Project Lazarus

[husker boxster]

In an effort to bump start the economy, I ordered $550 worth of parts from our site sponsor. The stash included various fan belts, brake pads, the high pressure power steering hose, an automatic trans filter and gasket, along with a gear oil syringe (new tool #13). The fuel pump check valve also arrived from a 928 specialist vendor.



I thought I might be able to save time by just pulling the fuel pump off w/o removing the fuel filter, but alas, it wasn’t possible so I removed both. Got the check valve and new copper washers into the fuel pump and re-installed. Turned the ignition and let the pump fill. Bumped the starter and the engine cracked to life. Shut it off and checked the fuel pump. Dry as a bone. Problem solved – no more fuel leaks. I think the old check valve was stuck open. I’ll keep an eye on it for a while. Trust is earned.

Next item on the agenda was some wheel and wheel well cleaning. Put the shark back up on jack stands and removed the tires. The inner barrels were all filthy with 30 yrs of grime.



Used my usual products to cut thru the grime but it took a bit more elbow grease than normal to clean them. However, I was a bit disappointed with the results. They all looked like this.


Turns out the black was paint, not grime. I tried several toxic fluids from carb cleaner, brake cleaner, and even some lacquer thinner to remove the paint but to no avail. Took some 800 grit sand paper and wet sanded 1 wheel.


Looks presentable but too much work. Need to rethink another solution for the other 3 wheels.

On to cleaning the wheel wells. They too had 30 yrs of grime. Each one took a couple hrs to clean, but they turned out ‘well’.

before

after

before

after

[husker boxster]

Now that everything is clean(see previous post), time to move on to a brake fluid flush. I gave all the nozzles a squirt of AeroKroil and crossed my fingers. All 8 easily broke loose and I got the flush completed. The fluid that came out looked a bit like Coke, but now has a nice amber glow. Maybe the normal maintenance items were going to be more routine.

Next up was changing the brake pads. It looked like a simple system, even simpler than a 987.



You pinch the retaining ‘spring’ with a vise grips and then swing one of the ends free from the caliper. Carefully disconnect the pad sensor and remove the pads. I started with the left rear caliper and it took me a bit to figure out the best way to do everything, but the old pads came out and the new ones slid right in. Easy peasy. This shouldn’t take long. On to the right rear.

The spring and sensor weren’t a problem. The inner pad wasn’t either. But the outer pad got part way out and became stuck.


It wouldn’t budge any farther. The caliper was held on by 2 19mm bolts. Based on previous history, I wasn’t looking forward to the upcoming fight. Got a breaker bar and ½” drive 19mm socket onto both bolts and thankfully both came loose. With the caliper free, I was able to hammer the offending pad out. The new pads slide right in w/o issue. On to the left front.

The outer pad gave a bit of a fight. They have a couple of holes drilled in them, so I looped a couple of wires into the holes and then stuck a long screwdriver into the loops. Gave a good pull and the pad came out. The inside pad wasn’t as cooperative. It didn’t want to come out at all. I decided to chip the material off the pad to give it more wiggle room. Surprisingly, the pads on all 4 wheels had quite a lot of material on them (they looked almost new), so removing the material on this one would give it a lot more room to maneuver. But it would only come about 25% out.


The front calipers are held on by 2 bolts with a 10mm hex indention in them. Once again, not looking forward to pursuing that fight but I got my 10mm hex socket out along with the breaker bar. Gave the 1st bolt a careful push and it turned! Except it was the socket turning inside the bolt, which was petrified and not budging. Didn’t bother trying again and fully stripping it and since the 1st bolt wasn’t coming out, no need trying the 2nd. I had to get the pad out with the caliper in place.

So I put my thinking cap on and decided to build a puller.


I looped a couple of wires over the plate and then screwed the nuts to move the plate up. It got the pad out a shade further but 1/3 out isn’t good enough. The plate started to bend, which caused the carriage bolt heads to slip off the caliper. Rats!

At this point I decided to try the right front. Maybe that side would cooperate. I don’t normally like to take both sides apart so you have no reference point to look at, but these were so simple it wasn’t going to be an issue. Got the outer pad out with a bit of a struggle, but the inner was just like the left side. I chipped the material off it too. Here’s a shot of how much room it had but still wouldn’t come out. Also note the caliper hex head bolts.


