We all love vintage cars. On a trip to Dana Point, Ca this past weekend I happened to spot this beauty in the hotel parking lot.
This 1958 Porsche 1600 Speedster appeared to be all original. The seats appeared to be still clad in the original – nicely worn leather. This is the 356A which was a modification of the 356 body (from 1957) it was known as Type 2 in the factory (or T2).
This beauty is in the original color, maybe original paint, but interior looks stock, right down the thin rubber floor mats.
I did notice a couple of things – the steering wheel looks to be metal, they were originally wooden and the under the dash gauges of course are after market. As the 356 was track raced the wooden steering wheels were quickly identified as a safety issue. During crashes they would splinter and pierce the drivers body – some career ending injuries. They were often swapped out for metal.
The engine was a OHV flat four with 60 bhp, 1,582 cc and horizontally-opposed OHV four-cylinder engine (the four-cam “Carrera” engine was a more power/extra cost option for the 356A). It came with a four-speed manual transmission, torsion bar independent front suspension, swing axle independent rear suspension, and four-wheel hydraulic drum brakes.
The production numbers were around 21, 000 for the period of 1955-1959.
Great tail lights!!
Now that’s what I like to see – bug spots….this car gets driven!!!!
Missing the ‘cage’ that often covered the headlights.
Thanks for reading.
Tim
Buy & Cherish this 1958 PORSCHE 356A COUPE LA CARRERA PANAMERICANA RALLY CAR Coachwork by… http://t.co/gL5hI8Hxu0
This 1958 Porsche 356A Coupe is said to be a matching numbers example, but where you will find the chassis number on the back-half is beyond us. The roof and rear panels do look like the right shape, and the engine has …
Some time ago I wrote about repairing my 1984 Corvettes door panel. The panel its self was not well made … read “cheap” and didn’t stand up well to time/use. Unfortunately, I can’t say there was any improvement in “quality” of the door panels in my 2007 Vette. But this project isn’t a Corvette door panel, but my son’s Chrysler LeBaron.
The LeBaron is 1990’s car and the door panels are 1990’s cheap, no nice way to say that. This quick project was didn’t start out about the door panel, other than we had to take it off to check the multiple window control switch. The window controls were part of a plastic insert that also has the remote control for the drivers’ side mirror poked through it. It stays put, normally by 3 prongs that push into “V” clips that are on stand-a-lone braces that are mounted on the door panel directly – but not well done.
Since the insert has slid down over the past few months, it seemed that either driving vibrations and/or normal door operations, so while we are in there we’d push the prong back in. Seemed simple enough.
The back of the panel a fiber board/plastic composite – not really fiberglass but similar and it’s pretty sturdy.
Back side of the door panel.
Here you can see the brackets I mentioned above. However, the way in which the bracket are attached to the board is meant to last forever. They are held together with bits of glue in holes along the edges of the bracket. In the heat of Arizona and the great condition our roads are in (tongue in cheek) this type of connection is not ideal.
Here you can see the glue the back of the bracket and that is oozed out into the holes.
This image below is the results of the glue pulling off – separating from the fiber board.
Part clue – Part fiber board. This was laying at the bottom of the door panel
It’s strange thinking that if I don’t post photos, it feels like i don’t shoot……Having the style and aesthetic of a photojournalist/documentary photographer, the process really isn’t finished until I share with like-minded people.
Over the last month I have purchased and currently importing my future wife…….a 53 Belair Hardtop
This Ocean Mist green and Arctic white 1954 Buick Special sedan is all original and was found near Chicago, Illinois.A total of 70,356 Deluxe sedans were produced in 1954.
Each July the tiny town of Iola, Wis., is invaded by a sea of humanity and old iron. Many in attendance come strictly for the swap meet, which covers about 4,500 spaces.
“Don’t tell me there’s no recovery going on,” said Kurt Kelsey, an Iowa City-based vendor of new-old-stock Pontiac parts. According to Kelsey, his business this year is much better than it has been in a long time. “The phone has been ringing off the hook every day,” he said.
Kelsey’s observation about an up-tick in the market isn’t alone. Positive reports have come from other vendors, parts manufacturers and catalog retailers since late last fall. Despite an unsettled national economy and high unemployment, the old-car parts business seems to be in the midst of a boom.
During a Dynamat seminar at the Hot Rod & Restoration Show in March, company owner Scott Whitaker said one-day shipping of Dynamat automotive insulation products has been impossible to promise lately, because a large increase in orders has outpaced new hiring. “The bump in sales wasn’t expected and caught us off guard,” he said.
