If you’ve been following along with parts 1 and 2 of Project Backdate, you know that after 10 years of waiting my dream car has arrived and is a special shade of nightmare generally reserved for murderous carnies. But my dreams shan’t be denied, so it’s finally time to get stuck in and turn this disaster into my rolling fantasy. First job on the list: removing the interior, or what’s left of it after the Florida monsoons have had their dirty way with it.

Forcibly torn out are the rear seats, the remaining carpet is chucked, and the passenger seat – which isn’t even bolted down! – is hoisted out. I’ll keep the sunvisors for now, just to be classy. Not classy were the 1990’s Autozone stereo head unit and equalizer. Also binned are the spare tire and sound-deadening material from the cabin. All I’m left with are a torn driver’s seat and a crusty dash. Game on.

Before the Miami Vice bumpers and wing can go, and before any other major mods, I need to get the car registered in sunny but hippie-infested Los Angeles. That means passing arguably the most stringent emissions test in the country. My first attempt at this was a non-starter when the SMOG station technician refused to even test the car because it had an aftermarket pod filter on it (Autozone strikes again!). Good thing too, because I hadn’t even noticed the complete and utter lack of a catalytic converter on the car. So it’s off to the excellent online Porsche forums to source a factory airbox, as well as a tested and working cat.

With those items found and borrowed from a very generous local, it’s off for test attempt #2. Aaaaaaaaand it’s a FAIL. My tailpipe emissions are actually spot on and perfect, but apparently my 30 year old fuel vapor lines are leaking. With those replaced, I should pass the test with a breeze according to all the data. Another weekend spent replacing rubber hosing and then test #3. Aaaaaand it’s a FAIL. The new fuel vapor lines are working perfectly, but suddenly my emissions have doubled. What the actual hell? Okaaaaay, I ran to my garage to check all my fittings and find that I haven’t secured the factory airbox tightly enough and some air is bypassing the whole filter assembly. While this is equivalent to just running without an air filter installed, I’m grasping at straws at this point so I convince myself that was the problem and after quickly resolving it, take it in to a different testing station just to cover my bases and make sure I’m not getting scammed. Test #4 – MASSIVE FAIL. In the span of an hour, my emissions have doubled again. It is now four-fold higher than it was when I started.

It’s time for drastic measures. It’s time for outside help. It’s time for an Iranian mechanic who has a PHD in biochemistry. It’s time for Old Man Steve. I take my ailing 911 into his shop, J&S Precision Auto in Venice, CA, and we poke around for bit. Eventually we isolate an intake leak to somewhere in the front of the engine. With a handshake instead of a bill, Steve sets me off to find the leak. During disassembly of my intake system, I quickly discover some very loose hoses and clamps. Basically, every time I was messing with the intake system – from installing the factory airbox, to re-running the fuel vapor lines, to adjust the airbox connection, I was bumping and further loosing all the joints and hoses. There must have been small leaks just about everywhere.

With a firm reassembly and double-check, I take it in for Test #5. Passed with flying colors. Thank God.

After a surprisingly quick visit to the DMV a few days later, the Porsche is now legal to drive – helpful for taking it in to mechanics or body shops. And now that I can legally drive it for the first time, there’s no better time to take it off  the road and onto jack stands for a solid month as I completely rebuild and refresh the suspension, brakes, and drivetrain. In one fell swoop front and rear, I upgraded the shocks to new Bilstein units, replaced all rubber suspension bushings, slapped on upgraded steering tie rod ends from a 911 turbo, installed a bump steer kit to smooth out the steering, replaced any ball joints, and painted my sway bars (good for at least a 15hp upgrade right there).

On the brakes, it was new stainless steel lines, new rotors, new pads, and rebuilt calipers. She should stop now. For the drivetrain, this Porsche backdate is now sporting a short-shift kit from JWest Engineering, a new trans coupler for more precise shifting, and new rear axles because why the hell not?!?!

Back on the road, our backdate 911 feels tighter and more receptive to driving inputs. Good upgrades all around, but they also chewed up 20% of the budget already. Time to recoup some cash by selling some of the parts I’ve ripped out. Then I have to diagnose the loss of power at the top end and get ready for the body shop. That’s where the real spending begins…

If you would like to follow the nitty gritty details of this build, they are posted on a 
Porsche technical forum here.

The post Porsche Backdate Pt 3: The Emissions Battle appeared first on FactoryTwoFour.

There’s something about a car being delivered on the back of a flatbed tow truck that is a combination of strange feelings. On the one hand, it is the ultimate in delivery service – making sure the car is safe and doesn’t collect a single dead bug or even put on any additional miles. On the other hand, 90% of cars on tow trucks are seriously broken and in need of some love. It is with this cognitive dissonance that I greeted my new Porsche. I giddily informed the truck operator that he was delivering a massive amount of happiness and that I’d wanted this vehicle for a decade. He was nice enough to pretend to care for a whole 20 seconds.

At first sight, this 1988 911 Carrera Coupe was certainly rougher that the online listing. There were more small rust bubbles throughout the body than the single one that was photographed, including a small but worrying one on the rear window frame. While on the inside – holy shit the was half missing, all rotted, and had a unique funk of a drowned smoker. But no matter! My dream car 911 was in front of me and I wasn’t going to be brought down.

