57 356 A mild resto

[merbesfield]

Next up is the floor pans. I was going to replace the entire pan but after scraping all the undercoating off, there are only three spots that are bad so I will carefully cut them out and butt weld new metal in place so as to retain all the original spot welds and panel fit details from the factory. Many of the areas actually had shinny metal under the rock hard undercoating. The areas needing attention are the back two outside corners where the water pooled and the front passenger footwell all the way forward. I may have to buy all new pans just to be able to chop them apart for patching. I hate to have to spend the money on them only to cut them up, but to try and hand form those pieces probably does not make economic sense. These pics were taken before I removed all the undercoating. When I first looked at the pans I thought I would have to completely replace them, but after completely stripping them my plans changed.

[merbesfield]

Some closeups and also the front door jambs. I removed the tar undercoating that had thankfully been hosed on long ago and what I found was near perfection. Mostly original black paint and solid steel.

[merbesfield]

Now back to the Porsche stuff. As I mentioned in previous posts I have been inching towards solid steel. The rockers are done. Pics to prove it.

[merbesfield]

Looks really clean Mark! Is this 911 you just picked up a while back?? If so I understand why you're workig on it; its the honeymoon phase and the "new" toy gets all the love...right?

The Honeymoon with the 66 911 is over. Most all the projects are done and she is sitting quietly wanting to be thrashed. There will always be side projects, but the heavy lifting is done. Fortunately, there is a new Mistress in the house. Quite unexpectedly, I purchased a 1982 Toyota FJ40. I am always watching for these and this one was one I could not pass on. Happily, she only needs love and attention, but no major projects. She is a driver. This Cruiser has been owned by a 73 year old gentleman who owns a Toyota dealership in Alabama. He has owned it for over 25 years and it amazingly has only 41K miles. It is about as near perfect a 1982 vehicle could be. The few little nigglets are very minor. I have been driving the wheels off it.

Here are a couple pics.



PO Mr. McKinnon in front of his dealership.

[merbesfield]

I know this is not much of an update, but I have been busy working on the 356 now that the 66 911 is complete. I have completed the rockers and am prepared to remove the floor pans. My question is, who sells the most correct pans for an early 356? The front battery pan was not available as you may know so I had to customize (back date) it to match the early pan. I would appreciate those in the knows opinion on floors. I believe there are about three manufactures. Restoration Design,Dansk, the red ones sold by Zims (edit Simonsen) (the name escapes me) and probably others? Obviously, RD has the best prices, but I do not know how correct their pans are. Please chime in. I may post a general thread about this as well.

[JTR70]

Looks really clean Mark! Is this 911 you just picked up a while back?? If so I understand why you're workig on it; its the honeymoon phase and the "new" toy gets all the love...right?

[merbesfield]

I thought I would post a few gratuitous pics of what has been occupying my time and keeping me from my 356. My 66 911. Working one day a week it takes a long time to complete anything. But it is important to balance cars with family and work, right? Who am I kidding, I would live in the shop if I could. Anyhow, it's in and epoxy primed. Next week, seam sealer and Schutz. Then brakes and.....

[JR]

Roy and Mark,
All the pictures that I have posted I shot in small resolution and I use IE8.
I don't have to down size that way and they work better on e-mailing.
Roy helped me out a great deal.
I call up Internet Explorer pull up the 356abcgt web site and go from there.
It solved all my problems.
Thanks again Roy!!
Dick aka JR

[JTR70]

Sorry you guys are experincing trouble. Just spoke with my webmaster and explained everything I.E. loading trouble for Mark and no loading problem for me with the same photos. Roy is on the right track; my WM thinks the problem lies with the web-browswers your using because he says nothing has changed with the site. He is a big fan of Google Chrome and highly recommends it over any other browser. I am partial to internet Explorer because its what I've always used however I have had problems with it losing all my photo attachments while I was editing and trying to add more photos. Very, very frustrating! I would then switch to Google chrome just to add the photos; never had a problem with dropped attachments using GC. This size of the photo won't generally be a problem unless its huge but the software will notify you of that. So if your experincing glitches try Google chrome for your web-browser. Hope this helps! Sorry to muddle your build post Mark...back to your car.

The small parts restoration is a nice diversion isn't it? They look nice! Your car's front wheel well area and brake detail look great too in the background shot. That Tiny access hole in the front tin is an old hold-over from the early days. Its for a hand-crank to start the motor. Can you imgine? Justin

[gkw]

Mark, nice job, looks great.
I also was not able to load pictures from my pc.
Gordon

[merbesfield]

Been also working on all my sheet metal readying it for the Powder Coater. Mostly just metal working the kinks and a little bit of repair followed by glass beading.






Also re-spot welded the little flipper panel, not sure what it is, where I could see it was spot welded from the factory. Must be an old access panel hold over for early 356 engine. This is a 69-912 motor.

[merbesfield]

Mark,

Difficult panel repair there. Nice result though! Well done. By the way are you using a different browser to that of your PC? The browser can make a difference I have found 'Internet explorer 8' seems to work very well here. My other browser was not so good at all.

Also I shrink the pics now they seem to load faster. www.shrinkpictures.com ( apply 750 pixle and ' good ' in the request
boxes ansd leave the others as they are. )Roy

Roy, I was using Firefox, which I have used in the past with success. I do resized all my pics before posting to 800 pix and it does make a big difference, just not sure what was going on. Done it tons of times the same as before, but yesterday no go. I will chk out shrinkpictures.com. The freeware I currently use is pretty good, but could be simpler.

[roy mawbey]

Mark,

Difficult panel repair there. Nice result though! Well done. By the way are you using a different browser to that of your PC? The browser can make a difference I have found 'Internet explorer 8' seems to work very well here. My other browser was not so good at all.

Also I shrink the pics now they seem to load faster. www.shrinkpictures.com ( apply 750 pixle and ' good ' in the request
boxes ansd leave the others as they are. )

Roy

[JTR70]

Really nice fabrication job on those repair pieces Mark! You're right those closing panels are curving in several directions all at once. Those ribs really do thier job don't they? Looking at the condition of the originals this was the right choice. The reinforment plate patch looks great too! Alot of time invested for sure! Great job! Thanks for the update! Justin

[merbesfield]

I am posting this from my iPad. If it works I will update info.



Wow, it worked from my iPad and not my PC?

Anyhow, this is the brace at the door corner. I have more pics showing the process, but much the same as above. Pattern, transfer, bend, form, smooth etc. this one was very challenging bc the curve is very extreme and had to be worked a little at a time. I was worried the metal would tear, but it just moved along as I asked of it. Again, this is not finished, just about 90%. Thanks