1985 Porsche 944

[broady]

Lets see just how started I was or wasnt then. Drivers side sill.

From the inside I could see where the floor and inner sill has been badly repaired. So I got handy with the grinder.





After this I decided I had to get stuck in, I started stripping sealer and rust. The front of the sill was in a horrific state.



The driver side footwell was in terrible order. I removed the seam sealer and then cut out where the muppet had over lapped the plate.



I put new floor sections in, and cut out the seat mount which has been badly repaired before. In fact I'm going to stop saying that. Just assume that all previous repairs were badly done.





With some strength restored to the floor and inner sill. I drilled out the spot welds out and removed the outter sill skin. You can see the bottom where, you know.....



The strengthener was removed and I offered up the new panel.



Trimmed up and offered.





With that welded in, I needed to get a skin on it. First of all I needed to remove the step from the original sill. This was in fairly good order, so I cleaned the gunk off with some thinners and then cut the old skin away.



Before the skin could get anywhere near the car, it needed drains. These were missing in the parts I had bought, and I didnt want to leave them out, as it would only encourage rot.



A curse word photo, but I made a die from some ally block.





I chased these in, in the correct places. Based on the original I removed. The many hours of offering up and checking and double checking started, before I dared show it a welder.





This was now welded in.



I started to make, the bottom of the A pillar.



Thats all for now resto fans

[broady]

We best have a look at the passenger side then, it couldnt be any worse could it?



The floor has had a large section replaced and you can see the bottom of the sill is not standard. I came to realise this wasnt an original sill.



Of it chopped it and oh christ look at the amount of loose rust in there. This was a sheet of thick plate. Around 2mm, I can only assume someone was armour plating this car.



And it wasnt pretty on the inside either. Plate over plate.



I then took the sill step out.



And then the front of the floor and inner arch saw some cutting.



3 layers of BS. This really was utter dog s.....



Having been through the ortherside and gained some confidence and just got choppy. Large sections of the floor came out, as they were sheets of crappy stainless blathered in underseal. Badly installed with many layers.





I was pretty angry with the amount of work I was having to redo at this point, so I was getting my head down and just doing it, lots of photos were missed.



So with everything cleaned up and painted on the inside.



The beginings of the strengthener.





The sill step was in a far worse state, multiple layers of curse word.



I trimmed the curse word of the edge and derusted the whole thing. It was rather thin in the middle, so I put a patch in.



I then had to remake the edge, I folded a 1m length and shaped it.



Clamped up and gently and slowly welded.



I then reworked the sill skin like the otherside, installing drains. Then mocked it all up.





This too f in ages. It was now october!

[jim]

It's about time you started a thread on the 944! It won't be long till it's back on the road

[broady]

Feb 14, 2022 12:39:30 GMT jim said:

It's about time you started a thread on the 944! It won't be long till it's back on the road

don't spoil the ending!

[broady]

I have in no way reflected the amount of hell I went through with all the fabrication and welding. But remember, there were lots of little holes and bits found along the way which also needed to be addressed. Which is why weve just covered May to October in a short period. Lets return, we reach late October 2021.

The backs of the sills needed closing off. Everything mocked up, lots of marking and trimming took place over a couple of evenings.





Welding wand out and lots of careful work. It still went a bit wobbly, but it was workable. I must remember to weld slower and slower.



The passenger side was a touch more of a challenge as it also required the arch lip. Having had to make the inner arch as well, I had no reference to work to. So I was all done by measuring the drivers side and by eye.



Naturally I started with some CAD.



The first rough beating around a wooden blocks.



I made a crude profile gauge from the other arch to help see the high and low spots.



As you can see, I didnt quite get this right once it was welded in, about to 10 oclock position it was sitting a little deep into the arc. I reworked this with some adjustment to the inner arch lip as well.





A bit fruther in, still not finished, but much closer to the shape.



That photograph was the 3rd of Nov 2021. It was what I had expected to be the last of the welding. I knew the front of the car better than the back, so didnt think there was anything to find up there. I was also in regular contact with the body shop as the car due to be with them Feb 2021. So I was trying to keep my slot open for paint, and we had agreed to get it in before christmas. This meant the level of work had to be turned up to 11. While also sitting aircraft engineer licence courses and exams for the last 3 months of the year. If I thought I was busy, I was in for shock!

Coming up in an all new episode of "why the curse word did I start this" Some mechanical work, rather than sodding welding!

[broady]

Hello again, lets throw some spanners at this curse word then. I had to chip all the old sound proof matt off the floor. There was a few evenings spent on that.



The first major part that needed shifting was the engine.



And to get that out, the radiator needed to come out. As you can see, the support was rather crusty. This was from the previous radiator that leaked.





I then did this the hard way, I brought the engine out the top. This is not the porsche way and there was about 5mm more space than their was engine. I actually did catch it on the bonnet catch a couple of times, it was easily straightened. But given this will all be freshly painted. I will be putting it in from underneath.