Having the pad at that much angle should have been enough to release it, but it was just as stuck as the left side. So I went to O’Reilly’s and got one of their loaner gear pullers. Got the smallest one they had. Tried sticking one of the arms down the opening, hoping to catch the pad on the hook of the arm. But the arm was too fat and it wouldn’t fit. Double rats!

Got on the Internet to see how much slide hammers were. There was one at Home Depot that had an attachment that looked like it would work perfect. But it was $55. I didn’t really want to spend that much, I wasn’t sure if I needed another new tool (already up to 13 new tools on the project), and wasn’t sure when the next time I’d need a slide hammer. Took the gear puller back to O’Reilly’s and asked if they loaned slide hammers. They said yes! But the only attachment they had that would kind of work was shaped like a V with hooks on the ends.

The V was too short and fat to slide down the pad side and hook it, so I had to come up with some way of wiring it to the pad. I tried several variations of wires but each would break. However, I could see it was slightly moving the left side pad. I tried a thicker wire in the pad and then wired one of the V sides to it. It took a couple of wire reloads, but the pad finally submitted.



Moved to the right side with the correct formula. Took a couple of attempts but that pad finally came out too.


Now all I had to do was slide the new pads in and I’d be done. Except they wouldn’t slide in. Even if they did go in, they would never slide back and forth. So fired up the bench grinder and took some extra material off the edges. Once they easily fit, I added a dab of paint onto the exposed metal. Popped them in and buttoned them up. Finally done!


What should have taken me the better part of an hr took me 4 days. When I originally looked at the pads, I thought about not changing them since there was so much material on them. But there’s no way they would have worked properly being rusted in place. At first I thought maybe they were cheap Chinese pads that were a tad oversized and easily rusted from not being used, especially when the new rears slid in without problems. But since the new fronts had trouble going in, I’ll have to rethink that. At least the next owner shouldn’t have issues the next time they need changing.

When I got in and pumped the pedal a few times, the pedal became rock hard and I mean ROCK hard. Looking fwd to trying the brakes on the street. They should be really good.

Onward and upward.

[husker boxster]

Keys
Because of the age of the 928 and the complexity of the key, it is basically impossible to have a key made at a regular locksmith. I have a stubby key that requires a sturdy key ring to be able to turn the key in the ignition. According to Rennlist, the best place to get a replacement key is a place in Australia (yes, down under). You send them a couple of pics of your key and they make a key from the pic. Supposedly they’re very good and highly recommended. The other option is to go to the dealer, go thru the Spanish Inquisition about ownership, fork over hundreds of $$$, then the VIN is sent to Germany for a key.

So I sent a pic to Australia and got a quick reply back. He can make a replacement key from my pic and presented me with several options from a duplicate Porsche key with a light, to a key with a head on it that’s just plastic. During our correspondence, he mentions I have the ‘short’ key and I know what he’s talking about because I’ve seen the various keys that come with a 928 in the owner’s manual.


However, I didn’t know the significance of the short key and my new friend explained it to me. It’s kind of like a valet key in that it will start the car but won’t let you lock the car with it. Now it makes sense why in one of my earlier posts, I found the key wouldn’t unlock the trunk. If I wanted to send a lock to Australia, he could decode the 4 extra tumblers and create a ‘long’ key for me. I needed to think about sending my trunk lock half way around the world.

I got an idea. There’s a guy in Atlanta that’s parting out an 89 S4 that I’ve purchased a few items from. I asked him if he’d sell the ignition cylinder, 2 door locks, the trunk lock, and the key(s) for those locks. He said he would. Right after I rifled off my IM to him, I did a search on Rennlist and found a thread from 2002 where a current 928 specialist will take your VIN and create a key, after proof of ownership. I contacted the specialist and yes indeed, they still do the service. It will cost $135 for the key.

Thinking over the options, I think the prudent selection is the 928 specialist key. The cheapest option would be replacing all the locks, but I’m not looking forward to removing the door cards with their 30 yr old clips. Plus, the next owner would not be able to do the VIN type key replacement anymore. The 2nd best option is Australia, but with COVID, I’m a bit uneasy having my lock circumnavigating the globe. The only ‘issue’ with going with the specialist is they want proof of ownership. Since my shark has been comatose for so long, I haven’t been able to go to the DMV yet for a title in my name. In Neb, if you buy a car from out of state, it must be “inspected” before they issue a title. It’s basically a VIN check to see if it’s a stolen car and the chance to add $10 to their coffers. The specialists weren’t too keen using the title from the previous owners along with the bill of sale. So I’ll have to wait a bit longer before I get the long key.

