Porsche Enthusiasts Club Forum

Early 944's had two extra box mounts.

I wonder how much fabrication (a bit of welding I presume) it would take to retro fit them and if there was any efficacy to doing that.

Back to my plot: sent the gearbox mount cross member off for powder coating so until that's back, I am a bit snookered (the guys I use are A1 with a fast turn around).



I'd like to have the torque tube powder coated but the bearing removal and replacement looks like a pig to do - unless anyone has had experience of that?
Guaranteed, the heat will drive any lubricant out of them and if you were to dismantle it, you would be silly not to renew the bearings.

@waylander: price on them? eek. Is there an SKF equivalent?
Thanks mate.

?

Hello strangers!

Hope you are all well.

The search for an o/s wing continues.
Can anyone tell me if the only difference between the front wing of an S2 and a standard 944 wing is the bit that meets the bumper?

I got an n/s wing off some bloke who was a retired scrap dealer and it was 'kicking round his garage'. It is bloody immaculate and in black too!

The turbo/S2 wing is shaped differently for the different front PU. It would be a crying shame to start chopping up an immaculate one as they are hens teeth and expensive...........

Stuart

I am not going to chop the n/s wing.
This is for the o/s.
I wanted to see if I could buy an S2 wing and modify it - i'e, cut the 'nose' off it and weld on a front section. AFAIK, it's only different at this point.

Finally... MOT'd 19/04/2024. Started 24/03/2020.

Great work, looking good!

Ta.

Now i'm on the rattle and squeak trail finder.

Found this in the passenger seat back!:

That might be older than your car!

I unbolted the seat back in order to a) investigate the rattle and b) sort the forward release levers which were sticky. [Found the left cable was out of it's guide bracket].
So I am presuming that the only way in was when it was assembled. I am thinking about writing to VW Neckarsulm with a pic of the batch label (which was behind one of the covers) and see if I can return the coin to it's rightful owner and also see if they have a sense of humour.

Just a follow up on this thread to 'finish it off'.

Fully adjustable rear anti roll bar drop links got ditched. Couldn't get them to shut up. What a racket. Replaced them with originals and the ride is better and quieter.

ABS pump was too knackered to fix by extracting valves from a Merc pump. Got one in the UK. It was pants. Disintegrated on me whilst trying to dismantle. Bought one off Ebay US and golly; looked like it was 5 years old, came with the mounting plate and rubber bobbins - all in A1 condition. $170 plus customs and shipping but worth every penny (cent?) and more. Still dripping with brake fluid and not dry like it had been sat on a shelf for x number of years.
The old one had been bypassed by a selection of wires to make the ABS light go out. The skanks. All works fine now. I did replace the rear n/s section of ABS harness. Lucky as the other 3 are 'NLA'.
Waylander suggested that it might have had an offside crunch at some point in it's life. Seems logical.

Clutch judder is slowly going. It's almost perfect bar a little judder at lower revs. It's done 300 miles since the MOT and it was suggested to give it 500 miles. So the 85 shore liquid Poly DIY engine mount job I did works. I will do the same for the rear anti-roll bar drop link bushes when they go. I used liquid Poly for the lower rear shocks.

Had to replace the rev counter and oil pressure gauges as the rev counter topped at 4000 rpm and the oil pressure needle bounced like a 3 year old on a crate of Red Bull. New oil pressure sender unit is in the post apparently so changing it is imminent.
Odometer stopped working. Replaced that infamous drive cog. Nothing. Nada. 15 mile drive later and still nothing. Took it on the school run in the morning and it suddenly came to life. Funny old porker.

Now; an anomaly of the 2.7 rear shock lower bolt is that the bolt size is bigger than on a 2.5. Dunno why. This makes the shocks helluva more expensive. Over double. I elected to buy 2 standard one's. This meant taking the new lower bushing out to accommodate the larger centre shaft removed from the old one's and doing a liquid Poly job - and it's fine so far. Not as much 'rubber' because of the wider diameter shaft but it has worked.

Found a tiny crack on the rear n/s brake calliper where the bleed nipple goes in. This caused a headache as I could not bleed the brakes (combined with the master cylinder very slowly giving up the ghost) and it was so hard to find. Sourced a replacement calliper, bought a new piston and seal and bingo! Bled the brakes using a brake bleed kit in 10 mins flat.

She broke down on the way to the MOT and behaved perfectly throughout the MOT. Emissions perfect, no advisories... and then broke down on the way home. I delayed the job of replacing the rubber connector in the fuel pump supply line at the rear thinking it was okay. (I had even bought a waterproof connector in anticipation of doing it). Obviously not. I decided to slice it open and discovered that someone had soldered the female hollow round pin back on to the cable and stuffed it back in but it had broken and was intermittently loosing contact. I'm surprised it ran at all.

