osc911 Posted October 12, 2018 Posted October 12, 2018 This thread is making me feel faint. Superb work, I'm worried about what is lurking under the skin on mine.
Robos911 Posted October 19, 2018 Author Posted October 19, 2018 On 10/12/2018 at 9:29 PM, osc911 said: This thread is making me feel faint. Superb work, I'm worried about what is lurking under the skin on mine. Hope you don't find what i did 😯, if it is then i would have a good think about what to do, if i wasnt doing the work myself then selling and buying a better one might have been a better option, although at least this way i will know exactly what ive got!
Robos911 Posted October 19, 2018 Author Posted October 19, 2018 In a change from the usual update and to remind myself why i bought a Porsche in the first place i treated myself to a trip to Stuttgart, some nice IBs, and good to see a few in use and not the museum, along with a tractor on the road!! As a nice touch i picked up some Stuttgart plates as a from the dealer, quite surprised when they gave them to me!! On the resto progress ive now got the rear section of the floor edge tacked in place, nice to add a bit of metal instead of cutting it out!
Robos911 Posted November 3, 2018 Author Posted November 3, 2018 Finished welding the rear floor in this week and was hoping to get more new metal welded in but.... I carried on cutting the rust out along the bottom of the torsion bar. I don't know why it still surprises me, but it was worse than expected!! I almost lost my bottle when I realised the only way to fix the rusty heater tube was to cut the bottom half of the torsion bar reinforcement plate off.... Good news is that I can finally see solid metal! Just need to figure out how I am going to let in the new metal! The new repair panel doesn't look like a great fit so will need a bit of attention and ive no idea how I am going to do the heater tube??? I wont be able to weld all the way around it so I am thinking some sort of flexible tube that will slide over each end of the existing tube, I am sure ive seen somebody using a flexible exhaust repair section, anyone got any ideas 60mm OD?
Robos911 Posted November 3, 2018 Author Posted November 3, 2018 Something like this, comes 60mm ID and the heater tube is 60mm OD so should slip over.....
fat fuchs Posted November 3, 2018 Posted November 3, 2018 1 hour ago, Robos911 said: Something like this, comes 60mm ID and the heater tube is 60mm OD so should slip over..... I used something very similar, but just make sure you can compress it as you'll need to manipulate it where it sits below the torsion bar. To fix, I used small tack welds and sealed with exhaust paste. Great work as usual - good to see you sticking at it. Cheers FF
Robos911 Posted November 4, 2018 Author Posted November 4, 2018 You’ve fitted yours inside which makes sense, saves a bit of space! I think I will take the tube I cut off to the motor factors/exhaust place and see if they have anything that fits, they only seem to give the ID in the adverts!
Robos911 Posted November 17, 2018 Author Posted November 17, 2018 Yippee... nice to be letting in new metal rather than cutting out the old crap!! Bought some 2" flexi pipe which was probably slightly big, I would have been better off with the next size down but it bends easily and it squashes where needed. Prepared the panel with lots of punched 7.5mm holes, painted in 2 pack epoxy up to the edges then bare metaled and weld through primer. Gave the old heater tube a light dusting with matt black.... no reason why other than it looked nicer going back together!!. Inner sill is tacked on, kidney bowl is a trial fit, the rear panel seems to fit ok but I need to refit the lower re-enforcement panel, all in all I am happy, had a pause just to have a think and make sure ive missed nothing, at this rate 5 or 6 years and I will have it sorted ;0)
fat fuchs Posted November 21, 2018 Posted November 21, 2018 Some great progress there. Out of interest, what are your plans for replacing the other two threaded lugs at the torsion bar area? Cheers FF
Robos911 Posted November 21, 2018 Author Posted November 21, 2018 (edited) I got new lugs with the repair panel but Ive kept the bottom half of the strengthening panel (with the old ones still attached) so I was either welding this back on with the old lugs or making a new bottom half and fitting the new lugs using the cover as a template. Ive not really decided yet, but I was going to trim the panel around the torsion tube back a bit more to tidy it up and make it a neater repair. I kept the top lugs attached to use as a datum. Thoughts? Edited November 21, 2018 by Robos911 Pic of strengtheningplate
fat fuchs Posted November 22, 2018 Posted November 22, 2018 21 hours ago, Robos911 said: I got new lugs with the repair panel but Ive kept the bottom half of the strengthening panel (with the old ones still attached) so I was either welding this back on with the old lugs or making a new bottom half and fitting the new lugs using the cover as a template. Ive not really decided yet, but I was going to trim the panel around the torsion tube back a bit more to tidy it up and make it a neater repair. I kept the top lugs attached to use as a datum. Thoughts? I asked the question as that particular area caused me a bit of a headache when I fitted the Dansk repair panel over the top in terms of alignment. To avoid some of the issues I experienced, I would recommend checking everything a few times before you commit to welding to ensure all the bolts thread in easily through the retaining bracket. The flexible heater tube I fitted was causing the issues in my case. In addition to those checks, I understand that this area has to take quite a lot of 'load' during driving so it needs to be well repaired to avoid future stress fractures. Cheers FF
Robos911 Posted November 22, 2018 Author Posted November 22, 2018 Got you👍 Ive already noticed that the panel isn’t a great fit, with it pushed over the existing lugs it’s a good few mm out on the edge! Pic below, it seems like the lug holes are out i.e. if it was rotated ACW it would be a much better fit. I’ve not tried it with the reinforcement and new pipe underneath yet.
