1990 Porsche 911 C2, A Story

In reply to mazdeuce:

I had almost pulled the trigger on a set of KW Clubsports with RS sways when I did an about-face and sold it before it turned into "another track car project".

The weather is conspiring against me getting the garage finished so I thought I should just work on the 911 instead. First I needed to replace the hood (or front trunk?) switch that I stole for the door. Done.

Then I needed to replace the one license plate bulb that was burned out. Also done.

Then I needed to deal with the only two things on the car that didn't work. The right turn signal won't self cancel because the return cam is worn, and the brights don't work. Both of those problems are located inside this switch.

The switch is riveted together and is non serviceable. I've fixed the brights problem once and probably could again by reaching through the holes in the side, but the turn signal thing is just worn out. Luckily, pretty much all 911 parts are available if you're willing to pay for them. I always knew I'd bite the bullet eventually and spend the nearly $400 for the switch, so I finally did. You have to pull the steering all the way down the the bare column, but it's not a bad job.

This is the second time I've had the column this far apart and I kick myself each time that I'm screwing the stock wheel back on instead of putting on a nice Momo. Someday.
It's all back together and working. Once the brights worked again I learned that one of them is out so I need to replace that one headlight and then see about passing the last inspection with emissions that the car has to pass.

mazdeuce wrote: I always knew I'd bite the bullet eventually and spend the nearly $400 for the switch, so I finally did.

A smart man. If you're going to spend the money eventually, just spend it now so you enjoy it. I finally took this approach with my new-to-me V70R. The garage has a pile of wheels, two new bumper covers, and a full PCV system sitting there waiting for my attention. Exhaust comes next, once I'm comfortable everything is up to snuff.

FWIW, I bet if you drill the rivets out, you'd be able to service it. Clean contacts, fix cam, etc.

<--- Learned to rebuild "nonrebuildable" switches after pricing a few out.

In reply to DILYSI Dave:

That's actually the plan. I want to get inside it and see if I can figure out a solution to the cam issue. I can't find anywhere online where it's been solved and I'd like to see if it can be done. What I don't want is to not drive the car while I'm messing with it. Worst case scenario, I have a backup switch.

So my wife fired up the 911 this morning and headed off to work all excited about the new self canceling turn signals. 90 seconds later she was back in the driveway.
"Did you mean to put the steering wheel on exactly upside down?"
Ah crap. I marked the wheel and the hub so I could align them, but I put a line all the way across. I guess I should have put a mark from the center out. Live and learn.

I have done that!

On RX7s (2nd gens) you can put the wheel on correct except have the turn signal device 180 out. This makes for VERY annoying turn signal cancellations and behaviors!

Yea, that too. Before I "fixed" it the turn signal didn't cancel one way. Now it doesn't cancel either way. Fantastic. My wife still drove it to work.
Oh well. Two screws, one plug, one big nut, two more screws, switch the horn ring around, and put it all back together. No problemo.

mazdeuce wrote: Yea, that too. Before I "fixed" it the turn signal didn't cancel one way. Now it doesn't cancel either way. Fantastic.

HA! Success. You have restored symmetry! It's a legitimate defense.

Fixed it....again. Anyone who is thinking of pulling the wheel on their 964, give me a ring for some tips. I'm really good at it.

Your car continues to inspire me to search. I'm watching late 80's 911s regularly on eBay. Had I not bought Mama's dream car in December I think I could've been in the seat already.

mazdeuce wrote: Then I needed to replace the one license plate bulb that was burned out. Also done.

It always amazes me how much parts bin engineering Porsche does.

Those are the EXACT same licence plate light assemblies that are on my Boxster. I just put LEDs in them last night...

In reply to Maroon92:

They were still using those? Amazing. The door switches are the same as those used in 1964. The parts overlap is pretty cool.

I think that being a small quantity niche manufacturer forces them to engineer smarter in that regard. On something like an F150 where a trillion of them are made every year, the benefit of using carryover parts is so minimal that it's not a motivation.

Excellent thread. I really like the idea of making a car purchase a journey. I need to make a build thread of my car.

Wandering about with my wife today and the seat switch stopped lowering. It's been moody for a while. It was warning me. As usual I ignored it until there was no other choice.
Basically you take out a couple of screws and pop the pair of switches out and then pop the individual offending switch out and then pop it apart. It would have been easier in some ways to find the plug and unplug it so I could work on it outside the car, but that seemed like too much work. I did put a paper towel under the switch to catch the parts that fell out. I'm getting smarter at this. The switch is a basic rocker with springs and balls. Easy peasy. Either a ball falls out, or the switches just get corroded. Either way, once you pull it apart, the balls fall out, so the simplest test is to just put it back together. A little dielectric grease to hold parts in place, pop it together, and up...down...up...down...up...down. Success.
I always have people ask me what it's like living with an older Porsche. It's easy, as long as you're willing to dive in and sort these little things out as they happen. Still a wonderful car. Still a joy to drive.

