M491

For Sale – 1987 Porsche 911 Carrera Cabriolet M491 “Turbo Look”

/ Jeff / 2 Comments

printable-for-sale-sign

As much as I love this car I just can’t stop thinking about the new Targa GTS. The beautiful retro look of the Targa reminds me so much of when I originally fell in love with Porsches and bought my 78 SC Targa. To me the new Targa is the nicest looking Porsche in a very long time and I have an opportunity to snag a GTS order from my dealer. I only have room in my garage for one car so after much deliberation I’ve decided to sell the Cab. I know it will continue to appreciate in value but I just can’t stand the thought of it sitting in storage and not being driven, it should go to someone that will get more joy out of it. I’m still working on updated photos of the car so I haven’t posted it for sale anywhere yet. I’ll be posting it on all of the usual sites/forums and EBay once the photos are ready. Looking for $65K

I finally posted the For Sale page.

Taking the long way around

/ Jeff / 2 Comments

Winter has very much arrived in Seattle and the bright sunny topdown days of Summer have been replaced with constant rain, cold fronts and gray skies. As a result my 911 has been spending way too much time in the garage, frustrated and wanting to get back out on the roads.

When my loving, caring and thankfully forgiving wife asked me to move the car outside so we could clean the garage I jumped at the chance to fire it up and drive it around to the front of the house. The car started without hesitation, there was no rain in sight and by the time I had backed it out of the garage I was overcome by the sound of the engine. I knew I would be taking the very long way around the house.  I wonder how that garage is coming along?

 

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A cold but dry winter day in Seattle.  The view from Alki is beautiful any day of the year.

Showing The Suspension Some Love

/ Jeff / Leave a comment

I live in a part of the country where you just can’t get away with speeding, at least not for long. Eventually some Bellevue motorcycle cop is going to get you or the back road you found will be too full of bicyclists to really enjoy. Outside of track days or the occasional high speed tunnel run (about 10 seconds) you just can’t take advantage of crazy horsepower or top speed. But you can have a really good time with a well sorted suspension without drawing too much attention.

When I bought my car I knew it might need new shocks and that was confirmed the day it arrived. After confirming the front struts were Boge I was able to order all of the parts that I would need. With the expert advice and wrenching from Steve at Auto Services West we are going to get this car fully sorted with a full compliment of Elephant Racing upgrades:

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Image from Elephant Racing, I just love this visual.

In addition to replacing the worn out factory shocks with Bilstein HDs all around I decided to complete the Turbo Look suspension by adding the Turbo Tie-Rods, Adjustable bump steer kit and new front and rear bushings:

Elephant Turbo Tie-Rod Kit
Adjustable Bump Steer Kit
Bilstein HD Shocks
New Front & Rear Bushings

Here are a few terrible iPhone shots of my car on the lift getting ready for the suspension upgrades. It’s the first time I was really able to poke around underneath.  Damn…this car is clean and original. Thanks to the previous owners for taking great care of it!

No oil leaking from this baby (yet!)
Nice and tidy
Looking good back here

A Blast From The Past

/ Jeff / 2 Comments

My first Porsche was a 78 SC Targa that I bought when I still lived in Northern Virginia. I was driving home from college one day and saw a beautiful white Porsche sitting in a grass field with a for sale sign on it. I went home, grabbed my Dad and went to take a look. I had read all about buying used cars so of course I kicked the tires, looked at the battery and opened the engine compartment. Basically I had no idea what I was doing. Fortunately my Dad did so after a thorough inspection and a long test drive we decided the car was solid and I bought it for $10K. I wish that I had held on to this car but eventually I needed some money and I sold it. I always knew that I would come back for another one someday.

I recently mentioned to my parents that I only had one photo of my old 78 SC and it was just a low quality digital capture of a framed print in really rough shape. Well as always my parents have come through and surprised me with some other photos that I thought were long ago lost! Thanks Mom and Dad for finding these and sending them my way.

78SC Side

Looking at it now, it’s no wonder I fell in love with it the second I saw it!

78SC Rear

It might not be as wide as the Turbo-Look but it still looks great.

78SC Front

This was taken on Skyline Drive in the Shenandoah National Park.

78SC Head Engine Bay

The car needed a top-end rebuild and my Dad and I did some of the work ourselves.  Well, we dropped the engine ourselves 🙂  Such fun!

78SC Engine Out

Two things to note about this image.  I had no idea what I was doing but fortunately my Dad did.  And apparently I thought it was cool to wear a Taz hat.  Oy vey!

 

My First “Project”

/ Jeff / 2 Comments

When I bought this car I had images of wrenching on it myself, doing all of the maintenance, teaching my two boys all about how to work on cars etc. But the truth is that I have no freaking clue what I’m doing. My Dad is a genius when it comes to working with his hands. He’s built race cars, custom knives, beautiful furniture…the list goes on and on. Somewhere buried deep in me must lie some dormant genes just ready to come out right? This car is going to help me discover them. Slowly.

The Project

My car needs new shocks, it’s bouncing all over the place. No, I’m not actually going to replace the shocks myself, that’s a 201 class and I’m still in 101 territory. I just needed to confirm a few things about the suspension. I just needed to know the type of front struts that I have and I needed to know the size of the rear sway bar so that I can get some replacement bushings.

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Tools ordered, car jacked up for the first time and the best helper in the world ready to lend a hand!

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The front wheel is off, just look at those beautiful 930 brakes!  Now time to discover who made these struts…

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It’s Boge for the win!  A set of Bilstein HD inserts made for the Boge struts will fix my bouncy ride.

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It turns out my M491 Carrera has the standard 21mm Carrera rear sway-bar and not the 20mm 930 sway-bar.

Time to order some suspension parts. I know this might seem like the stupidest little project but for a guy that isn’t use to working on cars it was a nice confidence booster that getting the car in the air and handling simple work is no big deal. Maybe I’ll try to tackle this suspension upgrade myself after all…

 

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