Carrera GT Recreation

[arajani]

I've been a Porsche lover for several years now, and everyday, my interest seems to grow just a little bit more!

My first Porsche is a 2005 997 Carrera S that I purchased in 2009. I continue to drive this car every day, and absolutely love it.

My best friend has a 1987 911 Carrera cabriolet, and decided to buy a 356B T6 just two years ago, which really got my thinking about older and more interesting Porsches!

I just finished building a 550 Spyder through Carey Hines -- an absolutely incredible craftsman with a shop in Bremen, IN (his company is the home of the BECK products). The car will be shipped to me in just a few days -- I can't wait to drive it.

Several months ago, I started thinking about a coupe -- and couldn't resist buying a 356A. Amazingly, I found a 1956 356 -- just around the corner from my parents' home in the hot, dry San Joaquin Valley (Central California). The car had always been garaged, and the man I purchased it from was the second owner -- he had owned it since 1972. It was incredibly intact, very drivable, and without any visible rust. I drove the car to work for a solid week and loved it! It isn't a matching numbers car however, and it has certainly been hit in the front (and that's where it might get interesting when we get it down to bare metal!).

The car is now getting ready for a full bare metal restoration. I plan on turning it into a Carrera GT recreation -- pretty much just like Justin!

I've collected the following bits and pieces:
GT fuel tank from Stepan Gencev
Carrera oil tank from Thomas Tate
911-4 motor built by Chuck Beck (pre-dates the POLO motors). The tooling for the dizzy was actually made by Chuck Beck, and sold to Dean! The motor I have from Chuck is good for 210 hp, and has just been rebuilt; it was his own personal engine that has been sitting in his garage, unused.
Breitling stopwatch

I'm planning to buy a few bits from Robert Kann at GTWerk very soon, including a GT rollbar, oil tank screen, louvered engine lid and mesh screen.

This site is a spectacular resource -- and I am really happy to be able to check in here and see what you all are doing (and learn from you all!).

As I get more photos and make my way through this incredible journey, I'll post them here.

Gratefully-
Anand

[JTR70]

What a great find that coupe was Anand! They don't come along this well preserved too often anymore. I understand that it was hit at some point but believe me you're miles ahead of the game dealing with some old bad collision repair than you are with serious chassis cancer. It really looks like a great find and a T1 to boot! Congratulations!
The Spyder looks cool too! You'll have to share some details and photos of it once you take delivery. Your motor sounds very interesting, Photos?
Thanks once again for sharing! This is going to be a great build.
Justin

[roy mawbey]

Anand,

Justin is correct to find an 'A' like the one you have is very rare and to find it so close by even rarer. It looks great and as its non matching your engine sounds really interesting. Slightly more BHP than mine

Looking forward to seeing your progress, should be interesting.

best of luck

Roy

[merbesfield]

Excited to see more of your A project. I too have a T1 that I am building, rather slowly, to be an Outlaw of sorts. Welcome.

[arajani]

Mark, Roy & Justin: thanks for your posts and kind words! This forum is just amazing -- feels great to have some friends out there cheering you on!

My friend Carey has stripped my car completely -- and is getting it ready for Redi-strip.

The good:
Only one some area of rust near the rear window, but otherwise has almost no rust at all (that we can see yet, anyway!)



The bad:
The front end got crushed pretty badly, and as the picture shows, the inner trunk side panel was smashed pretty well (Carey says it looks like an accordion).

The nose is a bit asymmetric too -- they forced the passenger side inward in order to make the fender tube support line up, but it is pushed inward from the wreck, so that pulls the whole fender inward.




The REALLY BAD:
1. The lower shock mount is totally gone...thank goodness it stayed on for my 12 mile daily commute.



1. My throwout bearing was installed with no clips (I drove this car on the freeway to the hospital for a week...YIKES).



Everything out:



Regarding the Chuck Beck 911-4 -- someone posted about the motor on this site a while ago -- this is the very motor I purchased directly from Chuck with the help of Carey (it was in his own personal 550 Spyder replica)! The post suggests that the motor was from Dean, but in fact it pre-dates the Polo motors, from what Chuck tells me.
http://porsche356abcgt.com/forum/6-Hot-Rod--Modified-356/1845-The-Polopolus-4-cylinder-911-engine.html?limit=6&start=18

I'm waiting for some photos of it (the motor is headed to Carey's shop where Chuck will install it and my independent rear suspension on his own!).

