Pick A Pair Of Porsches
This was written in the early 2000s, but the ideas are still valid - a little work and some patience can get you a helluva lot of fun.
I can already hear you thinking "Here we go, the guy's lost his mind." but lemme tell you The Tale before you naturally assume the worst. A few well-known almost facts:
No one wants a 20 year old car
Porsches are high maintenance nightmares
Parts are impossible to find
You have to take them to a dealer to get anything fixed
Everyone knows these things, but since only one of them is true, an older Porsche is cheap, cheap, cheap! The pair of beauties in the pics? There's not ten grand in the both of them and that's after restoring to factory new specs. Now, if you treat these girls like Chevys they can become high maintenance nightmares, but that's been true of every high performance machine I've ever owned (and close to 50% of my dating relationships). By keeping a log and maintaining the car like an airplane - on a schedule, not when things break - I've had better service reliability from my 25 year old 928S than most people get from new cars.
This is another situation where a little skill, sweat and elbow grease can get you a helluva nice result. On the other hand, I so could have bought a used Hyundai (with no air-conditioning) for the same bucks an saved myself all this work ...
1988 924S
When I was in college, I pushed around a white, 1977 924 with a cracked cylinder head that my bud Wayne Harris sold me for cheap, thereby launching me on a career of fixing cars. When I got the machine she had a cracked head, buggered CIS injection system, aftermarket turbocharger, hot-wired cold start valve and leaky accumulators. Herbie Yates, who can fix anything that burns fuel, taught me how to wrench Volkswagen / Porsche / Audi style, and how to keep from having to wrench so often. All throughout college I fixed, tweaked, modified and played. Driving new cars where things -actually worked- got me out of the weekend maintenance habit, but I still miss working on engines and electronics. Busman's Holiday, I know, but it can be extraordinarily relaxing to break rusty bolts after a long day of Mathematics and Management.
This car came from eBay for $2500, and needed some interior work, basic maintenance and minor bodywork to be straight, clean and ready to roll. Did all the usual bits: timing belt, rollers, balance shaft belt, brakes, and the expected cap, rotors, plug wires and all rubber hoses and belts. With 60k original miles, this car was a lucky find. I added four (4) new Blaupunkt speakers in the OEM sizes and locations, a new Alpine radio to drive them, and XM. In case you're still on the fence, XM Rocks. BPM, Chrome, Watercolors, Bluesville. Oh HELL yes.
OK, back to coffee and gear grease --
Since I had four (4) sweet 16" telephone dial wheels from the 1978 928 roller, I simply swapped them over and gave the 924S (which had 15" telephone dials) a more aggressive, but still OEM look. The 924S is my daily driver and she really eats up the mountain roads from Shoal Creek Falls to my factory in Copperhill. There's something to be said for the Old School; no ABS brakes, electronic suspension or gyro stabilized headlights (no joke, the Benz has 'em).
Always doing my level best to keep North Carolina's DOT in exciting skidmarks, I found myself rocketing down NC-208 near Hot Springs at well over double the posted speed limit. Hooah! With enough power to really climb the mountains and the positive control for me to feel comfortable doing a four wheel drift in the curves, the 924 was a fantastic find. Especially with some killer tunes on board and someone who enjoys the ride.
1981 928S
This car looks fast, and it is. With a 4.7 liter 90 degree V8, it was one of the fastest cars of it's day. Now, not so much. The Mercedes S500 is faster, and many newer sports cars (and sports sedans!) are too. Still, she handles wonderfully, like nothing made before or since. If you haven't had the opportunity to drive a 928, you'll be really thrilled to try one out. The machine runs like it's on rails -- absolutely nothing unsticks this monster. I've taken mountain roads posted at 40 in the 924S at 70 MPH only to find I can do them at 100 in the 928! The car's not even close to loose, I've just run out of cool -- this way, way too fast to be on the ground. I guess it's true -- Nothing Even Comes Close.
The Black 928 was another eBay special, found in New Jersey and brought back with my Dad riding shotgun on a three-day Cannonball odyssey to Atlanta. The car had close to 100k miles on it and required a good bit of attention, but nothing THAT difficult or expensive. Some of the highlights:
Replaced godawful chocolate brown / puke interior with black / silver grey
Reinsulated interior surfaces and firewall to meet 2005 expectations for quiet
New speakers, amplifier, Alpine radio and (of course) XM
New valve cover, intake, exhaust gaskets
New steering rack
New wheels and tires
Overhaul brakes, new master cylinder
Transmission overhaul
Fix coolant leaks
Unscrew buggered electronics and wiring
New front bumper cover, chin spoiler
New left fender
Upgrade to GTS mirrors
Remove bogus 928S rear window trim and replace with GTS wing
Strip, repaint (many, many thanks to David Davis, Progessive Bodyworks, Atlanta, GA 770/457-8258)
Repair sunroof
Replace rubber trim bits and window trim
Replace driver seat with Cayman seat to accommodate 6'1" 200 pound driver (that'd be me)
The usual list of minor maintenance items: door locks, squeaks, rattles, window lifts, etc.
As usual with 928's, the engine was bulletproof but the accessories were dying from lack of maintenance. No big overhaul needed, just a lot of little picky things. Stripping the interior to metal and re-doing it all was a good move: not a squeak, rattle or noise, which is a lot to ask of a car old enough to vote and almost too old to join the Marine Corps. The '81 is a sweet machine, but the GTS is, well, ...
1995 928 GTS
OK, every car nut's got his dream and the 928 GTS has always been mine. Able to hammer 100+ MPH over the speed limit (assuming it's posted at 70), the 928 GTS is the final version of Porsche's monster aluminum V8. Punching out just under 400 HP, the mostly-aluminum GTS is still the fastest production car ever built. Woohoo! The boys in Zuffenhausen stopped making 928s in 1995, and made only 110 that year, 14 of them with stick shift. My baby above is #31.
Mods include:
Competition suspension upgrade -- all Koni adjustable, lowered 10mm (back to Euro spec as designed)
Front and rear sway bar upgrades
Five point harness hard points
Blueprinted and balanced engine, cross-drilled #2 & #3 for better oiling, bearing upgrades, rings, head work, etc. etc. etc.
Exhaust upgrade
Cryo-treated and slotted rotors, competition pads
New timing belt
New speakers, amplifier, Alpine radio and (of course) XM
I can't tell you how happy I was to get my mitts on a clean, well-tended stick-shift GTS with only 30,000 miles on the odometer! Cole Palen would have understood that these cars need to be driven not just waxed and fawned over, and drive her I do. The GTS rumbles like a tank, and flies like nothing but the Cozyjet. Why they stopped making these I can't imagine, but for the price of a new mid-line Lexus or BMW, the GTS is many, many times the car. Like my bro' Jerry once said about the Czech-made L-39 Albatros: "That's a lot of machinery for very little money." No doubt. This is one machine I'll keep in the stable for years to come.
Final Thoughts
Cars are just transport, and don't mean a thing. Of course, like anything else, they will it you let them. People spend huge dollars on new cars only to find they've purchased half-baked electronic prototypes and self-obsolescent junk. I've had friends tell me that they can't afford anything cool to drive, and others say that luxury cars are wasteful. To both camps, I'll give you this: here's three beautifully restored machines that together and finished cost less than a lot of new cars, are currently NOT taking up landfill space, and are more fun to drive than anything else I've ever tried at any price. You CAN be cheap, environmentally conscious and still have a helluva good time. Like my crew chief and IA friend Valerie would say: Got Wrench?