max

Hi asm993, apologies for resurrecting an old thread, but i wondered if you managed to find a paint shop you were happy with? I'm looking tio have a full respray on my 86 3.2 and localish to you by the looks of it, so wondered ho w you got on with the respray? Any tips or recommendations on shops very welcome.

The book the video is about is a tad pricey though.... £640 used, £1006 new! http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-listing/B010EVJ6W2/ref=sr_1_2_twi_har_1_olp?ie=UTF8&qid=1440713075&sr=8-2&keywords=Porsche+Unexpected

In case anyone has any similar symptoms as were described in my previous post, it was indeed the brake master cylinder. Fitted a good quality pattern part, as recommended by Type911, and the far now has a firmer pedal than it has ever had. Cheers. Max

Chaps, May i pick your collective brains. My car has been in storage for 6/7 months whilst i have had a garage built. I went to pick it up today and as it has been on a battery conditioner, it started no problem. It was only when i went to move the car that i realised the brake pedal almost went to floor. I pumped the pedal and some pressure came back, but still didn't feel great. 30 secs or so later no pressure again, pumped it again and it came back. A couple of minutes later nothing again. And so on, and so on. The brakes do work but are terrible and the travel was way too much to consider actually driving it from the storage facility to my house, even slowly. - There were no puddles or leaks apparent at any caliper, or under the car - I have checked and i cannot see any leaks under the pedal assembly. Although i did not have the tools / facility to remove the panel covering the pedal assembly to have very good - The reservoir was full and the was not losing fluid when going through the pumping cycles mentioned above - The calipers are new (18 months and very few miles) so don't suspect them. Due to the pressure/no pressure scenario and no visible fluid anywhere, it doesn't seem like a leak. I am more suspecting knackered seals in the master cylinder - letting fluid by, holding pressure momentarily, then letting fluid by again etc etc It would certainly make sense after various periods of inactivity in the last few years. (criminal i know) Would you chaps suggest any other checks before i go ordering a new m/cylinder? Also, i see re-build kits re available. Have others used these and been happy? If not, OEM vs. after market new units? (silly question?) Any advice much appreciated. Cheers, Max I forgot to say my car is 1986 3.2 Cabriolet. And looking again, rebuild/seal kits may not be available, so please ignore that bit. Cheers, Max

Good to hear Mark. You sound like the resident expert and you live in London... how many cups of tea and packs of biscuits does it take to secure your services???

I know, it would make the whole job much easier and more accessible, up until you do the rear quarters and bulkhead. Perhaps there is hope for us mortals yet???

Yep, I'm definitely of the 'measure twice, cut once' brigade. The chap on the YT clip i posted above reckons is takes 6 hours???

I looked at the Appbiz sets - they do seem to be the most sensibly priced. Did you get hammered in customs costs? That always worries me? Were the RS sets Silverknit or 'Domestic' (as it seems to be referred to as)? There is a decent video here to show what i am in for: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnZ7Chcomyg

Making it??? You are far braver than i am!! Thanks for the tips. You're right, all my sections are pre-cut so no room for error. My original carpets are all in place but knackered, so I will be removing each panel one by one and taking a huge amount of photos for reference. Were your sections pre-cut or did you have to trim the sections supplied? With the dosh you pay i hope the sections are ready to install. Surely the patterns very simple to copy for any supplier? Not at all. I bought from a US seller here - http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/251753269943?_trksid=p2060778.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT He has various carpet sets for Euro cars, and the feedback is that they have all been very good quality fit and finish. He had this set (83-85 Black Cab) listed for quite a while, first at $800 then $700, so i offered a cheeky $500 and he accepted the bid. I have a mate importing a Mustang in a few weeks (god knows why!) so i am sticking the carpets in with the car to avoid carriage and any customs charges. I thought a full carpet set for 30-40% of what you pay for Silverknit in the UK was worth the risk of the unknown seller. Fingers crossed it pays off!