In early April, Bob Marx at Marx Parts in Arpin, Wis., came to visit us and he, too, was upbeat about his rising sales. Marx has been growing his inventory of vintage gaskets and rear main seals and is now rebuilding fuel pumps, but he said that new products do not explain all of the growth he is seeing. Like several other industry veterans, Marx pointed to the TV exposure of the Mecum and Barrett-Jackson auctions as a factor that’s helping the hobby grow. “New people are getting involved with old cars,” he said.
“After a winter of inactivity, old cars tend to leak or fail when they are put back on the road,” said Fred Kanter of Kanter Auto Products, who wonders if the business boom might be seasonal. “March, April, May every year, it’s the same thing — spring,” Kanter said. He pointed out that from spring through summer every year, his most popular items are fuel pumps and water pumps. “There’s a lot of factors that affect our business.”
You never know what you’ll see at big swap meets. You might come across a 1958 Edsel Pacer looking for a new home.
Al Suehring of Amherst Junction, Wis., specializes in ring gears and is another vendor who feels that the market is strong. We caught up with him at the Vintage Chevrolet Club of America dinner in Chilton, Wis., and he said that his business from the United States and abroad has been showing noticeable increases lately.
Ray Yager of Classic Industries said the level of growth of reproduction parts sales is “hard to keep up with.” His firm supplies MoPar, 1955-’57 Chevy, Camaro, Firebird, Nova, Impala and Chevy truck parts, and parts sales for these vehicles are moving in a positive direction. Yager thought the company’s 18-month-old MoPar parts catalog may account for some, but not all, of the huge increase in business he’s seeing. At least one vendor who solely deals in Chevrolets is likewise seeing increases in business.
“I’m having a really good year,” said Ron Kellogg of Chevy Tri-Power. “Rather amazing since I’m selling restored multi-carb setups in an era of $5-a-gallon gas prices. I’ve probably sold 25 Tri-Power units — normally a year’s worth — since November 2011.”
Kellogg’s increase proves that car collectors still want high-performance options on their classics.
In addition to new products, increased TV exposure of the hobby and added catalogs, parts suppliers said both the use of the Internet and increased advertising seem to be attracting more customers. Some big companies such as Mid America Motorworks and Eastwood have begun sending daily e-mails to thousands of potential customers. This takes time and money and employees with Internet skills, but their efforts are paying off with increased sales.
Many mom-and-pop operations that can’t afford daily e-marketing efforts are creating websites, Facebook pages, blogs and Twitter accounts to reach the marketplace. Hobby events aimed at professionals — such as the Racing & Performance Expo, the British Motor Trade Association and the SEMA Show — all offer seminars on Internet marketing techniques to these businesses.
As their marketing efforts become more sophisticated, parts sellers are also discovering that they can use print media to drive customers to their websites. Companies that never ran a print ad before are discovering that a clean-looking space ad with the right design and not much text can generate strong client interaction. The right picture of a car can catch the potential customer’s attention and a simple e-mail address or website link is all that’s needed to bring business knocking. A good ad will pay for itself much faster these days.
While an increase in parts sales would suggest that restoration shops and collector car sales are both on the increase, growth in those parts of the hobby isn’t as clear-cut as it is when a part is “checked out” in an online catalog. Collector car dealers such as Colin Comer of Colin’s Classic Auto in Milwaukee and market players such as Joe Bortz are fairly universal in the belief that collector car prices are off 15-20 percent in today’s market. Some restoration shop owners say that they are busier than they’ve ever been, but others say the opposite.
From all of the indications we have seen and all the comments we’ve heard, it appears the old-car parts niche is improving for 2012 and this trend will presumably filter down to other parts of the hobby. The hobby is changing in many ways, and the wise businessmen in it are getting more sophisticated as the market grows.
No this isn’t going to be one of those talks and no we aren’t going to run out and hung a tree, ok…if you must…go ahead I’ll wait…..(insert bored whistling)……(more bored whistling)…..Ok…are you done?!!
As I get closer to getting the heads on the Mustang, I’m going to have to begin picking any changes I want made to the CJ heads. While cruising the web checking out options, I ran across this piece (Corvette related but springs are springs as far as an engine is concerned) and there are some good tips here.
Quick! What the fastest moving component in your engine? If you’ve taken a hint from the title of this article, you probably guessed correctly – it’s your valve springs, those tight little bundles of joy that open and close your engine’s valves.
Beehive springs come in a variety of shapes and sizes. The benefits of moving to Beehive springs where possible (and today few situations are not Beehive compatible) are many.
