engine was cranked to see if we could get a spark. Instantly we got a detonation as well as the spark light flashing (although we didn't spot a spark in the bright daylight ).
We hastily refitted the spark plug lead and tried again. Another single detonation and that was it.

By this stage the battery was at the point where the car would barely crank - so time to call it a day.

So here are some observations from what we have seen today:

a) We can get fuel to at least one of the injectors when I manipulate the fuel distributor ( I haven't tried the other 5 - but the fuel distributor was tested before I fitted it to the engine )
b) We have seen the spark plug tester flash when fitted to one of the spark plug leads using my spare CDI unit. However we don't remember seeing any spark when the dummy spark plug was fitted and with its body earthed. However we have had a small number of single detonations with the spare CDI suggesting that we have had some sparks.
c) The engine doesn't crank particularly briskly when the battery is freshly charged and it doesn't take too much tinkering before the battery is flattened enough that the crank is weak. I'm thinking that the battery isn't quite up to cranking a 911 engine and isn't helping.
d) There is an occasional scraping noise which seems to be coming from the fan housing when the engine is cranked. Maybe I should remove the fan belt to try to identify the source of the noise.

There are a number of things that have yet to be set up but I wouldn't expect them from necessarily preventing the engine from starting.
These are:-

i) distributor timing
ii) distributor dwell
iii) CIS idle adjust
iv) CIS mixture adjust

I'm not sure there is much else I can adjust.

So I need to have a rethink for a second plan of attack.
I think a new and decent battery is the next on the list.
Second I would like to observe a proper spark from the spark plug. Is it possible the spark plug tester could flash but the ht not be high enough for a decent spark?

Tomorrow is Luftgekuhlt at Bicester - so plenty of time for reflection.