I then wheeled it outside, sprayed it down with gunk and jet washed it all off.



Heres the front suspension, more for a "look at how grotty this is" than for any of the work at this point.



Oh and guess what, more welding was found.







With that found I thought I best get the rest of the underseal off the front arches and make sure that id only have to break out the welder once more.



There was a worrying looking plate in the upper left of this inner wing.

And this nasty on the passenger side, this was the back of the battery tray.



Part of the repair.

[75swb]

The gift that keeps on giving. Well for your welding practice at least...

[broady]

75swb you are not wrong, and there is more to come.

With the welding in the arch and battery tray done, I stripped the arch, hard work with the heat gun and a scraper. I think I might just pay for the next project to be dipped.





And we return to that nasty plate we saw earlier. Having stripped things down you can see that it was mounted on top of the wing.



I failed in a big way to take photos as I worked. But I have the end result here.



A general view of the engine bay and the state of it.



Next job was to strip all the interior floor. Again with the heat gun to remove the tar board and then the polly strip discs.





And once cleaned, any areas showing pitting were treated with dinitrol rust converted and then 2 coats of rustoleum inhibiting primer. I will use Dodomatt on top of this as well.



I then worked my way around the front over a period of evenings. Stripping, inhibiting and generally degreasing. This was followed by a masking session and then the dinitrol.









More bordom of removing old sealer. This time the inside of the front wings.





And treated with rust converter. Then rust proofed.



Something I missed earlier was a repair to the bottom of the passenger wing.

In order to align the new sill. I needed a wing to work this. but it was a bit crusty.









I was now entirely fed up of welding, I had also got a date agreed with the body shop. So i farmed the last of welding out to them. The sections around the rear light and the two sections in front of the front lights.

And thats all youre getting today!

[broady]

That was mid Novemeber 2021 and the car was due to be in the body shop before christmas. It started to feel possible.

Relatively simple things remained. Cleaning up and organising parts. Both doors were stripped and all traces of glue and sealer were removed.



This was to speed things up for the bodyshop. I also remove the sound proof matting from under the bonnet. Well the tiny bit that remained.



It was then hung back together front suspension back on, wings and doors hung to make it suitable for transport and the day was upon us. December 23rd 2021.



At this point I took most of a weeek off for Christmasing. Once back too it, it was nice to have a big space in the garage. Which enabled to me have a clean and tidy up. Which was good and relaxing. There's no therapy like tidying a garage.

Many months previous I had been given a 3D printer. I decided to use this time to learn how to use it. Thanks to thingiverse I found some inlet manifold blanks. These would come in very handy while cleaning the engine down.







Short and sweet today resto fans

[broady]

Lets get stuck into this then. I decided I was going to clean and paint. But when has any thing ive decided gone that way on this one?

I spent quite abit of time researching to see what colours various bits should be. I have stayed fairly faithful to this. Getting some parts Cad plated, some powder coated and some bits painted using a paint which replicates cad plating quite well.



Heres the front end stripped, and it revealed an oil leak. Not a big one, but any leaks I found needed taming.



The red fuzz of coolant around this heater take off.



The days went by as I continued to remove parts. Then many many hours were spent with wire brushes, rotary brushes, strip discs and so on. While doing this, the ideas chruned. I decided I wanted a wrinkle finish on the cambox. But the lettering needed to contrast.



Etch primed and started building up the silver.



I then had a little play with the wrinkly paint. I pulled the timing gear cover off, cleaned it up etched and baked on the stove.



It wrinkled up quite nicely.



With that known, I set about the rest of the engine. Get it all covered in silver.







The sump was proving hard to do insitu. Another big lump comes off, but it makes the oil pump easier to remove too.





And may coats of paint later.



All the gubbins at the front end got the same treatment.



Then it was time to get technical. Quite a few hours were spent masking and triming.



I applied a lot of heat as this paint is very sensative. But I failed to get the finished I wanted.



It was close, but not good enough. I rubbed it down and masked it all off again.



Ill show you that next time.

[hopeso]

That's some work you put into making the engine stand out. Looking very nice, well done.

[broady]

Thanks very much, I wasn't happy with that. There is more to come. Once I saw the car and it's engine bay. I had no choice but to improve the engines appearance. 🙂

[broady]

More engine building. With my failed attempt at wrinkly paint, I decided to remove the cam box, rub it down and throughly clean it up. And heat it up properly sat in front of the stove for 2 hours. I then spent 2 mins shaking the can of paint. Ran to the shed, painted it with 3 coats and then plonked it back it front of the stove.



The top face wrinkled up nicely, but the rest was patchy. Better than last time but still not great.



I decided that it would be better to retry this in the summer with a warm engine. I could then mask off the full engine bay and paint the box in situ.



To that end, on with the rebuild. Various brackets reattached.



