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Car update and spec's since people have been asking:
The car was originally a black 1989 M491 RHD Coupe. I believe it's one of approximately 75 for that year. I can't quite remember as i looked it up a long time ago. In the USA according to this site there was only 15 LHD Coupe's in 1989.
I have most of the service history (12 dealer stamps) and original purchase invoice which is great for the extensive history file!
I bought the car 4 years ago from an acquaintance who had bought it to do a backdate and primarily track it.
He did the following:
Added 968 sports seats
Painted the front end and rear end.
Added light weight front and rear IROC bumpers, ducktail spoiler.
Prototipo Steering Wheel
Southbound lightweight carpet interior.
RS Door cards
Removed rear seats, rear seat belts, clock and all sound proofing along with numerous other items in his pursuit of removing weight and got the weight down to 1100 KGS!
74 RS Mirrors
Had 10mm spacers.
Custom Exhaust
Bilstein Clubsport shocks/poly bushes. Turbo ARB's and torsion bars also.
He also had the original rims refinished and found a set of Braid rims for the rear and i believe that was about it until i persuaded him to sell it.
What i then got on with (in order of what i started doing):
I initially just wanted to tart it up aesthetically and make it a pleasure to tour in. I decided to upgrade the sound system and went with the MKI Porsche classic radio in it along with some nice light weight morel speakers, sinfoni amp and small pioneer sub which was being mounted under the seats with silicone to save weight. Re wired the entire interior - was a mess.
Re-trimmed the top of the door cards and deleting the mirror switch.
New keys - the only mod done by yours truly!
Lightweight rear lamp units - weigh in at approx 400 grams each as opposed to the > 3kg factory ones!
Wasn't happy with the window trims - they were letting the side down so they came off for refinishing.
Then started getting into the car as it had a load of rusted parts and the headlights were in poor shape:
Headlight knackered.
Horn
Yikes!
Headlights Redone
Headlights Redone
Re-did the windscreen seal which resulted in us finding rust so got rid of all that! Ended up repainting entire roof and windshield area.
More pics of it finishing up :
Old parts!
At this juncture i then had the car serviced and replaced a load of parts - new brake pads, oil sender unit and the usual minor service bits and bobs. Changed the 10mm rear spacers to i think 5mm can't recall, had the car corner balanced etc.
Refinished the wheels:
Enjoyed the car for a few weeks:
With my old CGT:
The car then went off for some mechanical work. The captions are all from the shop as they were progressing:
Engine out - we are not going to rebuild it - a compression test was done on the engine prior to removal and it is in really good health. What we will do is strip a lot of stuff away and replace with new, maybe even a few colour changes
Transmission needs a good clean - good opportunity to check the state of the clutch and flywheel<br/>
<br/>The fuel tank doesn't look to bad, but underneath it is - we will take this out and see what we find<br/>
<br/>Fuel pump underneath the tank - all those pipes will get replaced at the same time as the pump<br/>
<br/>Well it is a fuel pump that was working - but that certainly is not going back in the car - new one on its way<br/>
<br/>Fuel tank drained and removed - quite a bit of rust on it<br/>
<br/>Now, you could spend time cleaning this up, but frankly it is a lot easier to get a replacement. You really cannot sandblast these tanks for fear of getting some debris in the tank itself - it is just not worth it. New tank delivered and currently at painters.<br/>
<br/>New fuel tank, resprayed original colour and then we have transferred all the stickers etc.<br/>
<br/>New tank and front completed<br/>
<br/>Starting the strip of the engine<br/>
<br/>Transmission in general need of cleaning up - tin wear needs attention too.<br/>
<br/>Engine and transmission<br/>
<br/>No sound deadening so we will treat this section and put in new<br/>
<br/>Underside of the engine bay not in bad condition - we will clean this area up and put on some protective coat<br/>
<br/>Underneath the front<br/>
<br/>This will clean up easy - get rid of the rust and then repaint<br/>
<br/>This will clean up easy - get rid of the rust and then repaint<br/>
<br/>Fuel tank area<br/>