Hi, I have just purchased a full interior Silverknit carpet set for my 84 cabriolet. I was wondering how many of you have have tackled the job of fitting a full carpet set, and how easy/hard you found it? I obviously want a very good result and having never done anything like this before am slightly dubious of starting the task. I am also going to check with some trimmers/upholsterers to get an idea of fitting costs. Can anyone recommend any good places? I am in London / SE area, but am prepared to travel. From memory Southbound want an extortionate sum for fitting alone, so any other suggestions welcomed. Thanks as always, Max

Are you just sanding, masking and painting them in situ? My cabriolet door glass frames need doing, but i have always been a bit nervous of doing it and getting a good seamless finish, right up to the seals etc? Can anyone recommend a good manufacturer and colour for a good original colour match? Someone tell me it will be OK and i will get stuck in. Cheers, Max

I couldn't agree more. Even better was that he wouldn't accept any dosh for his his time, his diesel for driving all round Kent OR the offending part. I can't recommend Cliff and his team highly enough! Cheers, M

SO... i finally got my car back last night after the whole engine strip and the immobiliser fault being fixed (as above). As i left Project 9 the weather cleared and the roads were starting to dry, and all felt good. That was until i stopped for petrol... I topped up the go go juice, got back in the car, pushed down on the clutch and 'clunk ping' - oh *#%@ that didn't sound good, but even worse the clutch pedal stayed almost on the floor. After much head scratching and scrabbling around on the floor, i could see that the clutch cable bracket (915 116 613 01) on the bottom of the 915 box had snapped - what are the chances of that????? So, a call to Cliff at Project 9 and a bit of a sob story saw him coming out from home at 20:30 on a Friday night to help me out. By chance he was part way through rebuilding a 915 box, and had ordered a clutch cable bracket as that one looked a bit tired. It was the first one he had ordered in years - a small stroke of luck in an otherwise luckless story. So, after driving round to collect the tools and new part from the workshop, we were finally fitting the part on a garage forecourt at 10:30 in the dark. The good thing was that for my 40 mile drive home the roads were dry and clear. Feels really good to have the car back! Happy weekends peeps. Max

Ah-ha i see - lots of leather and labour in that lot! Cost seems sensible now. I am very impressed with the prices on the Car Hood Warehouse. I will be speaking to them to tomorrow for a quote on hood + fitting. I'd love to see some pics of your progress? Thanks very much. M

Hi, Thanks for the response. My seats and hood are not in desperate need of changing, it is more that they are both on the long term to do list, to really bring the car back to it's best. To me £2300 still sound like a lot of dosh (perhaps i am just tight), particularly if they aren't too far gone! What did that include? I would just need the bases and bolsters/backs done on both seats. The reverse of the seat is in vinyl and in pretty decent shape. My hood is manual, so just interested to hear of cost options other than Southbound. Sorry for the thread hijack!! Cheers, M

Hi Bert, Can you point me in the right direction of suppliers of carpet, seat covers and seat foam for that kind of cash. I am also considering a new hood, so could you please pass those details on too. I know of Southbound, but with the expert knowledge and quality comes the price. (ouch!) I can't seem to find much feedback on anybody else, and whether they have experience of IB's, so they appear to be a bit of a gamble. Thanks, Max

Hi all, Thought i'd bring you up to speed on this thread, as some of you had asked for an update. The original starting troubles were indeed down to the Clifford immobiliser, so were were diagnosed and fixed by the guys at Project 9. (electrical gremlins not my fave job or strong suit). However, the problems didn't end there.... I have had a slight oil leak (or two) ever since Cliff at Project 9 rebuilt the engine and gearbox, at an eye watering cost. (pretty much the value of the car!) When they investigated the leak they found an output shaft seal had failed which meant engine came out, seal replaced and also a brand new clutch went in, even though the existing clutch pack in there was less than 300 miles old. Whilst they had the engine out, they noticed that there was a weep/leak along the seam of the engine cases. An attempt to weld a minor crack with the engine together failed which resulted in the engine coming apart again and to be sure of the cause, the cases were sent for pressure testing of the seams and all the internal oil ways. The oil ways held pressure OK (phew), so the engine case seams were skimmed to ensure a good seal and the engine is currently going back together. To Project 9's credit they have been very thorough and all this work is covered under warranty of the engine rebuild back in October/November 2013. Anyhoo that is my update... i am just looking forward to getting the car back! Enjoy the sunny driving weather - gggrrrrr! Max

