DDK - Die Deutschen Klassiker

Looking good Andy, hope you didn't get any blood on it.......

Eventually everything was cleaned, painted, re-greased & refitted along with the new Konis:




The major hurdle was installing the new anti roll bar bushes (with one still 'dodgy' hand) - those fitted directly to the bar itself were made easier with the help of some heat from a hot air gun plus some silicon spray grease but the ones in the lower trailing arm (arrowed) need more thought/effort:





After several unsuccessful attempts, a combination of a heavy duty threaded rod, a suitably-sized metric socket, various large/thick washers & more silicon spray did the trick ...





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Next task was to switch the rear lamps from all-red US-spec to amber/red Euro-spec versions.

After some 'reading up' about this conversion on the 356 Registry it appeared that the necessary (additional) wiring at the rear of the car should already be there.

I searched around the back of the car looking for the 'spare' wire & eventually found it tucked up (& taped) underneath the car behind the engine compartment.

On checking the continuity I found, as previously mentioned on DDK by others (in the 356 section), that the other end of the wire terminated at the 6-way connector block under the dash. There were only 5 wires connected, the 'empty' terminal being opposite the end of this 'spare' wire.

Thus unplugging the black/mauve wire from brake light switch up at the indicator switch & plugging it into the 'empty' terminal at the 6-way connector completed the feed to the rear of the car (for the brake lights).

I then used a double 'bullet' connector sleeve to split this feed to the 2 rear lamps.

I had previously bought some new Euro-spec rear lamps on German ebay but was surprised to find that these also only had single filament bulb holders for the inner (red) lights.

Rather than cut/modify the lamp units to accept twin-filament bulb holders for the stop/tail lights, I found some spare twin-filament terminal inserts (the small circular discs with 2 wires attached) & fitted these along with 5w/21w non-offset pin bulbs - never knew that these existed before !

Everything works perfectly with the added benefit of using 95% Factory wiring.

Andy, think I've told you many times, but I really really love this car

Thanks for the updates

Nice stuff Andy

All good stuff Andy. I've just re-read the thread from the start as I'm just starting into a "GT" 356 build on a customers car.

Nice update Andy,

When it comes to actual driving....356, 911 or 904?

Cheers,

Great updates. It's a wonderful car and looks so cool on the road

I was talking to Mark who came to Spa with me, the other day and he said that his fav car there was the little 356, great car Andy.

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Thanks for the positive comments - Jon, I look forward to seeing a few shots of the build in progress.

Darren65 wrote:Nice update Andy,

When it comes to actual driving....356, 911 or 904?

Cheers,

Darren - it's difficult to make valid comparisons between the 3 models.

The 904 must come at the top - the fact that there wasn't (isn't ?) another car like it in the UK was a huge bonus.

Some of the appeal was down to the engine/gearbox combination - instant throttle response allied to perfectly matched close ratios - plus that intoxicating noise on megaphones ...

It was one of the few cars I've owned that put a smile on my face every time I drove it - & one of the very few that (occasionally) I have regretted selling ...

The 356 is such an easy car to live with - &, ironically, that will probably be the reason I sell it.

It's eminently usable - drives well, feels 'solid' (the MOT tester kept opening & closing the door just to hear/feel the quality), is able to keep pace with modern traffic & seems to be universally admired - it's one of those cars that you'd feel happy to just jump in & drive down to the South of France. The big advantage is that you can have a lot of fun at lower speeds.

A 911 comes somewhere in the middle - difficult to summarise as every version I've owned has been different (& all of them except a couple were modified). They were all good fun at the time but there was always a continual quest to 'do something different' which became increasingly more difficult (& expensive – as you know). I suppose, having owned quite a few, the 'novelty' has worn off to some extent & it would take something special/different (& a significant price reduction) to entice me back into owning one.

Very cool car

Nice new project Andy.....but, why a wood steering wheels ?
I think the good idea for our lovely car is a original steering wheel but "reduced" in diameter !
What do you think ?
An exemple
PORSCHE 356 STEERING WHEEL by jean-luc criado, sur Flickr
If i'm remember, the final diameter is 400mm....but i'm not sure....it was in 2008 ! and sold to a friend since !
JLC

Hi Jean Luc - I personally think that woodrim wheels suit the 356 era better than leather wheels & Nardi was one of the top manufacturers of wooden steering wheels.

In the end my final choice was influenced by what I had 'in stock' - as stated at the start of this thread I had 2 period Nardi woodrim wheels at the time, a 430mm flat wheel (dated 1966) & the 400mm dished wheel (dated 1963) ... which is the one I went for.

I find it ideal in terms of diameter & 'feel' ...

For future reference I thought it would be worth copying a few of the photos/details from my 'Wild Atlantic Way' thread which appeared in the General section towards the end of 2016 ...

- see original thread here:

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=58215&hilit=Wild+Atlantic+Way

The 356 proved to be ideal transport for the trip - small & light enough for the narrow/winding roads we opted for wherever possible, spacious enough for 2 people & their luggage (plus the inevitable but totally un-needed spares & tools, etc), comfortable/compliant enough to cope with the often pot-holed roads & (almost) quick enough to put a smile on our faces screaming up & down various mountain passes with the sound of the exhaust bouncing off the rockfaces ...

The car got favourable comments everywhere we went - people seemed genuinely pleased to see such a car being used as intended - rather surprisingly we only saw 2 other 'old cars' the whole time we were away ... a Mk II Jag & a Triumph Vitesse convertible nr Killarney.

Door to door we covered just over 2000 miles - the car didn't miss a beat & required nothing other than petrol ... not even any oil in spite of quite a lot of 'spirited' motoring !

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Now featured in the latest edition of 'Classic Porsche' magazine (#42) ...