Too Damn Hot!

It's been too damn hot to do much of anything outside or in the garage lately.  We're in the dog days of summer and I prefer to work in the air conditioning this time of year.  I'll paint, hang wall paper, lay floors, whatever it takes to avoid the heat.  I installed an attic exhaust fan in the garage last spring and that really helps but not quite enough.  Theresa has been trying to convince me to buy an air conditioner for the garage (a window unit) but I just can't bring myself to spending the money when I would really rather have a good sand blasting cabinet.
 
Here is our forecast for the rest of the summer through August.  

 

356 Values

I finally received my title today from the great state of Texas. What an ordeal this has been. If anyone wants to know the details, email me. Now that I have this, I'll order the Certificate of Authenticity from Porsche. Hopefully it will have good info on the orginal build of the car.

This brings me to my next question - should we rebuild the car to match the CofA or should we build it as we see best. Hopefully the CofA will tell us it was black with tan interior and we won't have to worry about that. Otherwise we will just have to wait until that time comes to make that decision.

While I was in Birmingham a few weeks back for the Talladega race I picked up the June 2004 issue of Excellence. In it was a market update on 356s. If my car is worth anything close to this once I am finished, it will be a miracle. My expectation is to fall in the Good range once completed. Look at the chart under 1958 Cabriolet.

Front Fender Work

I have been concentrating on the front fender area. I first removed all of the front suspension including the sway bars, steering box, suspension arms and tie rods. I think that the tie rod ball joints were probably original as I had to cut them with the grinder to get it disassembled. Once I had everything out, it was easy to work with on the work bench and I was able to remove all of the pieces of the ball joints. The link pins and king pins did not have much play in them so I will plan to reused them with their shims.

I am planning to send the suspension parts out to be powder coated. I was planning to send them to Allied Powder Coating and then my father told me that a friend has a set up in his garage. I am not in real rush so I will investigate his buddy before I send it out.

Now that the suspension is out, I have been using the grinders with wire brushes to knock loose all of the crud under the fenders. I think that someone had removed the undercoating before because all I really found was rust and dirt before I reached the metal. Everything came out pretty easy other than the fact that I was getting cramps from working in some tough positions on my back.

The closing panels (item 37)on both sides of the front fenders were replaced with new ones from Stoddards. It is not the prettiest weld job but it is functional. I will POR15 the area and spray undercoating before the suspension goes back in.

The rust along the trailing edge of the fenders was a real dilemma. I decided to patch the rotten areas rather than replacing the section with replacement parts (item 44). Keep in mind that this will be a daily driver not a concourse car (I hear the pros gasping now). My main concern was in keeping the door gaps in place. The gaps looked really good with the original doors installed and if I were to have replaced the fender it would have required a lot more work to make the gaps match again. I was also worried about making the upper fender line match with a new replacement piece. I figured that if I patched it rather than a new piece, the worst that could happen was that it would look like crap and I would have to use a replacement part anyway. I should at least try.

The patching came out pretty good using the left over material from the replacement gas tank floor. It will take a little skimming of the body filler to make it look good before paint.

The front fender braces (item 36) were also replaced with replacements from Stoddards.

While I was under the car I found that the diagonal support (item 10) needed to be replaced as well as the lower few inches of the bulkhead (item 20). It looks like the bulkhead had been repaired before but did not last. I have ordered the new diagonal, floor pans, and perimeter kit from Stoddard. Once I am finished with the front fender area, I will have to figure out the next steps.

Gas Tank Floor Complete

The past month has shown slow progress. Work is picking up and we went to Cabo for vacation. I have installed the new gas tank floor that came from Restoration Design. It wasn't too difficult in comparison to the battery box floor. The remains of the old floor were cut out and the two supports between the floor and the dash were cut out and saved. It took me several hours to trim the new floor to fit like it should. The over all length was about 2" too long. The width at the rear was good but the width at the front was about 2" too wide. Once it was all trimmed, I tacked it into place and placed the gas tank in position to make sure everything lines up and the trunk would close. A new hole for the fuel cock was cut in with a 1-1/2" hole saw.

Now that everything looks good, I used 1" long welds spaced at about 3" apart to secure it. It didn't need to be pretty as it gets covered up. Once things cooled, I used the 3M seam sealant all the way around and then again in the battery box area.

Before I started all of this, I cleaned the entire trunk area with a buffing wheel removing all of the rust and the glue from the sound deadening material. From this I found that there were a few pinholes that had to be filled in with the welder.

Now that everything is clean and finished, I coated the entire area with the POR15 and called it complete.

Before and after photos.