57 356 A mild resto

[merbesfield]

I forgot about the front. I remember seeing you punch the hole, but by hand will have to do. Thinking about filling in the over rider support hole. If I ever get bumpers back on the car I'm pretty sure I would not use the over riders. Unless I was going back stock, which I am not.

[JTR70]

I'm with you. My car had the overriders too. I'm not a fan of them either and filled the holes years ago. Car's looking good! Justin

[roy mawbey]

Interesting the position of those beehives. If you had nothing to follow I guess you would line them up and indeed they would never look quite right. I wonder how they made the decision to offset them?

A guy holding them on the body and saying to Hans ' here or here what looks best' or a design guy pondering?

Also, those chrome overrider bars that seem to be on so many cars in the USA but hardly ever seen over here. For years I never knew they existed. Were they just developed only for the USA. I do seem to remember the 356B front bumper height was dictated by safety rulings introduced in the USA ? Maybe I am wrong on that?

Roy

[merbesfield]

Interesting the position of those beehives. If you had nothing to follow I guess you would line them up and indeed they would never look quite right. I wonder how they made the decision to offset them?

A guy holding them on the body and saying to Hans ' here or here what looks best' or a design guy pondering?

Also, those chrome overrider bars that seem to be on so many cars in the USA but hardly ever seen over here. For years I never knew they existed. Were they just developed only for the USA. I do seem to remember the 356B front bumper height was dictated by safety rulings introduced in the USA ? Maybe I am wrong on that?

Roy

Roy, yes I do believe they were a US only thing. I am sure Justin will know. I'm not so sure it was for safety though. Probably car protection. The US believes in 5 mph crash protection.

[JTR70]

hey mark, yes, they were put on cars destined for the US market. I believe the bumpers by themselves did not meet the height requirement set by the DOT during this time so the factory raised the bar so to speak. Justin

[merbesfield]

Well I finally have something to report. For the record, I have not been screwing off. I have been helping my buddy Scott build his 68 hotrod 911 and we have been hitting it hard for the last couple of months or so. (visible in back ground)

Any how, I got the right side Beehive holes closed up along with the over rider holes. Still need to clean the areas up and do some metal finishing. I have also media blasted all the engine tin in prep for the Powder Coating. Quite a job, but it all looks like new.

I have now moved onto the rust repairs on the rear inner fenders. This was a bit of an unknown. I knew there was some rust, but was not sure how bad it was. After spending the day removing the undercoating on the outside and the sound pads on the inside (yuk) I am fairly pleased with what I found. Much of the areas are shinny metal. The seat bottoms looked like new, mostly. Unfortunately, where the water ran in the qtr windows, it left it's mark. You can see the how the water traveled. I think the pics look worse than the real thing. Not sure how I want to attach this. I could replace the entire panel, but seems a bit over kill with so much of the metal very solid. But it is usually easier than working a bunch of small patches, however, my goal from the start was to leave as much original metal on the car since it is so "rust free" as they say. At least for a 356 that is. Here are the pics.

Gordon, I saw in your build where you made your own panels. Was it very tough? Why did you not buy them from one of the sources? I think it would be easier to buy the entire panel if I go that route, if I patch it, I would probably buy the panel if not too expensive. Anyone have experience with any of the suppliers as the whether they fit or not and which suppliers is best? Thanks, Mark

[JTR70]

Hey Mark,
Thanks for the update. That 911 project looks interesting. Have never seen a 911 running those space savers like a 356. Hope Scott will share it one day soon. Gordon did a really nice job on his replacement walls but that is a ton more work. I think you can definitely get away with small patch panels here. As far as the ribs go a resourcefull guy like yourself could easily make a hammer form from some bar stock and punch those into some 20 guage with a little heat. I had the same area go bad in my car though only to the left side. I thought it was from the quarter window leaking too but after all these years of playing with it I came to the conclusion that it was leakage from the rear window once again. I had several small pinholes of rust in the lower left corner of the rear window when I first started in 87. All this leakage ran back to the engine compartment and rotted the forward wall there and also ran forward pooling between the tarpaper and the ribs eventually rotting them too. This is why I put those drains in; water is eventually going to find its way between the rubber seal and the trough.


