Porsche

Sunday Drive and the first “photo shoot”

/ Jeff / Leave a comment

Sunday was a pretty typical January day in Seattle…cloudy with a high chance of rain. I have a choice with this car. Baby it and treat it like a garage queen, or enjoy it rain or shine. This is no garage queen so we took it out on a cold rainy day for our first Sunday drive. The temps would be in the low 50s so not too bad for the summer performance tires.

Meg and I ditched the kids and took off to have some fun. When I got home, my youngest son, Shep, wanted his first ride and so I went back out. I brought along my camera this time and stopped at a favorite spot of mine for some quick iPhone shots…nothing fancy.

Shep was very patient with me but also wanted to get in on the action 🙂

I randomly ran into a co-worker that was there to take some skyline photos and he shared a few of his shots with me as well. Thanks to https://www.instagram.com/wildmanzen/ for the photos.

Time for some critical “mods”

/ Jeff / Leave a comment

My automotive mechanical skills are severely lacking but I can tackle the easy stuff and I completed my two must do mods this morning:

I started by re-flashing my Cobb tune to stage 1 on 91 octane since 92 is the best I can find in the Seattle area and I don’t want to mess with custom mixes. The last owner had the 93 octane tune. I’m sure I won’t notice a difference and this will give me peace of mind. Say what you want about Cobb vs custom tune but this was so easy to do myself. I’ll have to see how the car feels with the stock engine and PDK tune so I can appreciate what I have. Super easy to flip back and forth.

Next I installed the Rennline ExactFit iPhone mount. Picked it up from Suncoast and the install was super easy, just follow the video they provide a link to.

I like the look, where it mounts and that it doesn’t interfere with the passenger, the glove box or cover up the PCM.

A few screws…super easy install.

Something Wicked This Way Comes…

/ Jeff / Leave a comment

After a short wait that felt like forever, today was delivery day! The streets in my neighborhood are small so I decided to have the car delivered to a car club I belong to. Weather gave me a break and the delivery, inspection and ride home was rain (and snow) free.

My son capturing that “how does this work again” look on my face as I’m prepping the camera equipment:

It is really here!

A short video of the delivery:

Some fun photos we took quickly on our way out before the weather turned worse:

Made it safe to its new home…my garage!

I found the one! Okay, I found the “next one” :)

/ Jeff / Leave a comment

After a brief hiatus, I’m back where I belong behind the wheel of a Porsche 911. After some pricing / market research and a ton of great input from others, I will be taking delivery of a beautiful black 2011 997.2 TTS this week! The car was purchased from Tristan @ RAC Performance and it was a quick and easy process. I wish I was able to meet them in person but I felt very comfortable doing business with them remote.

A stunner!
The original owner checked a lot of nice boxes, my favorites being the factory aero package and Turbo II wheels!
The full leather interior with the leather center console looks really nice and I love the painted back seats…just can’t let my kids sit back there now 

In addition to a nice set of original options, the car has a SpeedTech exhaust, integrated 9500CI radar system and the Cobb engine/pdk tune so it saved me at least $8K in upgrades. Full front clear bra as well. I would have preferred an all black interior, but with a black car the two-tone might actually be a nice break from black. I did order a set of black floor mats for the car.

The car was just put on a delivery truck and is enroute to Seattle…should be here by the weekend weather permitting.

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.

Who says a 27 year old 911 convertible is an impractical family car?

/ Jeff / 5 Comments

So it’s like 45 degrees outside today but the sun in shining bright and my car has been sitting in the garage way too long. But I have a problem. I need to spend time with my two crazy boys and I really need to make a trip to Costco to stock up for our holiday party. Is it possible to combine a fun Saturday drive, quality time with the boys and a domestic chore like shopping at Costco. Hell yes!

 

It might be 45 degrees but the heater works great so we are going topless!

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Gabe and Shep have their blankets ready

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I told you they were crazy boys and they love the wind in their hair!

Our long Saturday cruise was interrupted by a very slow train. At one point it stopped and went backward 🙂

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And finally, here is the proof that a classic 911 can be the perfect car for a sunny cruise with kids to Costco. Screw mini-vans!

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Showing The Suspension Some Love

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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!