The photos below are all courtesy of my dear friend Carey, one of the most amazing craftsman and mechanics I know (not to mention an amazing friend).

Justin: thanks to you also for all of the incredible things you post here. I have learned tons from reading your posts! I owe you!

Anand

[merbesfield]

Anand, your not playing around. Is this the same Chuck Beck that lives in Georgia, where I too live? Will you be sending your car here? I would love to see it.

[arajani]

Mark,
Yes -- it is the same Chuck Beck! Chuck may pick the car up and trailer it back to Atlanta once the bodywork is all done -- he'll likely do the IRS install there. You should definitely stop by his place and see it!

Chuck installed an IRS and a POLO motor in a 55 Continental coupe that ran the Carrera Panamericana a few years ago. Apparently it did quite well until the driver wadded it up towards the end of the race

Cheers,
Anand

[JTR70]

Thanks for posting this update Anand! Its moving right along. I hope your buddy will continue to take a lot of photos so we can all see what's going. Thanks very much for saying so; I am so glad that my posts are of some use!

I spoke with Dean a few nights ago about Chuck Beck and he was telling that he and Chuck helped one other to develop their motors. Chuck was having trouble getting a shorten cam tower to work. I believe Dean said Chuck was trying to remove the center section and reweld the ends together and it was Dean that told him just to cut one end off. I'll have to get him going on here.
Thanks again Anand!
Justin

[arajani]

Justin...
That's really cool stuff! Dean is a really wonderful person. I've talked with him on the phone, and it is amazing how down to earth he is, considering that he's so incredibly gifted.

That's also neat to know that the two collaborated -- it's a neat story! I'll have to ask Chuck about all of the other details!!

In other news...just ordered my oil tank screen, filler neck with rain tray, and roll bar from GTwerk!!

Cheers,
Anand

[arajani]

Status update: My car just got back from being Redi-Dipped in Indianapolis.

All of these 50+ year old cars have stories. The story of my car: BONDO. And lots of it.

We knew early on that this car had been hit pretty hard in the front, and there was lots of lingering evidence of this.

The nose, for example, previously appeared pretty smooth dead center. As evidenced by the photos, there was about 1" thick of bondo underneath there. Whoever welded this car must have done so with their teeth -- the welds are, well, horrible



The front beam support was clearly ripped and smashed:



The rear inner trunk panels had been Bondo'ed too, visible holes in them:




The rear longitudinals had Bondo too:




The rockers looked pretty good, overall:



Chuck Beck came to see the car, as he is taking it back to Atlanta with him:

[arajani]

Chuck brought some pictures of the 911-4 he made (now mine!) -- it still needs a good clean, but he has rebuilt it with new seals, etc:

210hp


His distributor:

[Carrera_The_Kid]

Cool stuff. I take it that's an aluminum case? What kind of shocks did the car have? They look original.

[JTR70]

Looking good Anand what a cherry virtually rust free shell; you did well! A clean bare metal shell is such a nice place to start! Yeah it took a little hit to the right side and kinked behind the beam a bit. Probably pulled to the right as it went down the road afterward. That is a sweet motor! It looks like it hasn't been touched for 20 years and has a real patina about it. You say its been rebuilt? Like the custom valve covers too! Thanks for the update and looking forward to more! Justin

[arajani]

Hey Justin!
Thanks!
Yep -- the motor has been rebuilt -- but it does look dated from the outside! Might need to do a new set of valve covers for it...I love the ones Dean has done.

Even though my car doesn't have that much rust, it still needs so, so much work -- I wish they had better anti-corrosion technology back then

All of my parts arrived from GTwerk -- Carey tells me everything looks really nice and is very high quality.





I ended up getting my windows from Russ at Fibersteel. They are at my house, still in boxes, as I won't need them for a while.

[JTR70]

Here are the valve covers I think your talking about Anand.

These are really nice and the motor loses that "lopped-off" look as with the cut stock covers. Dean doesn't cast these; someone in Northern Cal. does and I believe he gets about a grand per set of four. Not cheap but a really nice finishing touch. I'll most likely step up for a set of these... Justin