I forgot to document this repair because I just slowly closed the holes in stages. Very teadious but it saved me from making a patch. The middle rib was the worst and forward rib was just heavily pitted but did not go through. A perfect pocket created here with the original tarpaper deadner.


you can see here that the pinch seam in the quater window opening makes it very difficult for any water to get in. Not impossible but very hard especially when you consider its double sealed. Leakage from the rear window is the culprit. This is exactly why I put those drains in. No matter how careful we are some water is going to get by the rear window seal and spill over the channel leaching along that edge or shelf again. Keep us posted on what you decide. Justin

[merbesfield]

Scott is only running that wheel on one spot while he waits for another one of our buds to deliver on the matching Fuch. I agree with you about the water leakage, makes complete sense and I also have a hole back under the qtr near the engine compartment. Not sure how to fix that one. I am not cutting things apart to get to it. Thinking about an extended carbide burr bit to clean out the hole and then leave it for drainage. I have also poured converters and blown it through with compressed air followed by Zero rust. I think that will put the rust at bay for many years, esp given it will never see rain. Where did you put drain holes? I don't recall seeing that.

I will definitely be making my own panels, just looked and they are $535 from RD. I can make my panels myself with about $2 bucks worth of metal and several hours of time. I have made much harder bits. Still debating whether to remove the remaining sound pads, but my gut tells me they are ok bc they are up high and no signs of any issues, though you never know.

[roy mawbey]

Yes I agree also, fabricate your own and it should be fine. A question what is the area like when you open those rear quarter windows. The area that is flat on which the seal rests on? Has that not rusted a bit?

The rear seat floors look very good I have seen so many that were awful. Nice car to do I reckon.

Again, if you are sure, the insulation pads could be left. But be sure because you don't want to go back to that when its all done.

But in saying that really how many of take our 356 cars out in really rainy weather? Took mine out yesterday avoiding floods keeping to dry roads. One hour back its raining again and today non-stop rain. Staying in for New Years eve

Happy new year to all

Roy

[merbesfield]

Roy, my qtr window bottoms are perfect. The pics don't really show how good the seat pans actually are. When I removed the tar, they were actually shinny silver colored like brand new steel that had not been exposed to air. Amazing for 55 years. As for looking under the other areas, it is sort of you do or don't, once you start you are committed to ripping them off. I will definitely do some serious snooping before I remove them, especially the back one to be sure the window leaking did not cause any problems there.

[gkw]

Mark, the fender well metal I replaced was pretty straight forward
I used common 20 Ga. cold roll steel which would not make that deep
of rib by pressing with out splitting. I slit above and below the ribs and formed the ribs on a finger brake. Then scribed and trimmed then
welded. I did the shaping with a planishing hammer last to match the
original. One more thing, some of the welds are hard to make in
that area. I found this pic. to help explain. Good luck, Gordon

[JTR70]

Hey Mark, here is the link for the drains: http://porsche356abcgt.com/forum/14-356-Restoration-Projects/34-58367-The-75-Junkyard-Carrera-coupe-restoration.html?limit=6&start=54 Gordons photo really takes the fear out fabricating the panel. Justin

[merbesfield]

Hey Mark, here is the link for the drains: http://porsche356abcgt.com/forum/14-356-Restoration-Projects/34-58367-The-75-Junkyard-Carrera-coupe-restoration.html?limit=6&start=54 Gordons photo really takes the fear out fabricating the panel. Justin

Justin, trying to understand the pics. Does the tube you installed run from the rear window lip?

Edit, just looked at the last pic and now it makes sense. Yes from the rear window corner. The funny thing is I have zero rust in that spot, but I guess it just went past the lip and as you said ended up lower, but fortunately did not rust the lip. I will do some further investigating. Can you add additional sealing when reinstalling the rear window that will help? I know you are not supposed to need it, but obviously the seals shrink and then leak.

[JTR70]

You could try a silicone sealer after installation but its still no guarantee. I do agree with what Roy said earlier about our cars not being subject to the eliments as in years past but there will always be some exposure either from a freak rainstorm while your out or just a quick washing in the driveway. The water is going to run off the roof and follow the edges of the rubber seal and some will slip past it and find its way into the frame. I just wanted to give this water some place to go other than on my new upholstry. BTW: I like your avatar photo. Is that your '73 S?

[merbesfield]

You can never be to cautious when it comes to water protection and sealing. When you spend as much time as we do fixing all this stuff the last thing you want to think about is rust. When I did the 912 I sealed the shit out of it bc I never wanted to see rust again. Fact is if Porsche were to build one of these today they would do the same thing, maybe not as well, but they would surely do a better job than they did back then. The problem is that there are those that say, "well it's not original", we I say screw that, I want rust protection. I try to strike a balance between the two and still have it look original, just like your drain tube idea.

Yes the avatar is my S. I added that pic from my iPad. Can I post pics to the forum using my iPad? I was not aware that was possible. Here is the link to my S thread.

http://www.early911sregistry.org/forums/showthread.php?66125-My-new-73S