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The shop has been keeping me in the loop on the work they have been doing.
The crunched rear fender has been mended. The kink in the fender crease also caused a ripple fore and aft of the fender, near the bottom of the car. That has also been taken care of.
When they were checking out the car, they noticed the driver's door wasn't opening and closing as smoothly as the passenger side. Something I knew, but thought I would just have to adjust the striker. The door was slightly tweaked and they took the opportunity to even out the gaps and correct the door feel.
There were so many small dents all over this car as you can see. Since it's originally a Florida car, there was no rust to speak of apart from the start of a bubble roughly 5-7mm in diameter on the lower passenger side near the window seal. I had them pop the window out to make sure it wasn't any more advanced than that. Thank goodness I did, there was a section about 1.5" long that needed attention before it got out of hand.
It should be ready by the end of next week.
In the mean time we moved into our new house and I started getting the garage ready by insulating, drywall, paint and also epoxying the floor. Now to find some cabinets for the corner and then a garage sale to get rid of a lot of junk that I have been hoarding for no good reason.
It's back from paint. They did a great job with pretty much all of it.
Well. They broke the passenger side fog light housing, didn't put the sunroof seal in, lost a couple screw caps, lost the lock **** cap and didn't fasten all the side skirts on properly. The window guy also forgot to put the trim on the quarter windows too. Otherwise, it want really well. :lol:
The paint is 8/10. I'm mostly happy with it. It may need a cut/polish to take the few specs and orange peel out of it after it cures. But it's not something I was able to see outside today, so it's not a big issue. I was only able to see the issue in hard lighting. Knocking down the orange peel would be nice. It's *almost* as good as a factory paint job, which is quite a feat with no wet sanding. They didn't take off the washer nozzles or separate the flag mirrors completely, which kind of irks me. But you can't really tell, so I guess I shouldn't complain too much. My biggest complaint is they didn't paint the door jams. There are scratches in several areas that I wanted fixed. I will have to find a guy to blow in some paint here and there.
The repair work is a 10/10. They did an amazing job with that. Sadly, I don't have a lot of before pictures, and the creasing and kinking didn't show up well on camera. It's crazy the amount of damage they were able to remove for so little money.
The owner said they would take care of any of my issues, like the fog light and window trim. He is very personable, and goes to all the local german car shows with his personal vehicles. So, he is part of the community. I wasn't able to get in touch with him today though, which was a bit of a disappointment, as he promised to get his glass guy out to me today to fix the quarter glass issue.
Fantastic! A great story and one that we'd love to share. Would you be interested in writing an article on your adventure for the articles section of www.world964owners.com ?
Frank, I would be happy to do that. I'll have more to write about in a few weeks. Currently I'm working on a few things to make it more presentable for an upcoming show.
Last week my coilovers from SCALE (Standard Suspension) in Quebec arrived. I'm looking to do some business with them on a suspension related project and decided to give their product a try. Dampening and rebound adjustable, and they have a "ruler" of sorts on the side of their threads so you have a better idea of how far you are moving the collars and if they are set at the same height as the other side.
A comparison shot of the two. I threaded the coilovers up after the picture. I didn't want to be THAT low.
I had a few friends over and we got the front coilovers in on Saturday. It had been a while since we had all been together, so we didn't get a whole lot of work done that day.
Not a bad height for running around town. The car felt so much more alive after bolting these on and going for a ride. I got goosebumps while driving.
Now to do the rear coils. I'll make time to do that in the evening during the week. From the look of the single eyelet on the bottom it appears that they should be much easier to install.
Frank, I would be happy to do that. I'll have more to write about in a few weeks. Currently I'm working on a few things to make it more presentable for an upcoming show.
The rear coilovers did not go on as smoothly as expected. After pulling off the factory suspension, I found that the bolt pattern was quite a distance off from being able to fit. I'm not sure if it's a bad measurement on the side of the coilover manufacturer, or if the later 964s have a slightly different pattern and I was sent the incorrect set.
Not wanting to go through customer service and wait who knows how long for a new top mount, I took matters into my own hands. I made up a pattern of the factory spacing and drilled out the new holes. Using a bench vice I pushed out the studs and put them into the new holes. This would have gone a lot smoother if I had the vice clamped onto a workbench, but until I have one, the shop floor will have to do.
After the modification, things went together very smoothly. I took the opportunity to install my new wheels and I am very pleased how it all turned out.
One question I had for the community.. I have been trying to figure out how to adjust the fuel door. Mine is not flush on the hinge side and I can't see how it can be adjusted. Any suggestions?
I don't know how the factory does it but I just put a small stainless steel washer underneath each of the the mounting flange slots which brought it to the right height. I'm sure it would also work to bend either the flange or the mounting tab slightly to properly align the flap.
I had to carefully manhandle my fuel door to make it flush; the hinges had bent so no washer was going to fix it. If you aren't paying attention when you wash the car, it is easy to lean on and bend down. For me, it was either that or a helpful gas station attendant (can't pump my own gas in Oregon).
Very nice looking car. I'm on the cusp of buying one if things go well and I'm just around the corner from you my Canada's Wonderland. Cars and coffees maybe one morning.
I've been quite pleased with the coilovers over the last few months. I can now recommend the SCALE coilovers. They are very nice, VERY reasonable for the price. 12 points of dampening adjustment, easy to read measurements on the side of the coil body so you know exactly how much you have threaded the perches. So nice when leveling the car! I contacted customer support and they added the part number for the early 964 and fixed the bolt up pattern dimensions. People in the future shouldn't have an issue.
Fall photos from a month ago.
I have a long list of things I want to address over the winter, but the weather has been agreeable here, so I have been taking full advantage of it.
One of my issues is that the left heat exchanger is pushing exhaust fumes into the HVAC system. I've disconnected that side for now, but I will be removing it soon to see if there is a way to repair it. Has anybody had any luck with repairing internal exhaust leaks? With the amount of exhaust that was coming into the cabin, I expect there may be a crack on the manifold inside the clamshell housing.
08-12-2015, 03:48 PM