And some larger lumps. I got the exhaust system blasted and then gave it multiple coats of high temp silver. I did find a few pin holes in the 2 into 1. I have welded these up, but I need to add a step up adapter to the end as the dansk mid box I use its about 1/4 bigger diameter and its never sealed properly.



I also had the bellhousing blasted and liberally coated with engine silver enamel.



A throttle body with a little love.





With everything cleaned, painted and new seals installed. I put all the front engine pulleys back on. With the plastics.





The inlet manifold and full injection rail needed cleaning up. This was originally Cad plated but it was too big for that. So I set about cleaning it all and painting it. Ill skip all the steps of stripping and cleaning. Heres one I made earlier.







I had a large collection of parts plated. and its these little details that make me happy. Like this spring.



All the while the car was in the body shop. They started by bare metaling anything I hadnt already been at.





They welded up the front valance and the bubbling around the rear light where it had leaked. This was followed up with shaping up the whole car, and then prepared for a coat of corrosion inhibiting epoxy.

[Woofwoof]

Even after all these years the 944 is still a great looking car. So much so, I can still remember the first time I saw one.

Keep up the great work.

Bookmarked.

[Alpina99]

I've always had a fascination / desire for a Porsche and, accepting some "purists" dislike of them, a 944 would be equally high on my list,
Your work on this is first class (as is the VW)
I was going to comment on your high standards of fabrication and welding but, having seen your reference to aeronautical engineering it's hardly surprising,
Looking forward to seeing future updates on this thread,
Nigel

[broady]

I can also remember the time I first saw one. Its the reason I ended up with one. I was only about 8 at the time.

The 944 not being a "real" Porsche is tosh. And the snobbery is largely gone these days. Thanks for the compliments, I do my best to improve every time I work on something. Ive learnt a lot in the last 2 years. I cant want to put it to use on the next project.

A short and sweet one.

More body shop, the primer going on.







And then we get to some top coat.








While that was going on I had more bits cad plated.



I also worked on some boring details, Like cleaning down the fuel lines and painted ferules.



The sound and heat proofing in the prop tunnel was grotty as hell. So I had to do something about that.





I sealed the edges with resin, trimmed and then bonded with tiger seal. So far it looks passable.



Told you it was short and sweet.

[broady]

I havent forgotten you all, ive just been on holiday to florida, part of which was to watch the Sebring 12 hours. If you wanna see more just ask

Another 944 update coming in the next few days!

[motardman]

Mar 30, 2022 20:32:57 GMT broady said:

If you wanna see more just ask

Another 944 update coming in the next few days!

I'll take EVERYTHING you have got! Gimme more!

[broady]

Right then, some holiday snaps. There are videos, but I havent sorted them out yet. Other than this one.



Access is like no other track ive been too. After meeting up with some american friends over there, they gave us a little guide and said it as old skool as US tracks get. There is no covered areas, so in the heat of the day. Which was usually over 30c, you fully exposed to the sun. I love the heat, so thought it was great. Others, not so much.

We started with the paddock walk. The IMSA scruteneering bay.









A wander down the back of the pit stalls.



And heres a little track action. WEC night practice on thursday evening if I recall.







While wandering the campsite the following day we came across this. After speaking to the owner, its genuine race car. Suffered a rear end write off, so these guys got hold of it and made a BBQ, it still has all the original running gear in the front. They locked the steering and fitted a towing arm to the other end.



And walking back I spotted this. Dunno who'd own one of them...........



At the trade stalls, this chopped up vette C8 was on display.



We got to take part in the pit walk just before the start of the 12H



The good yorkshire sports car team.





There was also a NASCAR demo lap to tie in with the NASCAR return to le mans next year.



Lets have a few track action shots, first of all WEC 8h.











And finally the big one, the Sebring 12h.









I could go on and on. But thats a general flavour of it, it was a bucket list race. And I am so happy ive finally been! But lets get back to the matter at hand.

[broady]

The car came home, well most of it did. The wings and bumpers were still in the body shop, but as space was limited, this suited me.





A miscommunication with the body shop meant that the scuttle was painted white, rather than black. This was easily resolved.



I then had the wind screen rebonded.



And a quick show of the paint finish.



With the car back, job one was strip the front suspension and have it all powder coated.





With all this dropped off, the next priority was to get the engine installed. This was a big lump I needed out the way. In order to do this I had to sort the firewall out.

I fitted the repaired tunnel sound and heat proofing. It took a couple of attempts and some careful wedging with blocks and clamps.



I cleaned off the old foil heat proofing and laid on some fresh.



Then my two super awesome mates came round on a chilly saturday morning and helped me fit the engine. The first big job to do on a freshly painted car. GULP.



It only took about 90 minutes for the full process, prep, alignment, lifting and securing.



That got me up to going on holiday. Little has happened since. But the next update will most likely bring us fully up to date