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Introducing my 1990 C4. 120k miles and I'm the 3rd owner.
Just completed a full exterior and interior restoration. Complete paint change to 918 spec liquid silver metallic (glass/engine out, door jams, frunk, etc), all new OEM exterior reflectors, rubber, badges, mirrors, and all new black OEM interior.
Handling is sorted (for now) with Bilstein coilovers, Tarett drop links, strut bar, corner balance. Performance mildly tweaked with Wong chip and bypass pipe. Car drives strong except clutch is overly stiff and concerned about longevity.
Major issue(s) remaining are oil leaks. Case leaks, rocker seals leak, and tranny leaks a tiny bit. Leaks get worse when warm. Will follow the trusted "drive, wait, and see" approach, but also may have a line on a turbo 4.0 build that a customer may not be able to pay off (which of course means back to paint for new turbo tail and deck). Car will be out and about LA, Malibu, Ojai, and Santa Barbara so honk and say hello.
And thanks to everyone for all the valuable information provided on this site and in your posts.
Chris
Ps. Photo ****ty quality from mechanic's phone, but more photos to come from the road...
More pics please! There was a Rennlister who did this color on a 993 Turbo. It's stunning. I'll post a pic when I can get to my laptop this weekend. Enjoy!!
Don't want to post too many photos from the mechanic's dark garage and on his camera phone - as the car looks so much better in person - but here's another shot as they were finishing up the detailing. Car is on 996 17" spokes powdercoated gun metal grey.
approx cost for all that work you described?
why did you focus on the appearance before the mechanical? I’d hate to jeopardize new paint with a car in the shop for mechanical and moving it around with power
do you have a paint brand and code you can share? I’m preparing for a paint job on another make of car and that color has me reconsidering my choice
What a great color choice! I noted that Cali plates, will you have the car ready for Luft this year? It would be awesome to see in person and I’m also very curious about the paint process and how it differs from a standard metallic.
@tarek307 much thanks dude - means alot coming from one of the Jedi Masters of the 964Force! More photos to come...
@nowata approx cost for everything - parts, labor, body work, paint was about $25k. Took about 6 months. My original seats, dash, steering wheel were all perfect otherwise cost would have been much higher of course. But little things add up, like approx. $1200 just for fender liners. Some things I lucked out on like getting a new sunroof mechanism from the Singer waste bin for nothing thanks to my mechanic. Regarding paint v. mechanical the car drives very strong with good compression so it's just the oil leaks, which I know is a thesis subject on its own. I chose to follow what I think is the majority opinion which is that as long as the car is running well and strong just 'enjoy' the leaks at least until they present some fire or other hazard, which mine don't. My mechanic actually has a 918 he works on that had to get some repairs done so we literally piggybacked off his paint order. I may be wrong, but I don't think you can order this paint from Porsche unless you own a 918. That said it wasn't too expensive, I think the invoice for paint was something like $1000.
@golfnutintib hoping to pick up the car today or maybe this weekend so will post some picks driving up the PCH
@marineblue Yes, would love to do Luft. Hoping to bring it and see/meet others in the air-cooled scene.
@u7t2p7 Wheels were put on by the 2nd owner, Christian Knaak, who I'm not sure is on this site or not, but is a Porsche guy and owned the car for approx. 18 months after buying it from the original owner. He bought it as a 'fun car' to drive while he was finishing his own long hood early 911 project which I think is pretty close to being done? I experimented with some period correct silver BBS, but I agree these wheels are light, look good, and fitment is perfect.
Here's a few photos of the teardown. Car lived in NY with the original owner for over 25 years, and although it was garaged and driven sparingly (115k miles in 26 or so years) it still had 26 years of east coast weather and even worse 26 years of mechanical car washes. So the original paint was bad. The second owner (see above) did a small miracle getting the paint to look good from 15 feet away, but it was never going to look good, especially being black, it showed poorly. And with a small rust bottle in the typical spot on the windshield I made the decision to repaint it. Also, Carfax showed a rear end collision back in the 90's and we couldn't find any evidence of it, so I also wanted to investigate and make sure any damage repairs were done correct. Although I see this car as a driver and plan to put tons of miles on it, I also want to keep it for 30 years so didn't want any rust or other issues popping up down the road. As you all know, doing a full paint change is also an opportunity to really investigate hoses, clamps, etc. And of course we did find things like a missing sub frame bolt so the car not only looks so much better, but is much tighter. Back to paint, at first I was going to do black, but then when the 918 got damaged I had an opportunity to make this paint color change and jumped at it. Here's some 'in the works' shots:
Here's some shots of the paint. The one thing my mechanic did which I didn't understand was that he painted the engine bay and the frunk last. We had some discussion about it, but he said it's the way he always does it. I did inspect both the frunk and engine bay and everything looks good. The only thing we didn't do "as factory" was the frunk floor pan, where the battery and the spare tire sit, we left flat black as original. The reason we left it original was that it's in perfect condition, with no rust or corrosion, and shows that the original owner had the car garaged, taken care of, etc. Being an East Coast car with no records from the first owner, again 26 years of ownership, wanted to be able to document some evidence of good care.
@tarek307 much thanks dude - means alot coming from one of the Jedi Masters of the 964Force! More photos to come...
loool, i am no jedi master AT ALL, just learning about these cars, i think it would take 10 years minimal to actually master these cars...and you'd still learn new stuff as you go.
03-13-2019, 08:59 PM
Liquid Silver 964