Windshield
It appears some youngster took a bat to the windshield, so it needs replacing. Or maybe it was the previous owner who snapped at a routine maintenance job that took 4 days. I’ve called my glass place twice. The nice office lady has taken all my info, says she will give it to the owner, and he’ll get back to me. Which he hasn’t done. My last call to him was a week ago Fri. After talking to the lady, I did a search on Safelite because an old thread on RL mentioned them. I surf thru the various option pages and get to the price - $300. To be fair, I gave my glass guy til Tue to get back to me. He didn’t, so on Wed I rifle thru all the Safelite pages and order up the windshield. They going to come this Sat to put it in. In the words of Wesley Snipes in ‘Major League’, “This is good, this is really good”.

An hr later, I get a call from Safelite. They no longer have that windshield in stock. The only option is for them to go thru the dealership and it will be $1500. Ouch! His recommendation was to just go to the dealership myself. It would still be $1500, but if they order the wrong windshield, it’s their fault not mine. Pretty honest on his part, turning down $1500. But I’m not ready to spend 5X what I originally was going to spend. I contacted my key guy in Atlanta who was parting out the S4. I asked if he was interested in selling his windshield. He said he was planning to sell it. Great! I mention mine has the radio antenna embedded in it. He responded and said his didn’t. I think the 89 928 had the shark fin radio antenna on the roof, so his wouldn’t work in mine. Rats! The search continues.

Steering wheel
I’d removed the steering wheel because the stitches had come out of the leather.


Took it to my leather guys who said they couldn’t re-stitch it because the leather had shrunk. I thought maybe they could find a hide that matched and stitch it up. Except they’re not that kind of shop. Did some searching on Rennlist and found a place in MI that did steering wheel leathers. Contacted him and he had several potential options for my color. Just like the outside color that changes in various light, the interior has that same kind of properties – it can look grayish green to brown depending on the light. He was going to send me some samples. I should note the interior code for my car is QG. From my searches, QG is a no-description code that doesn't have a name associated with it, like burgundy or blue or black. I haven't been able to decode what it translates to, so the code is basically worthless.

I’ve also been following the adventures of Casey Putsch on YT since he recently bought a 928. His 928 also had the steering wheel that needed re-skinning. He got his new leather and did a video of him stitching it up while his wife gave him a haircut in the driveway. He mentioned the place he got the leather from and I went out to the site. He listed an available color of gray-green. I contacted the guy and he sent me a pic of the color.


That’s my color! I ordered up the leather and it’s on its way. Once it arrives, I’ll have to decide whether I’ll try stitching it myself or take it to my leather guys. Stay tuned…

[dghii]

Enjoying your build! Always loved the look of this car and appreciate it even more as it seems that most modern cars all look the same.

[Racer Boy]

If you do stitch the steering wheel leather yourself, will your wife give you a haircut in the driveway?

Great to see that the progress is continuing!

[husker boxster]

Originally Posted by Racer Boy

If you do stitch the steering wheel leather yourself, will your wife give you a haircut in the driveway?

Great to see that the progress is continuing!

No wifey but there are several ex-GFs who would love to have a razor in their hands standing behind me.

Originally Posted by dghii

Enjoying your build! Always loved the look of this car and appreciate it even more as it seems that most modern cars all look the same.

Thanks. They are great cars, just wish she'd cooperate a bit more.

[husker boxster]

Wheels
Nothing I tried would dissolve the paint on the inside of the wheels, so I got the 800 grit sand paper out and finished the other three wheels. They now all look like this.


Sunroof
Moved on to the sunroof. When pushing the button, you would hear things trying to happen, but the sunroof wouldn't move. As you can see here, the sunroof was a tad high on the left rear and seemed to be poking on something about an inch from the rear. The sunroof was loose on the right side.



I pulled the cover off the sunroof motor / trans area. I removed the motor and tried running it via the switch. It worked fwd and back. Then removed the trans and connected it to the motor. The trans worked when I did the switch. So the sunroof mechanism is bunged up. 928s are supposed to come with a sunroof wrench which is used to manually open and close the sunroof, but this is one of a very few items that's missing with my car. However, I have a friend in our club who has an 87 S4 5spd and he was wanting to give it some exercise and see my S4 (we live approx 50 mi apart). He brought his sunroof wrench with him. I replaced the trans and inserted the wrench, turned it while my friend pushed down on the sunroof. It moved! With a little work, we got it all the way open.