Hi, Thanks - it is a long term work in progress but is coming on OK. I got the paint shop to spray a bumper according to the code, and the match was pretty good. I have some paint left over, so will be able to use that for future touch ups and hopefully to match to when required. The car currently has the engine out though so missing all this good weather. Very frustrating! M

Hi Nige, The cause of the starting issues are still unknown I am afraid. Due to lack of time and stubborn speed/reference sensors not wanting to budge, I had to trailer the car to my my local independent (Cliff at Project 9) for further investigation. The DME relay and brain seem to check out OK, so they now suspect an issue with the Clifford immobiliser. I am on holiday at the moment, so have left the car with them for a week or so to investigate. I am hoping that when i get back the cause will be confirmed and remedied. I will keep you posted. Cheers, Max

I can't arg I can't argue with that logic! Always a good fall back plan, but am trying to understand the readings as they must either both be fine, or both be knackered. I'm struggling to see how they both fail at the same time. That is what i thought, so i tried all ohm settings on the multimeter and got the same result? I would like to go and check the ignition side again, but after messing around on Sunday night i left the ignition turned on for 48 hours and have killed the battery stone dead. After 24+ hours of trickle charge, it won't come back to life

OK, so i realised i was making a simple (read stupid) error when testing last night. (black probe in 10A DC, not COM, so no reading) So when re-testing tonight i got more promising results, although still confusing my simple brain - the results are below: Reference Sensor - BG 1+2 - 970 (perfectly within range) 1+3 - 1 / no reading on multimeter 2+3 - 1 / no reading on multimeter Speed Sensor - DG 1+2 - 976 (perfectly within range) 1+3 - 1 / no reading on multimeter 2+3 - 1 / no reading on multimeter The Bentley testing references are below. As you can see the readings for 1+2 are bang on but i am confused by the 1 / no reading for the other terminals across both sensors. What does the 1 reading mean? Does 1 equate to >100,000 OHMS? Or does this mean open circuit / knackered? If so, I can't see how both sensors can pack up simultaneously, as the car has been working perfectly until now. Can anyone with a bigger brain than me offer any advice please as i am stumped?

Thanks. I tested the reference sensor last night with my multimeter last night (set to 20 OHMS) and got no reading whatsoever. I am clueless when it comes to electrickery, but as far as i can tell any OHMS setting should provide a resistance reading as per the values in the Bentley manual. I am going to test the speed sensor tonight too to see if that reads correctly as i would be a tad suspicious if both sensors fail the multimeter test at the same time? It looks like a tricky job to get them out for replacement, especially if they are stuck, which would be just my luck! On we go.... Cheers, M

I agree on having not noticed the tacho movement before, as mine usually starts on the button too. The DME relay was brand new from Type911 a few months ago, so I am confident it should be OK. I do know they can be problematic though. l do have a Bentley, so looks like it is time to get my hands dirty and test some sensors. Thanks. Yep, i have just been reading up on the job of changing both sensors in the Bentley manual. All seems straight forward enough (famous last words). I think that will be my first port of call. Thanks for the advice chaps! Max

Thanks for the answer Nigel. Am i right in thinking that even if the dist cap, rotor etc. or indeed fuel pump were at fault, i should still see minor movement on the tacho when the car is cranking? i will investigate the dist cap and try an alternate fuse for the fuel pump tonight. Thanks again. Max

Hi, Since Saturday my 85 3.2 cab has refused to start. I have read through various posts/advice on this here forum, but wanted to sense check my diagnosis before i go spending money. The situation is: - The car turns over well but does not seem to be getting fuel - When turning the ignition on and cranking, i cannot hear the fuel pump prime - I have checked the fuel pump fuse is good, and have also bridged the fuel pump fuse to another fuse and can hear that the fuel pump is working correctly - I have changed the DME relay for a brand new OE part from the glove box and no change When cranking the car the tacho/rev counter does not respond at all - so to me this points to a faulty crankshaft reference sensor? My only other potential suggestion is the DME brain itself, but i don't have an easy way (i.e. the know how) of checking it or swapping out for a known working unit. Seeing as the crankshaft reference sensor is not too costly (£67 OE / £115 Bosch) i was planning on replacing that first? Is that the most sensible suggestion, or are there other checks i should be making? Thanks for any help. Max