Northwest Porsche Saturday Breakfast

/ Jeff / 1 Comment

After staying up way too late and enjoying a few too many gin and tonics my alarm rudely went off at 6:30 am. But I jumped out of bed ready to go because I was setting out for a nice long drive. Sun rising, cool but warming temps, the top down. Better than coffee to get me going in the morning. Okay, I needed some coffee too.

I set out to meet up with a group of Porsche enthusiasts that drive from the Snohomish area down to Issaquah on back roads and end the drive with breakfast and car talk. Since I was coming from West Seattle I got to enjoy a 45 minute drive to the meet. I arrived too late to make the convoy so I had fun carving up the roads from Snohomish to Issaquah all by myself.  Literally, there was nobody else on the roads.  It was beautiful.  Thanks to a good group of folks for including a new guy in their tradition, it was a great morning. Here are a few pictures of the cars that participated:

Obligatory all in a row shot
Love that color and the 3.2 he just put in there.
My Cab in the background
Love the green
Gorgeous 911T
So clean and well maintained
Stunning 912

No More Miami Vice Rockers!

/ Jeff / 8 Comments

I had to leave town for most of this week on a business trip which gave me the perfect opportunity to leave my car in the capable hands of Mark from Eurotech Bodywerkes.  The task was simple but critical.  Remove those boxed rocker panels that to me scream Miami Vice and put back the standard 930 rocker panels.  Mark did an amazing job and the car is back the way it was meant to be!  Now I have nothing against boxed rockers on an appropriate car, like the late 70s slantnose that was sitting next to me in this photo:

IMG_1261_smaller

Ahhhh!  It’s such a relief to get the standard 930 rocker panels back on the car.  I’ll leave boxed rockers to the slantnose cars.

And here is a reminder of what the car looked like from a similar angle with the boxed rockers:

Front

They Didn’t Forecast This

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It’s been hot and sunny in Seattle this week and I went to bed with a forecast of slightly cooler but sunny weather for today. I hit the garage in the morning, put the top down, snap on my top cover and head out for my morning commute. West Seattle is a tad gray but not too bad. The temp is nice enough but with a slight chill, giving me an excuse to see how my heat works. It works a heck of a lot better than my AC 🙂 After going through the Mount Baker Tunnel expecting to see blue skies, blue water and Mt. Rainier I’m greeted with this:

weatheronthewayDark skies above me and even darker skies ahead! Rather than pull over and put the top up I step on the gas pedal and decide to race the rain. I’m happy to say that I was pulling into my building’s garage as the first raindrops fell and for today I beat the rain. That isn’t always likely to happen living here in Seattle.

My First Drive

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We got back from vacation at 1 am and if it wasn’t for my two exhausted young children and even more exhausted wife I would have been tempted to go out for a late night cruise.  Instead I simply put my eyes on the car for the first time in person and went to bed.

Five very short hours later my alarm went off and it was time to head to work.  For the first time in a long time I was looking forward to my long commute.  I quickly put on my license plates, got inside the car and started off on my first drive!  A few initial impressions:

  • I really should have taken more time to get familiar with the car before hitting the road because simple things like mirror adjustments and climate control are still a complete mystery to me.
  • I think the car has a nice aftermarket stereo but who cares…the sound of that engine is better than anything coming through the speakers.
  • This car is tight.  It feels news, shifts smoothly and runs like a dream.  I’m sure I’ll experience my share of issues but for now it’s like driving a very old new car.
  • I honestly forgot how hard it is to do slow speed maneuvering in a car without power steering.  Backing out of my garage was a nice little workout!
  • That smell…I missed that smell.  It’s different from my older SC but still an amazing combination of oil, fuel and leather.  Unmistakably Porsche.
  • It’s so much fun to drive that I almost blew past my exit and headed for a drive in the mountains.  But that’s for another day.

 

AtWork_small

 

Taking a rest after a fun drive to the office!

Safe and sound

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Thanks to Holt for prepping the car so well and for Image Auto Group trucking it across the country.  It arrived safe and sound.  Our street was too small for the giant semi so they unloaded on a main street and drove it in.  Time to start having some fun!

photo 1

Quick snapshot of it coming around the corner

photo 5

Tucked away in its new home

The first project will be a drive to Eurotech Bodywerkes to get the boxed rocker panels off the car and put the standard 930 rockers on.  The boxed rockers are too Miami Vice for me and I think the standard rockers accentuate the aggressive curves a lot better.  If anyone is looking for a set of boxed rockers for their own project just let me know.

Last minute juggling

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So it turns out that even highly reviewed, highly reputable enclosed trucking companies don’t always run on time. I can’t blame the company, there are just too many variables.  My car was supposed to arrive in Seattle on Thursday but due to delayed pickups in other areas it’s looking more like Sunday. The only issue is that we are out of town by then and I won’t be able to pick the car up myself.

Truck on freeway

Time to implement the backup plan – a friend picks the car up for me and keeps it safe and sound until we get back from vacation. I’m not sure if this will make it easier or harder to enjoy vacation. Getting my hands on the car only to put it away a day later might be even harder than just waiting another week.

Great PPI results and the deal is done

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I decided to have a complete pre-purchase inspection (PPI) done by a 3rd party (The Porsche Specialists) before committing to the deal and the results were great:

PPI Results

The car shows no signs of ever leaking or any heavy maintenance (removal, rebuild, etc) and according to the shop it seems like a beautiful, tight, like-new Porsche in terms of the mechanicals.

Tim at Holt and the shop that did the PPI found several issues that were all fixed as part of the deal:

  • New tires and four wheel alignment
  • New power top latch motor
  • New high beam stalk to fix the high beams not coming on
  • AC recharge
  • Fresh air blower fixed
  • Windshield washer fixed
  • Windshield bullseye repair

While far from being a new car this 27 year old Porsche is in great shape and will soon be heading to Seattle by covered transport.

Map

Deposit is down – Back into the world of Porsche ownership!

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Some years ago I bought, partially rebuilt with my father and had a lot of fun with a 78 911 SC Targa. I sold it years later out of necessity and always missed it.  Fast forward far too many years and seeing the new 2014 Targa come out has me longing for the fun of that old 911.

When I started my search I was pretty sure I wanted a 87-89 3.2 Targa, an updated version of the 78 SC Targa I had many years ago.  Or a Cabriolet.  I naively expected to be sorting through all of my options to find the perfect white on black model out there for a screaming price.  The market has certainly changed!  Inventory is low and prices are high.  So high that I started looking at 930s to expand my options.  I love the look of the Turbo but in the end I decided that I didn’t want the Turbo engine at this stage. I couldn’t find what I was looking for anywhere. Then someone turned me on to Holt Motorsports as a source for high quality cars.

I jumped out of my seat when I found a white/black 3.2 with an authentic factory turbo-look widebody (M491) with less than 50K miles on it.  The aggressive looks of the 930, the exact same suspension and breaking setup as the high performance Turbo but paired up with the 3.2 engine and G50 transmission.  Sold!  Deposit is down pending a PPI and details for shipping it across the country. Here are some photos:

 

Side Blur

 

Seats