It will take a bit of work to clean the tracks, but getting it open was progress. And all the mechanical / electrical parts work.

Here's a pic of my friend's 928. It's very nice.


Trans Fluid
Time to move to the automatic trans flush. I put the Mistress up on ramps to give me plenty of room to maneuver under her. Once I got her up in the air, I found 2 problems:



Problem 1 is an electrical line that was broken in 2 places. I'd seen this line hanging down before, but now was the time to address it. Discovered that it's the line for the trans kick-down (dropping to a lower gear when you step on it and it evidently also changes the timing). Problem 2 is apparently the seal in the front of the trans that was leaking. That's not good. Will have to think about this one. Here's what the kick-down line looks like when removed.


The end of the wires wasn't a big deal, but the broken wires by the rubber elbow cover was going to be a problem. My plan was to splice some new wires inside the cover. I moved the elbow away from the connector and discovered the connector came apart with screws and revealed two female ends with wires soldered into them. I unsoldered the wires and soldered 2 new wires into them. Put it back together and it was good as new. All I have to do is splice it to the existing wires.



I decided to move ahead with flushing the fluid. Addressing the seal will mean removing the trans. I'm not ready to tackle that job. Maybe the seal will expand after driving a bit?

I'm at my max for pics in this post so I'll continue in a 2nd post.

[husker boxster]

Trans Fluid pt II
I pulled the drain plug on the trans, then removed the pan. The torque converter also has a drain plug. I thought the torque converter would be inside the trans pan area but it's separate. In fact, the area where the leak is is where the TC is located.


You rotate the flywheel until the TC drain plug appears in the open area of the grates. After about 20 min of going under the front of the engine to rotate the flywheel and then crawling under the center of the car to look at the trans and not finding the drain plug, I asked my neighbor to watch for the drain plug while I turned the flywheel. It took a quarter turn for it to appear. I thanked my neighbor for his help.

I drained the torque converter and let the trans drip overnight. The existing fluid didn't look too bad - had a nice red look to it. The old filter didn't look very dirty either. The next day I cleaned up the parts, put the new pan gasket on the pan, and put everything back together, including a new filter.



Now for the hard part - refilling the trans. Porsche in their infinite wisdom put the reservoir next to the trans and also next to a muffler. And unlike a normal car, there isn't an easy way to access the reservoir unless you crawl under the car. To fill it, you have to remove the reservoir cap, fill the trans, start the car and let the torque converter fill, add more fluid, then run the car thru each gear, fill again, and then put the cap on before shutting the engine off. If you shut the engine off before putting the cap on, fluid will gush out. However, the cap is at an odd angle and tough to put on under ideal conditions, but you'll be dealing with a hot trans and an even hotter muffler. I wasn't looking forward to that and procrastinated a few days.

I posted on RL to see if there was another way. Turns out there is. Porsche put a 90 deg port on the trans with a check valve.


With the proper attachment, you can connect a hose to the port and push the trans fluid in. But I don't have the proper attachment. Someone said you could attach a hose with a clamp. It just so happens the tube I used to fill the trans on my Cayman fit nicely on the port. I put a small hose clamp on it. Would the fluid push the check valve open or would it squirt out the end of the hose? I'd just purchased a giant syringe from Pelican and it came with 2 lines - a solid and a flexible line.


The solid line fit right inside my trans tube, so I attached it to the hose with a hose clamp. I put the flexible line into the gallon of trans fluid (it requires 2 gallons). I'd connect to the flexible line, draw a syringe full of fluid, then attach it to the fill hose. First try worked like a charm - no spilled fluid and the check valve opened. It all went in the trans. I pumped the 1st gallon into the trans. That filled the reservoir to a good level.


Time to start the engine, which sucked a bunch of fluid into the torque converter. Put 2 more quarts in after starting the engine. Ran her thru the gears. Put another quart in and ran it thru the gears again. Put another quart in. Shut the engine off. The reservoir was at the proper level and didn't leak.


While the engine was running, I checked for gas leaks. No leaks around the injectors and the fuel pump was dry too.

I planned on replacing the high pressure power steering hose while she's on the ramps. Should be simple - a banjo bolt on ea end of the hose. But I did some research and found you have to remove the alternator to get to the front bolt of the hose. And to remove the alternator, you have to unbolt the fan shroud and move it up so 1 of the alternator bolts can be removed. To get to the rear hose bolt, you have to remove the sway bar hold down and let the sway bar swing down. I might sleep on that job (for a few days).