Another curveball that was chucked at me was the immobiliser. At first, the key fob port fell apart. I soldered it back together which was tricky as the wires were fine. Didn't work. Found a brand new identical TOAD immobiliser on sale for £45 on fleabay. Plugged the new key fob port section in. Didn't work. Elected to investigate where it went in to the fuse box. This meant seat removal, glove box, glove box lid removal, that board that covers the ECU, the ECU plate and that plastic cowling (a pig) under the fuse panel.
The people who make the TOAD system is Scorpion. I called them and asked for a wiring diagram. They didn't have one as 'i was so old' but I had a fitting certificate dated 2009 with a 15 year warranty. However, they did explain how it was fitted. Found a break in a wire where is was soldered to the ignition relay wire to the immobiliser unit and back. Still cannot work out why you would cut a 30amp wire and splice in a wire to the immobiliser which is 5amps(?).
I was going to pull out the original Porsche unit but the car wouldn't run without it. I even used the Clarke's garage bypass configuration so that I could remove the plug in Porsche original unit but it didn't start. This was infuriating. So the TOAD system has obviously been piggy backed on to the old system. Why? I don't know. Surely the TOAD system was added when the Porsche system stopped working? Perhaps the original didn't stop or was it a function of it that stopped working? I'll never know.
I would like to delete the immobiliser(s) completely but I would loose those lovely flashing LED's on the door lock stalks. I like that touch. Needless to say it works and best (or worst of all), the soldering I did on that key fob port did work. It wasn't my soldering. I swapped it over just to see but put the new one in as it's nice and shiny.

The biggest headache I encountered was a leaking (transmission end) oil seal, despite me replacing it. This meant gearbox removal. That I could stomach because the only seal I didn't replace (forgot in amongst the malaise) on the gearbox was the main shaft seal, which was leaking. The princely sum of the replacement - wait for it: £1.42p (Postage was triple it's value (lol) from Autodoc). As I had to remove the box anyway, it was only a few extra steps more to do the engine crank shaft oil seal.

Useful to note if you ever replace the main transmission end oil seal: Elring do 2 seals. One is that dark orange colour. The other is the same colour but has a black ring around the edge. The latter has ribbing right across the width of the seal. The former, ribbing across only half the width of the seal. The Elring with the black ring is the one you want (I presume; later Oval dash. I can't speak for other engines).
I made a press so that I could evenly press the new one in and I cleaned the area so that it was immaculate. There was no nicks or scratching of the crank case. I used 400 paper and Holts parts cleaner. It was suggested that I use Curil T for insertion - outer edge only. I did. This made the press redundant (it will only go as far as the pilot bearing casing anyway, it just starts the insertion off. The press was simply a metal plate with 4 holes cut in it and using 4 bolts plus the 'old' seal, helps it in part way). The Curil T made insertion so easy, I thought I had bought the wrong seal but thankfully, Frazer parts delivered. I will never fit an O ring oil seal without the Curil T ever again. What a breeze. What I did notice is that the new clutch plate (as it had been sitting so long) left an impression on the flywheel. This impression I cleaned off and it 'halved' the clutch judder.

I'm finally 'there'. Started the day of lockdown and finished just recently. 4 years (with an 11 month wait for welding in two parts) and some stuff that side tracked the whole process. I took it for a spirited 90 mile run on Saturday and the engine pulls beautifully, it's quiet (the poly bushes squeak a little over speed bumps), the gear change is slick and everything works! It's put a huge smile on my face and now I can sleep.

Next... a 928 project? Hmm... mad idea. In the meantime, whilst I chew over that crazy idea, i'll drive the 944 all summer before putting it on for a respray. I sourced a superb n/s wing but now have to source one for the offside. Richard Korte from partworks.de sent me a link to a bloke in Germany that may have one...

...

Awesome work!

I know of 928 that could do with a small amount of TLC, no MOT but only because it expired and the lady owner isn't spending a penny on it. Her husband, who's pride and joy it was, sadly passed a couple of years back. Car has barely moved since but has been regularly started. Blue with cream leather, auto, MY89, quite tidy, runs sweet and stops sweet, comes with 2 sets of alloys. I have pictures if you are interested..............no warning lights lit up IIRC. Price negotiable, Glasgow area. Been a fair chunk of cash spent on it before the guy passed, all receipts are there.

Stuart

Oh yes please.

...and then pesky idle surges. According to Clarke's garage, Vacuum, dodgy throttle position switch or faulty Auxiliary air valve. I knew it wasn't the latter as it is brand new. The TPS I tested, no vacuum leaks... where to go from here?

I discovered that once warm, the throttle was not closing in the idle position thus not triggering the TPS whilst simultaneously not closing so that it was getting too much air at idle. The mechanism and return springs were all soft. I could not remove the butterfly as one of the little retaining screws was seized and subsequently rounded, That meant I could not strip it completely and clean it up properly, plus; the spindle is on 2 needle bearings to which I had no access.
Cue visit to Fleabay and a list of options for the 2.7 without any actual correct part numbers and not knowing if a readily available 2.5 throttle body would do. All that aside, I got this '2.7 throttle body' off fleabay from Status Porsche for a respectable £39.99 and then stripped it and cleaned it up a bit:



I noticed subtle differences with mine which suggests that there is a dedicated 2.7 throttle body and on the plus side, I got a round throttle cable wheel rather than the 'comma' shape thereby eliminating that blind spot. Either that or the round throttle wheel is an upgrade. It's all good. No idle surges.