The Poor Woman's Porsche

[theseeker411]

Damn those AREs are gonna look good!

[Kenz]

My Porsche is an '86 with the updated interior!

A little update to the Porsche:



My better half (@rightfullrudder) drove him to work and, on the way home, his alarm started going totally wild. Only way he could get it to turn off was to disconnect and reconnect the battery. We are still trying to figure out how to disable the damn thing, but we haven't had anymore issues with it thus far.

Upon further inspection, we decided the timing belt was a little too tired for our comfort level so he has been somewhat retired to the garage for the past two weeks. We watched a ton of youtube videos and asked around and decided the timing belt was going to be too much of a challenge for us to do since it needs a new one pretty bad. We dropped it off at a local shop (Eurofed) on Saturday for new timing belt, rollers, water pump, and all new seals. Picking it up either Friday or Saturday.

Also, I know the Fuchs were a big love for many people but I am really not a fan of black wheels on the red, so I sold them. And sweet Ben surprised me with these beauties:



Some gorgeous 5x120 15" ARE 398s! He refinished and rebuilt them while I was away at a bachelorette party. Talk about an amazing surprise! We have matching red center caps en route. We are just trying to get them to fit on the porsche with adapters, now. (If anyone knows anything about getting these to fit, let us know!)

Hopefully going to have the thing road worthy here soon, though the stancey part has been a bit delayed thanks to the cost of having a qualified shop do everything.

Still, the next thing on the list is to do a full refresh of the suspension. I would, ideally, like to swap out the rear torsion bar and shocks for a full set of coilovers. They just seem much more practical to me. It seems like the 944 people are totally divided over it. If anyone has any experience lowering these things, let me know! I'd love some advice haha.

[samulis]

Hi
Nice pick. So it's 1986, there is so called 1986.5 that has new dash and better ventilation. What did you get?
I've had three, one NA and two turbo's some ten years ago.
Cambelt isn't nothing out of norm, biggest difference is that there is counter rotating shaft to even the vibrations. Tightness of the belt is the problem, but there is tool for it and if I remember correctly an phone app that uses mic to listen correct sound of it. Get spare DME relay for fuel pump, it dying is common problem. If you can feel the engine when it is running, exhaust side motor mount needs to be replaced. Torsion bar shouldn't be a problem, unless it is rust welded.

[duct-tape]

You can absolutely lower the rear yourself via the torsion bar.

[Fruttolo]

Dunno if they can be modded like that, but with your idea of project I would look into machining your OEM teledials into faces to bolt to some 18" motorsport slant lips I think that would be super cool and still kind of oem+/period correct

[Kenz]

Wow thank you all for the amazing feedback! Work has been kind of crazy and we had Riverside Chattanooga this past weekend, so I haven't had much time to fiddle with the 944. We did put a new throttle response cam on it, and I am scheduling get the timing belt replaced. I have heard mixed things on how difficult the timing belt itself is to replace. I'm not sure yet, but I'd love to do it myself if possible.

I absolutely LOVE the seats that were suggested. I was definitely thinking of getting new racing seats. I'm not a massive fan of the OEM ones. I also managed to get the old head unit to work with an aux cord. I really didn't want to put in a newer head unit that didn't match.

Once the timing belt and water pump are done, I'm going to look more into lowering it. I've read you can put new springs or coil overs on the front and move the torsion bar in the rear to get a pretty good drop. I'm not sure how involved that is. If not, I'll just do coilovers all around.


I haven't decided on wheels, yet. There are Fuchs on it right now, and I have the OEM phone dials. Definitely going to do something Euro for wheels, but I'd love to have something three piece. My main goals for this build, right now, are to clean everything up but still keep it super 80s. Drop it low(er) and bigger, nicer wheels.

Sorry it's not much of an update! Still trying to get funds and parts around to work on the dang thing. At least my Focus is on hold, for now.

[Beemernut]

I think the perfect unholy matrimony would be a 1uz v8 in one of these, maybe some deep wheels and a widebody like this one...

http://www.broadfootracing.com/Wide_body_kit_19.jpg

http://www.broadfootracing.com/Green_1.jpg

[duct-tape]

Good choice. Excited to see what you do with it

Same.

You should see if a PDR guy can take care of those 2 spots on the front, probably save you a bunch of money

[z168]

Good choice. Excited to see what you do with it

[theseeker411]

Oh rad! I seriously looked into buying one of these before I goofed and bought an 80's BMW.

[RoyaleWithCheese]

Awesome! Congrats on the new project

This reminded me that I started a build thread on my crap-can 944 a while back and haven't update it. Which makes sense because it hasn't really had any updates in, eh... a long time.

These cars are a blast to drive! They don't seem to be all that popular because the timing belt can kill the car in a hurry if you don't swap it out at a regular interval. Doing the timing belt yourself can be a very rewarding and it's not that bad of a job at all. There are a couple special tools required though to hold the cogs while you tighten the belt but it's worth buying them if you plan to keep the car for a while.

Best first mod is updating the shifter. After 30 years they get reeeaaally sloppy. Only944 sells an awesome short shift kit for the transmission side (make sure to get the shift linkage arm too) and then you can rebuild the shift lever in the car with the following nuts and bolts and 5mins with a grinder:

- M10x50mm bolt- x1
- M10 nylon lock nut matching the bolt above - x1
- M10 thrust bearings - x2 (McMaster 5909K11)
- M10 thrust bearing washers - x4 (McMaster 5909K71)

[OrangeBlue]

A porsche to learn on? A transaxle porsche? Hats off, but it seems to be in good shape.

Since you radio is busted you may be interrested in the continental trd7412ub-or, it has almost everything, but it looks old.., that was a main selling point to me...

[Nuts]

Wow, well done on the project car of choice. I love them too!! Will be watching this thread. Enjoy!!

[Miroteknik]

Almost bought one of these back in the day, ended up getting my RX7. Please get a RECARO or something other than re-uphostering the oem seat. Extra points if you get a matching pair in a leather that (somewhat) matches the interior. The OEM seats are weird and since Singer still hasn't done a 944, you could be the first to do a Singer-style update on a 944.

[Fruttolo]

I love 944s too, nice cars indeed.
Please don't put hideous HIDs on, white lights on an old car feel wrong on many levels seeing shit at night is also massively overrated