Daily Slideshow: Find What You Love and Let It Kill You

Rod’s Roots

Rod Emory's automotive roots go back almost as far as Porsche's. His grandfather Neil started his shop, the storied Valley Custom, fresh off a stint as motor pool mechanic during World War II. Valley Custom was known for tasteful customs, utilizing advanced hot rod style metalwork techniques like chopping, channeling, and sectioning to achieve a factory-like finish in a modified package. Eventually, Neil moved from Valley Custom to work as a body shop manager at a VW/Porsche dealer, and when the time came Neil helped bring Rod's father, Gary, into the fold as the parts manager that the dealer too. Gary is rumored to have built the first Baja Bug in 1969, using a '56 Beetle to satisfy his urge for something along the lines of a Meyer's Manx. Rod, in turn, grew up around the dealership and he got his Porsche 356 when he was only 14.

>>Join the conversation about Emory's 356 and the love for Porsche right here in Rennlist.com.

Tubular

Rod turned that 356 into a vintage racer, and then into a career. He started by building and servicing Porsches for other vintage racers, and after garnering a lot of attention from building a car for Cameron Healy, noted car guy and founder of Kettle Chips, his business took a turn toward building more and more street cars. Since 2009 his focus has been mainly on 356 Porsches, restoring and updating them at the same time. One problem on nearly every car he finds is rotted floors caused by condensation around the 356's heater tubes. As Rod told Speedhunters: "Replacing the longitudinal area in the floors is the biggest issue with a 356." Rod explains: "The water pools up and causes major corrosion damage. We replace those longitudinals and install new heat tunnel mufflers that are filled with fiberglass instead of cardboard. Those are then cold galvanized before they are welded back together."

>>Join the conversation about Emory's 356 and the love for Porsche right here in Rennlist.com.

Modernizing

Repairing corrosion is just a step in the process, the real goal is to bring the 356 driving experience into the 21st century, or at least into the latter half of the 20th century. For those concerned about him hacking up survivors, Rod says: "I don’t work with pristine, numbers-matching cars." What he does do is convert them to 12-volt electrics straight away, making the lights brighter and cold starts more eager, among other things. The wheels were changed to wider alloys and shod in radials, and brakes upgraded to discs, though the biggest modifications are applied to the drivetrain and suspension.

>>Join the conversation about Emory's 356 and the love for Porsche right here in Rennlist.com.

Six into Four

"We change out the engine and drivetrain to a more modern, overhead cam engine with an independent rear suspension that replaces the swing-axle design," Rod explains. As for engines, in the past he has cut two cylinders off of a 964 flat-six, welded the case back together, and installed a custom-made crankshaft, resulting in a 2.4-liter four—but now he's sourced aluminum flat-four with which to start. The engines, which end up being larger than the original 356 mills, are mated to 964 transmissions via a custom adapter. Though sporting modern touches like dry sump lubrication and overhead cams, Rod's engines remain carbureted.

>>Join the conversation about Emory's 356 and the love for Porsche right here in Rennlist.com.

Return of a Champion

Rod's vintage racing past and his Porsche heritage made him the perfect person to restore the original Porsche 356 SL race car, the car that won its class at Le Mans in 1951. Except when the project came to him, via Cameron Healy, he had no idea it was that Porsche 356. The car was known to have raced in California in its later years, after being converted into a roadster, but beyond that details got sketchy. Once Rod was convinced he had the original in his shop he notified Porsche and 3D scans of the car were shared with the factory, which in turn shared scans of a 356 museum car, as well as other Gmund-era 356 coupes so that work could begin to return the car to its as-raced condition. The scans were used to create a wooden buck that new panels could be beaten over, and when the aluminum piece was ready Rod brazed it on and the car was born again. At Porshe's request, the car was revealed—in bare aluminum form—to the public in September of 2015 at Rennsport Reunion Five. Sixty years of Porsche history and Emory history came together. You can't kill history.

>>Join the conversation about Emory's 356 and the love for Porsche right here in Rennlist.com.

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