Next up are the plug wires and the last fuel line replacement.

[husker boxster]

Steering Wheel
I ordered the leather for the steering wheel a while back. A good week went by after ordering and I hadn’t received it yet, so I called the guy. He remembered I had ordered the gray-green leather. He said it was about ready to send. OK. Another good week goes by and I still haven’t gotten anything. I’m beginning to wonder if I’ve just flushed $100 down the crapper? Call him again. He apologizes and says he’s been extremely busy. Says he’ll ship it out in an hr and get the tracking number to me. A couple hrs go by and no email. The next morning there’s an email from him with a tracking #. Thank goodness. The leather actually arrives a day early and it appears to be a perfect match. The kit comes with 2 curved needles, silver thread and instructions. Besides the wheel sections, there’s also pieces that will need to be glued onto the base of the wheel. While I haven’t had a haircut in 2 mo, I’m not going to attempt sewing and gluing the leather onto the wheel even w/o a haircut occurring. I’m going to see if my leather dying guy will do the sewing. I want it to look nice now that I have the proper leather.

Spark Plug Wires
I purchased a set of wires a while back and set them aside for the proper time. There were various colors available but I chose red. When it was finally time to do the plug wires, I found that set to be not a very good replacement. They were too long and looked sloppy. The guru in Dallas had a set of wires that were an exact match to the factory wires and even came with the plastic clips that hold the wires in formation. So I bit the bullet and bought a 2nd set of expensive of plug wires. They arrived and looked perfect. The red set is going to ebay.

This particular iteration of the 928 engine has 2 distributors – one on each cylinder bank. Here’s the engine with the spark plug wires removed.





You would think the wires for the 4 cylinders of right bank would go to the right distributor and the 4 cylinder wires of the left bank to the left distributor. But that would be wrong. Porsche decided to route the wires from the 2 center cylinders of ea bank to the opposite side’s distributor. So cylinder wires for 2 & 3 of the right bank go to the left distributor and cylinder wires for 6 & 7 on the left bank go to the right distributor. To keep the wires organized as they cross over the front of the engine, Porsche created a fence that’s bolted onto the front of the engine. The left hand wires go behind the fence and the right wires go in front of it. Took several attempts (like 5) to get everything spaced properly and ensure they’re sequenced properly (7 above 6 and 3 above 2), but once it was all aligned properly it looked factory.

I also took advantage of having access to the last fuel line I needed to replace while the plugs wires were removed and the radiator hoses unhooked. Here’s a pic of the new line on the left and the old line on the right.



The old line connected to a regulator on the left side of the engine, went under the thermostat housing, snaked its way into the intake valley, then over the right cam cover and connected to the incoming fuel line (the actual fuel flows the opposite direction but easier to describe it this way). The old line on the right has a small section that is rubber and this is the problem area. As the rubber gets old, it can crack, causing fuel to spray on a hot engine. Not good unless you like 928 BBQ. The new line just goes in an arc and eliminates all the snaking around. Once I had the spark plug wires all connected, I put the new fuel line on.

Here are the results.





And here’s the finished product with the radiator hoses reattached.



I filled up the radiator overflow tank and was ready to test fire. She started right up and ran well. I check for any fuel leaks with the new line. There were a few tiny drops around the fitting at the regulator. I figure I can give the nut a small turn with the wrench to tighten it up. As soon as I touch the nut, it squirts gas. Poof! The center of the engine starts on fire! Crap! Normally I’m prepared with a garden hose and I have Punkin out in the driveway out of harm’s way. I have neither, as I was in a bit of a hurry. I rush to shut the engine off (I have to open the door since the windows don’t go up and down). The flames are still going. I had a bucket of water handy that I’d been using to clean something. Luckily there was enough water in the bucket to dowse the flames and I didn’t need to crack open the fire extinguisher. I figured I’d have all kinds of problems with burned wires to now track down. Amazingly, there appeared to be 0 damage. Wow! I tightened the nut, backed Punkin out of the garage, and got the garden hose ready. She fired right up (in a good way). No issues with running and no more pesky droplets.

I was in a hurry prior because I wanted to take her out on a test run in the neighborhood. So now I’m wondering if that’s a good idea. Still no fuel leaks. I decide to take a 5 gallon bucket half full of water, along with a gallon jug of water and the fire extinguisher on my test drive. Decide to venture out of the neighborhood and into rush hr traffic to go to the local gas station for a dab of fuel. Everything went well other than she died a block from the return trip home, but instantly restarted and got me back.