Page 106 of Porsche Panorama #685. Totally famous.

This morning Mrs. Deuce broke the seat switch that I JUST FIXED! Kind of seeems like the pieces are truly worn out so I'll be ordering another one.
I also got the most recent Lonestar PCA newsletter/magazine thing and the car is in there too. Looks like red cars photograph well.

Today was fix the Porsche day. I parked the wagon under the carport so I could move the 911 to the garage. Working on cars in a garage is pretty cool.

I started by putting more R134 in the AC. It took me a few minutes to figure out that I had to push the fitting on the low side port to get the stuff to flow into the system, but once I did that I restored cold to the system. Success! I'm going to buy a set to gauges to I can make sure I'm putting the proper amount in. I'm a bit nervous about overcharging it.

Then I changed the oil which is always an adventure on an air cooled Porsche. The flooding waterfalls of oil and the two sumps and the filter that demands that you spill oil and all of it. Today was sort of worse. I've been just sort of dealing with an oil leak that has always seemed to be coming from the main oil plug in the motor. I've tightened it as much as would be prudent and then just sort of lived with it. When I changed the oil last time the plug came out and went in not nearly as smoothly as I would have liked and it's been at the back of my mind since. The threads weren't stripped, but they weren't perfect so I bought a new one to put in when I did this oil change. The plug came out ok but had a couple of little slivers of steel that were clearly from threads.
berkeley me.
This could be very very very bad.
The last thing I want is a stripped case.
berkeley.
I crawled under and poked around and found out that I have nothing to worry about because it's already happened and been "fixed" with a heli coil. berkeley. Me. The metal was from the heli coil. God dammit. Well, I might as well see if the new plug works better. The good news is that it threaded in much better and seems to be doing fine. The bad news is that I have a berkeleying heli coil in the case of my 911. As long as the oil stays in the motor I'm fine and I think it'll do that, I'm just pissed off. When I take it in to have a proper mechanic adjust the valves in another 6K miles I'll have them look at it and tell me what they think.
berkeley.
So I put the oil in and go for a drive to get the car warm so I can check the oil level and it's running great as usual and pressure is fine and I get back and park it and check to see if the oil plug is leaking. It's not, but why is their oil dripping from the bumper? Pop the engine cover and notice that I was distracted enough that I didn't put the oil fill cap back on and it's spit 1/4 cup or so of oil out. Really? Am I that big of an idiot? At least I just left it on the garage floor and didn't lose it.
After that I replaced the old broken seat switch. It would have been easier to pull the bolts if I could have raised the seat, but, you know, the switch was broken. Anyway, not much to write about because I didn't take too many pictures because I was still not happy about the oil stuff.

That's enough playing Porsche mechanic for one day.

The 911 seems to want to be a media star. Note the GRM Dork decal that has been de-dorked. I really wish I could buy ones just like this from GRM.
TTAC 911 Autocross

Nothing much happening with the 911. Mrs. Deuce continues to drive it to work 2-4 days a week. She's well and truly in love with the car. I get to autocross it with the PCA and run errands on the weekend.
The other day I noticed that the center light panel was popping out on one end. These are $532 at Pelican, so I decided to see if I could glue it back together. I really should disassemble it completely and do it properly, but I thought I'd give gluing it in place a shot first. This is not the first time that a repair has been attempted on this light.

Congrats on being in the magazine!

In reply to bgkast:

Thanks! A friend just sent me the picture on Facebook. I haven't gotten mine in the mail yet.

The 911 is washed and covered and put away for the summer. Driving an aircooled car in air that is routinely in the mid 90's or higher isn't my favorite thing to do, so it's time for a snooze.
It's been a super rainy spring and between that and One Lap, we haven't been driving the 911 much. I checked and we only put 2500 miles on it since the cover came off last August. I'm still in love with the car and I'm not sure why I haven't driven it as much.

It's cooling down and we're back to driving the 911 a bit. I picked my daughter up from a sleepover the other day and we ran to the store. She wanted the su roof open so open it was. When we parked I hit the switch and the su roof slid most of the way closed before it hit the air deflector and stopped. Poop. This little guy broke.
No problem. It's a small plastic piece, how bad can it be? A couple bucks? $10. And I should really do both sides because if one is fragile then they're both fragile. And these little white slides are yellow and cracking so I better replace those while I'm in there. $7 each. Plus shipping. And that's how we spend $45 when one tiny plastic part breaks. The good part is that it was only two screws on each side and a little wiggling to get the slider in, I didn't have to disassemble the sunroof mechanism.
I am getting spoiled with any part I need being available. Any little plastic piece or screw or anything is just a couple of clicks away. Quite different from my Civic where a lot of bits are NLA.