The Resurrection of Foam Car - 63 T6B

[Phil Planck]

While waiting for my headlight seals I have been investigating original headlights. Interesting discussion on the R:
http://forum.porsche356registry.org/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=45788&hilit=headlight&start=15

and I read what was is Brett Johnsons' book. John, assume most of this applies to your T6B also.

Even though the my units are not original(as I recall PO said he had them somewhere) they are 5 & 7 o'clock adjusters which seems to be what was used in 63. They have park light bulbs, which I have removed, and plan to make some 1" square covers per above R post. One is pretty pitted and has been painted over. Have found another unit with original block off piece still in it that looks pretty good and may buy.

Also, discovered cold welds on drivers side fog light bracket so removed it and rewelded with welder on higher setting for 16ga. rather than 20ga. and that seemed to do the trick. The bracket is much thicker than the fender and I used my typical setting. Glad I caught it now.

Also found a decent condition and priced wheel with 62 date code as Foam Car never had a spare. One advantage of a slow restoration is you can wait until you find a reasonably priced part.

[Jack Staggs]

Fascinating bit of information, Phil. In the muscle car era here in the USA, domestic cars of certain types could be had with heater and other typically standard items deleted for racing purposes. I have not heard of a 356 being delivered with a spare tire delete option, but in another thread on this forum, a 356A Carrera is purported to have been delivered sans engine, by special request. Could you post your COA or kardex, showing this anomaly?

[bbspdstr]

"One advantage of a slow restoration is you can wait until you find a reasonably priced part."

I love that quote! All along, I thought it was ignoring a project that took the prize- with money, any money being needed coming in a close second!

Seriously, I like the Wolfsburg VW gaskets unless I need a thicker foam 911 gasket or even a 'standard' gasket from one of the major suppliers. (That's a joke!)

Unless you fill the larger distance you (should intentionally) make happen when fitting the bucket and already have a good idea of what primer and paint thicknesses will be, you will be at the mercy of rubber seal availability at the wrong end of painting the 356.

I mask the gap between fender opening and bucket after one pass of primer. I use a "standard" seal with the headlight that will be the final part when the project gets finished (with the long-awaited-for least expensive parts that are found)....

Generally, buckets taken out of a fender seem to not want to return exactly where they were. Mixed or repro gets silly really fast.

Getting the slight "wall-eyed" alignment to work and be even side-to-side is very difficult to do economically so one should set the buckets where they need to be and have 'enough' (original gap) space where possible and fill the rest after welding...or, as I often do, use a short stainless pop-rivet where the welds would be. The next bodyperson will thank you if collision or other mishap comes along.

Bruce

[Phil Planck]

Jack, my apologies. Should have written "was missing the spare". Its about the only thing that was missing when I bought it and PO stated he did not have it. Not much evidence left to look for tire rub marks. I never bothered to get CofA, but there was a guy who used to give you original engine # by supplying chassis number. My engine is not original per his records, and that info is on my old pc with a blown power supply. I did not mean to imply it came from factory without a spare.

Bruce, I plan to put masking tape over the primer and see how Wolfsburg seals fit. I kept track of left and right buckets and old weld holes are currently lined up on drivers side.

Found some material today to attempt making parking light block off. If succesful will post.

[Phil Planck]

Blank off pieces turned out good enough for Foam Car. Spent some time looking for material with a tightly checked pattern, similar to pics that have been posted. My wife suggested the back of the thick, cardboard, "paper" plates. Bought a small pack of them and they look pretty good. I glued them to a piece of rubberized gasket making material and painted silver




25cm square fits pretty good:



Both original chrome rims are cracked at the bottom, possibly from not using the spacer. I have some repros I bought 30 years ago, but the riveted tabs are a lot thinner than original and rivets look pretty crappy. Suppose I could remove original ones and put on the repros, but that is for when I have nothing else to do.

[bbspdstr]

Phil, thanks for the R link. Here is an 'op ed' about that:

It shows that there are more 'experts' over there for minutia and esoteric originalities and perhaps (maybe incorrectly assumed due to me just following links to topics 'over there') than here on Justin's site where there is more of the nitty-gritty with which to recreate a 356 on which to apply the aforementioned esoterica.

Personally and with prejudice, I like your result of the blanking piece for a VW/356 headlight.....from your wife's suggestion.

It's great for the R to have a Brad, Jim(s) or Roy (and many others), who are really really well versed in parts by being "in the business" and personal fanaticism....but I prefer the answers to such issues by the DIY creative common-sense people like you, here on this site.

Think about it....I do not know how old Jan Kolms is, but Roy and Brad are well past 70 and Jim and I are about the same age (past 70) and sure, I hope we ALL live forever....but what if we don't? (here, Jack is most likely to outlive us!) It will be up to the younger crowd to pass along the often elusive "originality" for the cars... if anyone still cares.

Maybe in the future forged Kardexes will show the "matching" serial number of the WRX engine their 356 came with "from the Factory." Who will enlist in what has been called over on the R "the Originality Police"?

And the blanking squares in the variable model headlights will be gone and the sockets sport LEDs of various festive colors.

Bruce-(hey, I will look through my bin of original chrome rims if you need one or two. I have been saving dented ones , as the brass is not difficult to straighten and then re-chrome. There are single and double riveted versions, varying tab shapes and plating. Be careful of the repros. Most are not good enough to be mixed with original parts and catch the upper center return of the rim on the upright tab of the bucket. Prefit EVERYTHING!)

