SC Coupe Restoration

[Jack Staggs]

Well, that really sucks. I went back to your pix, and I think I can see the difference in pitch. Are the upper horn grille openings relatively in alignment? All that being said, I have noted differences from side to side on know original cars as well. You know, hand made...

[JTR70]

It will be very interesting to know how that new part plugs into position Bruce; It looks nice enough. I know exactly what you mean by the look and feel of those Taiwanese "will fit" body panels and this clip certainly looks like one. I've worked with them on several of my Japanese truck rebuilds over the last 20 years. By the 1990's the quality and fitment was actually pretty good. I have a pair of their front fenders on my Toyota and they actually fit and looked great. My only complaint was that the lines got a bit hair-lipped at the forward corner by the turn signals but for the price they could not be beat. Toyota wanted about 185.00 per fender and I think I bought repops for about 29.00 each. I also bought the entire front end group for literally pennies on the dollar compared to the factory stuff. That being said I can just imagine what the profit margin must be for Porsche after they've applied their stickers. I'd venture to say that their cost is maybe 300 a copy if that???? Please keep us posted on how this goes and thanks!

Hey Tom, I know exactly how frustrating it can be trying to chase perfection. Keep in mind that this area is upside down, waist high and in perfect view. Once the car is down on the ground where it belongs and this valance is literally few inches off the pavement with front bumper installed you yourself will probably be hard-pressed to detect these slight irregularities.

I'm going through the same thing right now chasing the reflections from side to side. I've seen a lot of restored Pre-A,& A noses that are just not symmetrical and the reflection is "faster" on one side than the other. I'll look at mine from one angle and think yeah, pretty good, then from another and go ah-shit this thing is still off. Keep in mind too that these front ends can emit a lot of optical illusions. Sometimes I'll look at my horn grill openings and one looks higher than the other or they look crooked in there. As a matter of fact this very photo seems to show that the left opening is higher than the right. But its not, they are both in untouched factory positions. So I think it is wise to step back and take a break from this area, It may begin to look better. Another test you might want to do is to mock up the lower grills in there to see what their orientation with one another is. Keep your head up; I think you might be splitting hairs...

[bbspdstr]

Original nose, crooked horn opening on right side:





There was so much welding on this A Cab that a little more in the correction process wasn't a difficult decision.

-Bruce

[John Pierce]

Good info Bruce. Let us know how the Porsche repro nose mocks up.

[tperazzo]

Thanks everyone. Justin I now know why you punched your coupe

Other aspects of this car need more attention, so I'll move on for now. Once the bumpers and huge guards are fitted, I'll look at it again and decide if I try to fix it.

The horn grills are ok, it's just the fog light hole. I would have to cut it out along the perimeter, reposition it and then splice in a thin wedge. I'm worried about the heat associated with a double weld pass. Probably two days of work???? Probably 40" of weld length.

So Murphy's law prevails on this nose!

Seeking Murphy's Companionship, SMC

Just poking fun, ha ha.
Tom

[JTR70]

I really sympathize with your frustration Tom and am sorry to read that its not turning out quite like you had hoped. Been there many a time and am sure to find myself there again. This reminds me of a conversation I had a few weeks back with Victor Miles when I had him restore my emblems; during the call he was expressing frustration over a Cab he was in the middle of wrestling with. The upshot of the conversation was that unless you have actually worked on these bodies yourself you will never appreciate what it actually takes to get them right. I told him that I always that felt that these car bodies were probably one of the most difficult to work on. From front to back its a continuous egg-shaped smooth flowing line with no breaks in it. On top of that none of it unbolts and what does unbolt (closing panels) offers relatively very little in the way of adjustment without more cutting and welding involved. By contrast an early 911 is flatter and has all sorts of breaks and gaps with its separate front fenders and integrated removable bumpers. Victor said oh yeah, 911's are breeze compared to a 356... Anyway just story to remind you that by design 356's are inheritedly problematic to get right, but you already knew that. Keep chipping at it!