Robos911 Posted January 4, 2019 Author Posted January 4, 2019 No updates for a while, between a bout of being ill and xmas do's ive not had much free time. On a +ve i got a new welding helmet and tool chest for xmas and did make some progress. This has been a bit of a nightmare, the area under the torsion tube is 4 layers and then the tube itself which were all in a bad way. I’ve had to repair the suspension reinforcement plate, the the new pattern panel I bought was a completely stuff fit so I had to cut it in half and do it in 2 sections then the new corrugated tube needed to be persuaded into place . All welded up now and inner sill fully fitted. Trial fit of outer sill and kidney bowl and it’s looking good! I'm approx 100 hrs into it now!
fat fuchs Posted January 5, 2019 Posted January 5, 2019 Looks like you're through the worst of it now, well done. I would suggest a dry fitting of the front wing together with the door before you button everything up. After all that hard work you deserve good panel gaps! Cheers FF
Robos911 Posted January 11, 2019 Author Posted January 11, 2019 Nice to have some new metal in but there's loads more rust still lurking..... i'm not sure there will be much of the original car left by the time ive finished! With the 911 now obviously off the road long term i spotted a nice fun runabout on NW TIPEC so thought i would treat myself, one owner from new, 80k and full history, hopefully it wont turn into another project and i might even get on a trackday some time soon!! back to the Porsche, now there's a bit of strength back in the sill i thought i would have a look at the top of the rear inner wings so i tackled a job i've been putting off.... rear window removal! A new seal is £120 ish but i doubt you could get the window out without damaging it so i got the Stanley knife out and it was really easy but a bit twitchy, remove the trim piece and then slip the knife in and cut round! Once the window was out the rust at the top of the rear wings was fairly bad so being Billy big bollx i got the grinder back out and cut another big chunk of rear wing of..... probably looking at new rear wing now but hey ho... With the wing out of the way there's a bit of rust all over but the Targa support bracket is totally shot... time to order some more bits!
Robos911 Posted January 17, 2019 Author Posted January 17, 2019 While im waiting for some panels ive gone back to the front of the car and had a look at the bottom of the A pillar. I couldnt find a repair patch so had a go at one of my own. Had to stick the old panel together with some gaffa tape, then cover in masking tape to make a pattern, i then transferred this to cardboard to make sure it looked about right before repeating in metal. Little bit of welding, drain hole in the bottom and good to go! I think it looks fairly good and once the outer sill is fitted it wont be visible anyway. With the outer sill trial fitted theres another couple of small filler panels needed in the area, i will have to try and figure these out?
Robos911 Posted January 22, 2019 Author Posted January 22, 2019 The new Targa repair panel has arrived and I’ve trial fitted it over the existing one. As you can see from the pic the lip is higher than the lip of the rear wing (marked up 2 red lines). Looking back at my pics there was no noticeable lip originally. Looking at other pics this looks right so does the outer wing sit below this lip and get welded to this panel or do I trim the lip back? Anyone got a pic of this area with the wing fitted over this panel? Cheers
fat fuchs Posted January 22, 2019 Posted January 22, 2019 40 minutes ago, Robos911 said: The new Targa repair panel has arrived and I’ve trial fitted it over the existing one. As you can see from the pic the lip is higher than the lip of the rear wing (marked up 2 red lines). Looking back at my pics there was no noticeable lip originally. Looking at other pics this looks right so does the outer wing sit below this lip and get welded to this panel or do I trim the lip back? Anyone got a pic of this area with the wing fitted over this panel? Cheers You have it in the correct location. The rear wing sits below the lip.
Robos911 Posted January 22, 2019 Author Posted January 22, 2019 2 minutes ago, fat fuchs said: You have it in the correct location. The rear wing sits below the lip. Great, thanks 👍 Another question is the top of the wing seem welded across the repair panel then?
fat fuchs Posted January 22, 2019 Posted January 22, 2019 7 minutes ago, Robos911 said: Great, thanks 👍 Another question is the top of the wing seem welded across the repair panel then? No, just spot welded (or plug weld if you don't have a spot welder). The small panel in your picture is seam welded along the lip however. Cheers FF
Robos911 Posted January 22, 2019 Author Posted January 22, 2019 Ok great, I can see in your pic now, that bit of the top of my outer wing must have rusted away so I will have to make something if I don’t replace the full outer!! Thanks again for all the help you’ve been so far!! Much appreciated!
Robos911 Posted February 22, 2019 Author Posted February 22, 2019 Its been a few weeks since ive done an update, I got a bit side-tracked with the MR2, i gave it a bit of a tidy up, fitted a 4 branch and went and had some track time!! Great fun but back to the serious business of sorting the 911 Decided it was time to remove the front window and bonnet, with hindsight I shoudve done this earlier. With these out of the way I could assess the windscreen surround.... hmm not great, another repair for the list. Ive not worked out how to get the dash out yet so that's probably my next job. Also finished off the Targa repair panel and started to tidy up the rear wing, paint stripper doesn't do much with the coat of filler all over it.... not sure what I will find once its all off Next was to refit the door so I could do some trial fitting of the outer sill.... fit was fairly poor but after a bit of fettling I got 3mm even gap all along. This is still a trial fit, ive not welded it yet because I wasn't sure whether to drop it back onto the wheels first just in case theres any movement which would upset my nice gaps... Thoughts??
Roy M Posted February 23, 2019 Posted February 23, 2019 No expert but I would weld first to provide the strength to stop any movement. Fantastic work though - hard to believe you're new to this!
Robos911 Posted February 23, 2019 Author Posted February 23, 2019 10 hours ago, Roy M said: No expert but I would weld first to provide the strength to stop any movement. Fantastic work though - hard to believe you're new to this! Yes, after sleeping on it... always a good move... I thought it was a silly idea to move the car before the outer sill was welded on... seeing as the outer sill gives it a fair chunk of its rigidity!! Sometimes I overthink it 😂 Thanks, I’m just looking at it as one little job after another and eventually it will be finished... probably...👍
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