Once the car was on terra firma, I grabbed at the key and jumped in like it was Christmas morning. Nothing. No action from the battery. Who sells someone a decently expensive car and doesn’t charge up or replace the battery? I move past it.  The truck driver connects a jump pack and she starts up with the beautiful racket of a bag of hammers inside a clothes dryer set at permanent press that only an air cooled engine can make. She runs! Well, she was supposed to, but it is exciting nonetheless. I am grinning like an absolute idiot. I see the fuel gauge is sitting well below empty. Who sells someone a car and doesn’t have the decency to throw in a quarter of a tank? Still moving past it and filled with joy. The truck operator leaves as he senses I’m about to hug him and ask him to have a cry with me, and with that I’m all alone with my new Porsche.

Sit Rep: The interior is a total loss. What little carpet there is left is as good as ruined. The seats are more ripped than 1970’s Lou Ferrigno, and the dash gauges somehow all have rust on just their bottom bezels. This car has seen some water. After a panicked rummage through the floors and carpet, I’m sure this isn’t a Hurricane Sandy or flood car. The water damage is too light and the floor is sound. It looks like the sunroof has been left open for one or more Florida rainy seasons. A look around the sunroof shows that it has been totally scavenged and just the metal cover is being “securely” held into this German precision sports car with a wedge of cardboard. Moving outside, beyond the half-dozen rust bubbles, the front bodykit has a decent crack from too many valet curb kisses and all the black rubber trim is looking seriously tired.

This is all fine and mostly what I signed up for – why pay for nice exterior panels or interior carpet when I’m going to replace most of it anyway? All I needed – and paid a hefty inspection to ensure – was a strong engine and running gear. And my test drives did not reveal exactly that. Shifts are good, low end pull is strong, and the handling is on point. But on full bore, when I crest 4000 RPM, our little 911 looses all power and starts coughing and trying to find its place either in fuel delivery or timing. This is not good. I can look the other way on a dead battery, or an empty gas tank, and even on a mostly missing sunroof system. But now engine trouble on a car I had independently inspected? My cool was officially gone.

I can’t blame the seller, it is his job to offload the car. I can, and do blame the Florida shop I paid decent coin to for an unbiased walkthrough and opinion on the car since I couldn’t see it in person before I bought it. After an angry exchange of words over email and phone with the shop, they refunded my money in exchange for not being named here. I will just say this: if I needed any Porsche work done in the Miami area, I wouldn’t be going to any shops that rhyme with Bertex Auto.

With the worrying development of engine trouble right in front of me, there’s nothing for it but to get stuck in and get to work. This full Porsche backdate project where I turn this run-of-the-mill 1988 911 into a very special 1972 RS should take me about a year and cost anywhere from $10,000 to infinity dollars. My goal is to be smart and crafty and come in at a total out-of-pocket of  that low end $10K by doing the work myself and selling as many parts off the car as possible.

The full order of operations will be as follows:

• Renew/upgrade the suspension
• Renew the braking system
• Renew/upgrade the drivetrain
• Disassemble the car down to a rolling shell
• Install the backdated RS body panels and remove rust
• Send the shell off to paint
• Renew the engine while it is out of the car
• Drop the engine back into the freshly painted car
• Install a new interior and all final assembly

Along the way, there will be lots of broken knuckles, bruised egos, and too much fun. In the next post I’ll be tackling the suspension and brakes, and remove that crusty interior. Let the work begin!

You can read the next part of this series here.

The post Porsche Backdate Pt 2: The Sadness appeared first on FactoryTwoFour.

Well since I foresaw a future where my daily driver will be out of my possession for a few weeks I had to ask myself, what is the most sensible thing to do? Borrow a car from a friend? Share a car with a family member? No. The answer is to buy a piece of shit off Craigslist for as cheap as you can of course! Which leads to the first installment of Will It Flip!?

But wait, I need to be smart about this. There are a few criteria’s I need to follow. My maximum budget for a temporary daily driver would be $1000, it has to be able to drive, and I can’t loose money on the resale. Which means no blown head gaskets! Here at the Factory, Adam likes to tell me that I have a bad habit of looking up cheap cars on craigslist on my free time. I thought it would be the perfect time to provoke this habit and see if I can make use of it. After about 10 minutes of coming up with this idea and 40 minutes of browsing craigslist. I found a mechanic’s special 2001 Audi A4 Quattro 1.8 liter Turbo for $800 about five miles from me.

Though this whole idea may sound bad, I was convinced that this might be a decent purchase being that this car usually sells for about $2500 in decent running condition. The ad mentions that it only has been through 2 owners and even provided the VIN number. I had a friend do a VIN check and the provided information provided stands correct. I felt a growing sense of trust here. The life of the car has predominately been in Texas and just made its way to Los Angeles last August. No rust. The seller even mentions that it needs ‘minor work’; the front lip fell off and was in the cabin, the rear windows wouldn’t roll up, it needs a new mass airflow sensor, and has some cosmetic wear and tear. Easy fixes. All things I can live with.

After feeling the engine on a quick test drive and a really hard-ball-no-haggle-price of $800 later, I became a proud new owner of an all wheel drive, four-cylinder turbo, sedan in boring beige. The car ran decent for the price. I felt content as I drove home. That was until literally a stop sign away from my driveway, the temperature needle was reading higher than Donald Trump’s nose and the car started smoking out of the hood. That damn bastard didn’t mention about an overheating problem.

I made it just in time to get to my garage. Whatever, it’s okay. I think I’ve done enough work on my car and friends’ cars to trust that I can get to the bottom of these problems. The next morning as I reinstalled the front lip, I noticed the Audi gave me a small gift. It peed a little green. A coolant leak it is!

I’ll be taking you along the process of repairing the car, polishing it up and ultimately finding out if I can break even, trade up, or even sell it for more. Follow me on this multi part journey of…Will It Flip!?

The post Will It Flip!? 2001 Audi A4 Quattro – Part I appeared first on FactoryTwoFour.