[356JAGER]

Bruce,
One of my old T shirt designs may be back in vogue ?
Cheers,
Joel

[Phil Planck]

Bruce
Before you close up shop, save a couple repairable rims for me. I bought the repros from Rocky Mountain something or another when I was redoing the chrome on the 55 coupe. Decided to have originals replated. I plan to hit a pretty big VW swap meet in Sarasota next winter so will look for some there. In the meantime, what I have will work fine and has some patina.

My next issue is the wiring conduits to the buckets. I would like to go all the way up thru the buckets as original but am having problems finding tight bend conduit. Inner diameter of the bend is about 3". OD of conduit is around 5/8" as I recall. I called one of our major suppliers to inquire about buying just the bent conduit, only longer at the bucket end. Said they did not make that part, but had some loose conduit and assured be it was long enough. After paying a pretty steep price and steep shipping, the parts are: a) larger diameter than original, and b) not any longer than what I had. A phone call did not end up to my satisfaction.

Here is what I have:



I thought about welding some straight conduit to the oversize, but that sort of defeats the purpose of a one piece, unwelded part.

Any suggestions? I don't think most electrical contractors can bend that tight and also would like it to be kink free in the bend.

[bbspdstr]

Phil, it's been a long time since I made those bends and now my bender and all of my many dies/mandrels are with Rick Mullin after I got it and the dies/mandrels back rusty from Tony Euganeo...who never got around to making why he had borrowed it, years before.

Still, I'd call Mike or Alex at Restoration Design (unless they are the outfit that disappointed you) and see if they can help you and all of us by providing parts of parts. They sell unassembled rockers to me if they have loose pieces. Same price, less work for them and better for me.

I'll be getting rid of stuff after I put aside what I need for remaining projects and possible incoming service work....or you.

I am not imminently retiring, just trying to slow down and de-stress and taking on no more FULL restorations...according to the Sturgeon General, the leading cause of stress and pauperism.

I'd love to do sections or partials of restos, maybe reassembly to some degree and service work like tune-ups and oh, yeah, fabrication work, so I'll see how that goes.

It's that or.......seriously...volunteer at the local VA Clinic while still able to help those worse off than me.

Sorry I can't help with the tubing.

Bruce

[Phil Planck]

Thanks for the tips Bruce. Unfortunately it was RD. My fault for not asking for pics and dimensioned sketch. They dont make them and did not share their source. I will try Stoddard, where I bought the brackets I installed.

Wish I were nearby to your shop.

[Phil Planck]

The conduit on the left, above is long enough. I did not think it was, but installed it and protrudes into bucket at least 1". It came off a Stoddard bracket I bought years ago. Called them today and measured same as what I have, so ordered bracket just to get conduit.

Wolfsburg parts arrived today along with spare wheel.

[Phil Planck]

Bruce
I like your idea of pop rivets. Besides for the next guy, IF the bucket needs to be moved if I screw up on gasket, can just drill out the rivets and slightly move it and hopefully not screw up paint job.
Got both side covered with .005" masking tape and put the thin Wolfsburg seals in. With old holes lined up the headlight assembly was a little loose. Pressed it in until snug, then did same on other side. Need to determine total paint thickness, as I just have self etch primer on now.





While waiting for conduit to arrive from Stoddard decided to bite the bullet and fill in this gapping hole in the engine compartment:



This was created years ago, before I had confidence in removing rear outer panel as Bruce suggested. There was a bad dent in the area above tail light. Complex curve there. In order to get to it I cut out the inner panel, but the hole was never big enough so ended up cutting out 4 pieces. Time to make one piece and get this fixed so I can install sound deadener and engine.

[Phil Planck]

See "Headlight Mounting Tips" thread that Justin started for my headlight saga. I got the jigsaw puzzle pieces tacked together to see how it fit in the hole. Fit pretty good, but a gap on one side from a piece I did not save, or lost.

[Phil Planck]

If you saw the big sheet of metal above, my challenge was to cut out a piece to make a one piece patch. With all of my large horizontal surfaces covered, I remembered that I bought a drill operated nibbler when I first started this project 18 years ago, but had never used. Amazingly I found it and put it on my cordless drill. Worked great. I used tap thread cutting oil. These are still available.





I just used it with the sheet metal laying on the shop carpet you saw above, then swept off the offal.

Think I have my headlight installation problem resolved. See headlight fitting thread.

[Phil Planck]

Got the patch shaped for the hole in the inner rear panel. Used bead roller to get curved bend at top.
Here is trimmed patch and tool I used to get a line 1/2" from edged of hole. This is a less accurate version of the tape method I learned of and posted a while back.



I opened up the small pencil holder on a compass to hold a Sharpee marker and set at 1/2", went around the opening:



In the overlap area I drill holes for clecoe fasteners and installed the panel:


I then used the sharp tip of the compass to scribe it along the black mark 1/2" from the opening and marked the patch panel. I was also able to mark the back a portiong of the panel from behind thru taillite opening and from underneath. This helped confirm the marks on the other side, which are not as smooth due to trying to slide the scribe along and around the clecoes. So I trimmed the marks on the back first and they coincided pretty well with the ones from the compass. Time to weld this patch in.