Uh-oh Bruce, I may have to check my horn grill openings now..

[tperazzo]

Thanks Justin, those are true words for sure. I guess that's what makes these cars fun in a punitive way.

Now, I'm trying to work on my rear bumper indents. They have lost their original shape and depth due to some strange body work in this area. Someone softened them and now I'm trying to restore close to original.

Would one or two of you be willing to measure the relief depth as shown in the picture below? Measured just in front of the hole.


Also, I'm not clear on the outer shape. Here's a template I made from the best side. It's a .pdf file linked here:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9i4R-oybcZkbTJVMkpDRlZ6ejg/edit?usp=sharing

Perhaps someone can print it out and confirm it fits. I'm mostly concerned with the end with the hole. The template is a little wavy once it gets away from the hole.

Here's what I'm starting with



Thanks in advance for any help.
Tom

[John Pierce]

Hey Tom!

Here are my measurements in mm and inches (a little more than 3mm or a little less than 1/8"). The template fits well.

Good luck.

JP

[tperazzo]

Thanks a bunch John, That ought to keep me busy for a while. If you need any measurements, just let me know.
Tom

[Jack Staggs]

That's another area where deviations are all over the place, from my observation, on factory cars. Any comments Bruce?

[bbspdstr]

Yep. I have had and used NOS rear caps and quarters that would have made the Ferrari replacement parts guys proud. There have been some WITH the indent, some WITHOUT...and lining those 'with' have been iffy. It's odd that the vertical joining seam bisects that impression.

Here's an original paint C with only the rear bumper pulled back in it's past, and the depression is merely a hint, maybe a couple of mm. Others have been much deeper:



In fact, the impression is much further continued rearward, more into the curve, and the bumper hole is farther back, too, than other C cars I looked at just now. Strange. Here is a later C:



Jack is correct, there apparently is no true 'one and only way' for those body depressions for the bumper ends in shape, depth or length. Only an average and only what's looking 'correct' in any given application. The only thing I can say from my limited experience is that all B and C 356s had some sort of depression when new. How they were made and what part of production is unclear. May be time for another viewing of "Made by Hand."

[tperazzo]

Thanks Bruce and Jack for warning me about bumper indent inconsistency. Yesterday, I dropped by European Collectibles with my templates and asked to snoop around. After looking at 8 or so cars, I found out that the length varied from 6" to 9" as Bruce's pictures show. This measurement is not exact because its subjective as to where the lines end, but you get the idea. There was one unrestored car that I took dimensions from and they are basically the same as what John gave me. I ended up with about 7" long.

I started by making a backside form.


It has a little curve to it to fit the car.


Tack welded to the car and a brace welded to the backside so that I could push on it with a wedged in 2 x 4" Sorry no pictures of my woodworking



I ended up with about 3mm of relief versus 1mm that I started with.






I'm not sure if the upper line should end at the same dimension as the lower line or not, but I left it at this. Please comment if you think it looks wacky.

My painter will need to spend a little extra time smoothing this out because its been beat around before me plus what I did to re-form it.

Gotta love the ball-peen hammer marks visible in the pictures. What were they thinking? Or maybe it was some kind of picking tool? Either way it made a mess.

Thanks again for reading this.
Tom

[John Pierce]

Nice! I like how you think, Tom, to get to a solution. It's one of those little details that would bother me also. Thanks for showing how you got to the desired result.

[JTR70]

Nice job on that hammer form Tom, it seems to have worked beautifully! As Jack and Bruce pointed out there are no absolutes with the construction details of these cars. It's a nice luxury to have an original to look off of though. Good choice of splitting the difference at 7 inches on that embossment for the "best average fit". That's all you can hope for when it comes to these cars. Your bodyman's gonna love you, you're making his job so much easier. Keep up the great work!
Justin

[Phil Planck]

Tom
Great solution to your dilemma. Sorry I did not take measurements off of Foam Car for you, but it's a Reutter and probably different.
Phil