Sorry, no video of the fire but here's a boring video of the test drive adventure, if you’re interested in watching.




Sunroof
Yesterday I worked on the sunroof. I cleaned the opening, which was very dirty. The tracks were grimy so I sprayed some carb cleaner on them to clean them. There were a couple of spots on the track rails that had their paint worn off. I assumed this was where there was extra rubbing, so took a hammer and 2x4 and knocked them down a bit. The sunroof moved better manually but still not free enough for the motor to do the job. I’ll need to do more research as the article I have on removing the sunroof must be for a different model yr as nothing he’s saying is matching up. There’s only 1 video on YT but it’s for an 83 and it’s different. Back to the Internet.

Title
I found out the inspection site is open for business, but the DMV is closed. You have to put your paperwork in an envelope and drop it in a box. The DMV folks will then handle your paperwork and mail the newly issued title to you. Things never go well at the DMV under “normal” conditions and I can see LOTs of potential problems with this system, so I need everyone’s positive energy on this as I get the nerve up to give up possession of the title, bill of sale, and the power of attorney from the seller into a drop box. What could go wrong? Thanks in advance for positive thoughts.

But my friend dropped his 09 Cayman S off this afternoon. I need to clean the interior, take some pics, and write the ad, so the shark is on the sidelines for a few days as I prepared to sell his CS for him.

[Racer Boy]

on the story about your dad putting the Ford into Park.

Great to see the progress that you are making!

[husker boxster]

It seems like I haven’t gotten a lot done on The Mistress lately, but now that I’m going to chronicle the last 2.5 wks, it appears I have a lot to report.

Steering Wheel
I got a call over a wk ago from the upholsterer. He wasn’t happy with the fitment of the leather on the top of the wheel. He said he had extra material and the holes weren’t going to line up well. He felt the best soln was to cut it and make a seam at the top of the wheel (there already was a seam in the lower half). He caught me as I was walking onto the golf course. I said that was fine. The next day I got an idea of putting a stitch of black leather as a wheel center marker. The proper color for the swath would be cream to match the seats, but that’s not a common color, so I thought black would be easier to employ. I texted him some links to some wheels on Suncoast’s website. I didn’t hear back and got busy and didn’t call to see if he got my text.

Yesterday he called and said the wheel was finished. I drove to Lincoln this morning to pick it up. It looked very good but didn’t have the black center swath, just a seam. I asked him if he’d gotten my texts. He said he doesn’t do texts. OK. My bad for not following up. It ended up being $225 (we agreed on that price after the phone call about the seam) and it was well worth it as it looks very nice.




Windshield
Someone on RL found a source for the elusive 85-88 928 windshield. It was an Italian parts store in ATL. He got the windshield for $760 + $200 shipping. It arrived in good shape and the installer had no issues putting it in. He gave the contact info in his thread so I beat feet to get an order in. I go to the website and see the price is now $840 + $200 shipping, but hey, beggars can’t be choosers. That price is still $250 cheaper than from Porsche. Order it up and wait for a tracking #. Get an email instead saying the w/s is on back order and will take 2 wks. OK. I wait 2 wks and don’t hear anything from them. Called them this morning. They called back and said they hadn’t heard anything from that supplier so they’ve sourced the w/s from someone else but it will be 2 wks. Let’s hope.

Key
The key hasn’t arrived. Left a msg with the nice lady in NC.

Dash
I took the dash apart to replace the faulty odometer gear. I had to remove the dash pod, then pull the dash cluster out from behind.





Once I got the speedometer out of the cluster, it was obvious the old wheel was in sad shape.





I was able to get everything apart and put back together again. I also spent a lot of time cleaning electrical connections in the hope that would solve my lack of instruments working. Everything went back together and looked nice. Popped the cluster back into the dash pod, cleaned the 3 wire plugs, and put it back together loosely. Put the key in, started the engine, and… No instruments. Shoot. Will need to look at fuses and relays next.

Window Switches
I purchased a pair of window switches hoping this was the cause of the no window workie issue. Purchase the pair from our sponsor’s site. Pull the passenger switch out (plus the 2 ft of attached wires), install the new switch, and find that 2 of the 4 wires are 2” short. WTF!?! Here's a comparison of the old and new wires.