<br/>Fuel tank area<br/>
<br/>Front boot area has been treated and now has a protective coat - it is not possible to do the whole front boot area - remember the car has not been dipped so we are not in a position to start with a blank canvas<br/>
<br/>Front scrubbed ready for treatment<br/>
<br/>Cleaning up and treating<br/>
<br/>Housing and fan missing - I wonder why <br/>
<br/>Rear area underneath treated including the entire floor in the middle. Lots of parts that you can see in the picture such as hoses etc are all going to be replaced<br/>
<br/>Time for new heat exchangers ! and maybe a new exhaust system <br/>
<br/>Time for new heat exchangers ! and maybe a new exhaust system <br/>
<br/>Shocks have been cleaned up<br/>
<br/>Starting to replace clips<br/>
<br/>Starting to replace clips<br/>
<br/>Remember the underside of the engine bay lid - vast improvement now.<br/>
<br/>Under floor of the car has been painted and protected<br/>
<br/>New fuel tank and pump back in - have treated the fuel tank underneath as well - just a few more connections to make<br/>
<br/>Under the front<br/>
<br/>Under the rear<br/>
<br/>Under the rear<br/>
<br/>Engine bay completed<br/>
I then had a moment of madness and decided to sell the car...it didn't sell as it was priced high and the market back in 2014 / start of 2015 was quiet so it sat for sale until i decided i wanted to keep and use it.
Did a couple more bits and pieces to it, nothing crazy - boot and gas area were trimmed, windows were lightly tinted and ended up adding the MKII Porsche classic radio and added some new seats:
I then took the car to the Nurburgring and SPA and unfortunately the alternator let me down and i couldn't track it! I was absolutely gutted as this was to be my last EU trip for quite some time! The car was fine when it was running but if you turned it off it wasn't starting on it's own power which meant no track time due to the inherent risks! So close, yet so far!
After this trip I has the alternator sorted and decided to send the car over for a check to Porsche specialists, Tuthill Porsche in the UK as i was going to bring it over to the USA and wanted the car at it's best. Previously the mechanical works conducted were limited to what you have seen thus far - we hadn't opened up the engine. Tuthill and myself went over and discussed every aspect of the car - suspension, brakes, you name it. We ended up fettling with a load of stuff, nothing crazy though as the sky is the limit with them and a lot of it would have been overkill for what i wanted from this car (a cruiser to do roadtrips, occasional track day and canyon driving).
What started with a small short list turned into them finding a bent valve and a full engine rebuild. We discussed the build and what i wanted from the car and what they thought would be appropriate for its intended use at length.
The 3.2 G50 IN THE M491 config. is a lovely, albeit heavy car as stock. It comes with the wide body, turbo brakes and suspension (which had already been changed). The previous owner and myself had sorted the weight element out and now it was time to give it some more poke. I wanted longevity and didn't see the need to bore out the engine or go crazy. We added a few trick parts here and there such as a turbo 'S' cam.
Here's a brief list of what they did aside from the rebuild:
Here are a few pics of the rebuild:
Off to my paint shop for a final review before shipping (the stickers were removed as they were ruined from some temp wrap i put on to get to SPA).
Here's the final numbers. Initially i thought they were low, however they actually tested a stock 3.2 a few days later and it came in with much lower numbers than my build so it's obvious the dyno was conservative, which is fine by me. What's impressive is the TQ and the midrange. The car does actually have a different chip in it with a very slightly different map which further improved things subsequent to the dyno posted below. Tuthills are extremely happy with the car and have said it's an absolute hoot, that it's one of the best 3.2's they've built.
The car then got collected and flown over to the US where it's just being registered before it hits the streets!
Hope you all enjoyed the write up as much as i have enjoyed this project over the years! Now that all the work is finally finished there's nothing left to do but drive it hard and enjoy the bloody thing!
05-28-2017, 01:59 PM
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