Beehive springs, such as those offered by COMP Cams, offer a huge number of benefits over stock-style cylindrical springs; reduced valve spring mass, faster valve acceleration, increased valve train rigidity, reduced valve train component stress and a whole laundry list of other positives.
Best of all, the word has gotten out and folks all over the country are using them for a wide variety of applications from street performance to extreme racing endeavors. That’s a really good thing.
Along with their success has come some confusion over exactly which beehive is right to purchase. Currently there are over a dozen beehive spring styles out there, each offering some unique take, be it in the seat pocket diameter, ovate wiring diameter, pitch or internal spring “frequency.” Regardless increased selection has bred some minor confusion, albeit easily cured.
Beehive springs are conical shaped springs that employ this powerful shape in the creation of a spring that can deliver both excellent performance and lowered seat pressures. With lower seat pressure, valve train components (especially the pushrods, rockers and lifters) are less stressed to perform the same work.
This beehive spring weights in at 99 grams, while a comparable conventional spring is 121 grams.
The difference between beehive and conventional cylindrical springs is obvious especially when you compare them in this manner. Note the dramatic difference in retainer diameter equating to less valve train weight.
According to COMP, effective beehive springs can support an additional 700rpm over stock cylindrical springs. How? It just stands to reason that the smaller coils at the top of the spring don’t require as much force to get the valve moving quickly, much quicker than conventional style springs. The higher rpm potential equates to better durability and performance.
There are some very knowledgeable engine builders who don’t understand how a single coil spring can be better than a dual conventional spring.
“Its like watching a race car running 60-foot elapsed times on the drag strip,” stated Bill Godbold, Chief Engineer for COMP Cams. “For example, take two identical cars with equivalent 500 hp engines.
“One has stock suspension and the other a sophisticated racing suspension. The car with the race suspension will get going more quickly and achieves better 60-foot time. The same principle works with beehive spring mechanics.”
It’s been a while since I’ve provided an update on the restoration of the 1975 fuel injectedVW bug that I’m project managing for a former workmate. So I thought I’d post of some details andsome pics.
The car is called a “Standard” – that doesn’t mean a manual shift (although it is a manual 3 speed), that means the most stripped down, no optioned, VW you could purchase. I’m talking interior door panels with a thin covering of fake leather over (almost as thin) cardboard. Rubber floor coverings (I wouldn’t even call them mats!!!), a headliner, cloth seats were the total of trim in side. There was no upholstery covering the rest of the interior – just painted metal. It did have an AM radio – which was replaced it a JVC.
Not much to the door panel.
Headliner and sun visors are about the only other upholstery, the rest is painted red like you see here.
In fact importation of these striped down models was halted shortly after about 100 here shipped to the US in 1975. This is one of the 100 allowed in. Pretty cool story.
This particular car belongs to June Yang and she purchased the car, brand new, while attending college in Iowa. The car lived in Iowa it’s entire life (until now) and it show’s signs of every winter too. The car had been stored for years and suffers from a severe case of rust and by all accounts shouldn’t able to sit up-right on four tires.
But like many folks, who love their V-dubs, June has a lot of memories tied to the rusted fenders, college, and other life milestones. So when she moved to Tucson, Az she thought of bring the Bug with her. She was advised that the car was not safe to drive down the driveway much less the block and certainly not 1/2 way across country!!! And that was an
understatement!!!!!
I met June when she came to work at the same establishment where I labored. I’m not a closet car guy and a visit to my office at that time it was pretty clear. Eventually she asked about having the car fixed and her desire to have it join her in Az was discussed and although I had no idea the exact condition. I helped arrange transportation to Tucson.
The goal was to get it here to some place that could get the car running (it wouldn’t start and brakes hadn’t been serviced in some time). In run condition, the thought was we could then running it around (save a few $$) to the various places I had planned to do the work. Unfortunately even running it wasn’t going to be safe enough to drive. See here<<<<>>>>
The transport had one bump when the driver’s truck died en route. The company immediately arranged for a local company to pick it up and finish the trip. I believe June called them every hour for updates. Eventually, the car showed up at my favorite auto repair shop and Tim Sisk gave me a call to come look the car over.
These pictures don’t nearly capture the condition this car, frankly I was taken back as well and I grew up driving a 1930-ish Ford stripped down pick-up that served as an alternate tractor on my grandfather farm, in upstate New York – no floor boards and the like. This VW was nearly eaten alive by oxidation.
Rust 1
Rust 2
And here's a little side view.
See the highlighted area? It's not attached. It should be. It holds the body to the frame!!
So are you saying WHAAAATTT???? Pretty much the standard response… but don’t fret….there’s a plan!!!
