Looking to buy service manuals and have looked at the "big three" and it appears that Pelican is the only one who has them ( but I could be wrong ) other than ebay. I see Pelican's are a 9 volume set and some on ebay are 6,8 even 10 volumes. Most are burgandy binders and some are grey. Is there a difference based on binder color? My car is an 82S Euro ROW 5spd. I assume, well hope the manuals cover the Euro cars too. Thanks.

 

I have an extra grey set I don't need. Comes in the original box and only slightly used. I'd like $500 shipped. PM if this is interesting.

FWIW, there are WSMs in CDs. Jim Morrison sold them back in the day. Cheaper, but I really like the manuals.

 

You will need WKD 481 620 to cover your 82 RoW. The US version will not have the wire diagrams and other things early 80's RoW's had.
The Gray ones are later versions and it had 9 volumes in the final one.

 

FWIW, the US set I have includes the ROW wiring diagrams. The differences between US and ROW cars are in the lighting. US cars have the main harness conductors needed for the ROW lighting. Differences show up at the end sections for lighting. On later cars for instance, the rear fog light functions in ROW cars are managed at the harness between the main harness section and the tail light housing.

----

Back to the OP's question: The factory manuals have been out of print for well over a decade now. The sets you see at places like Pelican -may- be NOS, but are more likely used sets. Depending on condition, used sets seem to sell for $350 for a well used set to over $500 for sets closer to original condition. There are some scanned sets available online, but there are some challenges in things like wiring diagrams where details are fuzzy in the scans. Look for links in the "new visitors..." thread and see if the scanned versions there will meet your needs. In our own community, Jim Morehouse scanned and indexed the manuals, and also compiled an excellent collection of supporting info including factory tech manuals and system-specific tech manuals and bulletins. Check with 928SRUS (ROG100 here on Rennlist) for that CD set. I use the Morehouse CD's almost exclusively. When I'm working on something, I can print out the pages I need. I sometimes add notes and comments to the sheets I use, and add them back into the PDF scanned set I keep on my shop computer so they are easy to recover and remember next time. I still go back to the printed wiring diagrams once in a while to get clarity where the scans aren't perfect, but that's very seldom these days, and usually it's for info to support member questions here. Others do the same I'm sure. Others seem willing to "share" wiring diagrams and markups here, pages extracted from those scanned sets. I'm not a fan of that practice, but since I'm not the IP police here I leave them alone. You can find samples in some recent threads of the quality of those scanned wiring diagrams that might help you decide if the scanned versions are adequate for your needs.

Regardless of all that, I wouldn't consider owning the car without a full set of printed or factory soft manuals.

 

Bob, WKD-481-620 (9-volume gray-binder set) appears to be available from Porsche. List shows as $704, and a bit under $500 with some careful shopping. I'm assuming they were reprinted, but it could be vapor. Old stock seems unlikely given a decade of unavailable.

 

Thanks guys! I appreciate the effort in putting these on CD's, but I like good ole printed manuals ( it's the Harley Tech in me ). So the grey is what I'm after?

 

PM sent

 

I got the CDs and printed and bound them myself. Cost WAY less than $500 to do this. Get binders, three hole paper and print out on a laser printer.

 

Thanks doc,
This has actually got me thinking of picking up the cd's. I sent Roger a pm.

 

I keep fiddling with the scanned wiring diagrams, and forget that I have a tabloid (11x17) size sheet scanner. I may need to do at least a 1989 set as a proof of concept demo. Then I can color on them to my heart's content.

A long while ago I got started with converting the 1989 drawings to CAD. I was obsessed with idea of having colored wires in drawings, including the x-with-y-tracer styles. I got bogged down with building the wire-color files and then distracted with real honest-to-goodness client work. Since then I'm more enthused with the idea of having simpler system-specific drawings to make tracing and diagnosis a lot easier. More in the style of the early drawings with "rungs" drawn vertically. I've been sorta doing those on a sketch pad to help with diagnostic descriptions. It takes a village though.