I go back to the website and look at the page. There’s 1 comment and it says 2 of the wires are short. Crap, wish I’d looked at the comments. Why in the Wide World of Sports would anyone produce it like that? The other 2 wires are the exact proper length. The site does sell another switch, but it’s $75 instead of $44. For $31 x 2 I can get my soldering iron out and make the wires longer.



Do both sides and now for the moment of truth… No workie. I check the fuse again but it looks good. There’s a complex relay also associated with the windows and the sunroof. Not sure how to test it, but I’ve gone ahead and ordered a new relay. Figure the switches and relay are 30 yrs old so it’s adding value replacing them even if they’re not the culprit. If the relay doesn’t solve the problem, will look for broken wires in the doors.

Sunroof
I’ve saved the best for last. The new sunroof trans arrived and I put it in. Hit the switch and the sunroof went completely open and then completely closed. I adjusted on fitment a bit more and got it looking a bit better. Still worked fine. I popped the headliner back in and even got the 3 impossible screws in. Tested it again, worked fine. Then decided to do a water test, so I poured a glass of water over all the edges. No water inside, all ran out the drain holes (which I’d cleaned earlier with the trombone cleaner). Think I can consider this one at the Done Sign.



Obviously you can tell I haven’t had a haircut in 3.5 mo. Sorry about that.

I still have several things to track down, but I’m getting closer. However, I’ve had to spend a bunch of time recently getting ready for our DE this upcoming weekend. I’m the club’s registrar and we’ve had almost double the entries for this event – lot’s of pent up desire to hit the track. That’s great except it makes for a lot of paperwork on my part. And we have a lot of COVID paperwork too. I’ll also be instructing at this event as well as observing the classroom sessions as I prepare to become a Chief Driving Instructor. Oh yeah, I have to get my car ready too. Once the DEs done, I have two people who are interested in me selling 3 of their cars. This retirement gig keeps me really busy. Maybe I need a job to allow me to slow down.

[husker boxster]

It’s been awhile, but today was a major milestone.

Windshield
The guy in ATL continued with the ‘you’re still on 2 week back order’, so I began looking elsewhere. A local glass shop said they could get the windshield for me and in fact had one in their warehouse in KC. I specifically requested an 85-88 with the antenna. Yep, they had it and would have it in OMA the next day. Could put it in at my house on the following Tue. Before I committed, I needed to see if I could get out of my ATL commitment. I was able to, so ordered up the local w/s. Everything is good.

Tue arrives and so do the installers. The main guy’s done a 928 w/s before and says mine looks good & shouldn’t be difficult. They pull their stand out of the truck and put the new w/s on it. I look and say it’s the wrong one. No radio antenna. Crap! They call the boss and he says he’ll do some calling. To their credit, the w/s has a tag on it that says 84-95, so it probably showed it would work in their computer system.

Several days go by & I don’t hear back from the boss, so I call. He says he has a couple more contacts he needs to talk to. A week goes by, still no word. I debate whether I should buy the $350 w/s and deal with a different antenna. Not sure how the earlier models do the antenna, but in 89 they did a shark fin antenna on the roof. However, I’m not too excited about this for 2 reasons: 1. I have to drill a hole in the roof and 2. I’ll have to remove the leather headliner to fish the wire to the antenna. The leather may be shrunk in its old age and may not want to go back into place. Kind of a defeatist attitude but nothing has gone to plan with this project.

My other option is to bite the bullet and bye the uber expensive factory Porsche w/s. I’ve had a good run of Wheeler Dealer sales lately, so I decide to splurge with the factory model and get this part of the project to the done sign. I stopped at the dealership Mon afternoon and place the order. $1366 (after PCA discount) + $160 for primer (whatever that is) + $220 for shipping from Germany. With tax, it comes to $1872!!! The parts guy tells me it will probably take a week to arrive (yeah right, I’ve heard that before). The local glass company happens to be next door to the Porsche dealership, so I stop over and set it up for them to install it when it arrives. Yesterday morning I get a call from Porsche and the w/s has arrived. Wow! 3 days. I asked if it was already in some warehouse in the US and they said no, it shipped from Germany. I call the glass people and they can come this morning.

A different guy arrives this morning and goes to work removing the old w/s and the glue that held it in. Pulls out the new w/s and yes it has the antenna. That’s as close as I got to it after verifying, as I didn’t want to accidentally bump it off the stand. He gets the new w/s installed and charges me $168.

It’s been a long haul to get to this point. Hopefully you’ll indulge me while I show off some pics of the final leg of this adventure.

Current w/s. I think some kids beat it up with a baseball bat. (Or the prev owner got upset with a project not going well.)



Out with the old.





In with the new.






Looks sooo much better. I still have to put the trim around the w/s, but I like admiring it even with the trim off. Will need to rummage thru my box of parts in the basement for the rear view mirror.

The shark has been gathering dust lately while I shifted my attn to my Wheeler Dealer activities. Now I should have more time to get back to her. With the new w/s, she looks significantly better and may be the impetus to get back into the ball game.

Post Script
It looked to me like the installer used his own primer on the window before he dropped it in. So I went on a mission to track down my $160 primer. After a discussion with the glass place and then the dealership, I got $160 refunded on my cc. Yay! Takes a little of the sting off.

[piper6909]

A new windshield makes such a huge difference, doesn't it?

I've always been impressed with windshield installers. Particularly how one person can handle something of that size an plop it down with such precision. Then they smack the hell out of it to seat it and somehow they don't crack it! I tried installing a windshield in my teen years, but had no such luck. I immediately cracked it when I tried to seat it.

[dghii]

Love the update! Stay after it!

[PaulE]

Thanks for the update. Sorry you had to pay so much for the windshield! Someone around the corner from me is selling two 928's as a package deal for $9,900. One is a yellow 79 that runs and has some things he knows need to be fixed. The other is a red 87 European model as a parts car. Your posts enable me to live vicariously rather than dive in way over my head!

[husker boxster]

I was searching the interweb 2 weekends ago for a windshield molding clip and accidentally found the plastic seat gears I stripped back in April on the passenger seat when I attempted to move the seat forward with the manual crank. I had left that project off my To Do list since I figured those gears would be unobtainium. But there they were on our favorite sponsor’s website. Finding them inspired me to pick the baton back up on this job. Ordered them both (wasn’t sure if I needed one or both) and went to work Mon morning to see if I could get the seat out. To refresh your memory, Porsche in its infinite wisdom holds a 928 seat in place with 6 bolts – 2 in front and 4 (?!?) in the rear. I could move the seat back far enough to get the 2 fronts out. I could move the seat fwd enough to get the 2 rear bolts out but not the 2 fwd rear bolts. Cranking the seat with the manual tool got it fwd almost enough to get the bolts out but I needed a good ½” to get an allen wrench on them. That’s when the gears broke and I left it to marinate.

With the seat bottom lifted as high as it could go, from the front I removed the motor with 1 of the gears attached then the other gear which was held in place by a snap ring (which went flying off somewhere). This gave me access to the square cables that run the seats. I popped a drill on the left cable and was able to move the left side fwd enough to get to the bolt on the left track. I removed the fwd one and put the rearward one hand tight so the seat wouldn’t flop around. When I tried the drill on the right cable, it moved slightly fwd but not quite enough to get to the fwd bolt. Still needed ¼ to ½” to fully access it. The cable seemed stuck or jammed or as far as it would go, so I didn't want to go any farther and cause damage. So close but yet so far.



I posted a question on RL to see if anyone had any ideas. A couple were proffered, however, by now it was 100 deg so I waited until the next day to try them.

Tue morning I looked to see if either suggestion would work. Nope. I went back to the right side cable. It had a protective plastic cover on it, with the end being a fat nozzle. This prevented the drill from getting a decent grip on the cable. So I removed the plastic covering, which gave me more cable to insert into the drill. Made sure I had the drill tight on the cable and gave it a slow twist forward. It moved. I now had enough room to get to the final rear bolt. Success!



I lifted the seat off its base, unplugged the power cord, and then rested the seat on the center console and door sill. I cleaned the threaded slide bolts (had already gotten the majority of the crap off earlier this spring) and then shot some lithium grease on them. Ran them back and forth with the drill and they ran well. Then measured them up so each side was in the same place. As I removed the seat, the snap ring that went flying was on the trans tunnel carpet. Yay! I hauled the seat into the basement where I'll do more cleaning on the tracks later. I also wanted to do some work on the switch I installed earlier this yr, as it felt like 1 or 2 of the steel balls may have fallen out of place.

With the seat out, I could turn to cleaning the area under the seat. This is the last spot in the interior I had left to clean. There's still a bit of funkiness in the interior and I'm hoping getting this area cleaned will eliminate the remaining smell. It defn needs some cleaning.




I also fished a lot of coins out from the track by the console. None of them were deformed but they don't need to be in the track area. Turns out it was $1.63 and with the remaining change from the driver’s side, I’ll parlay it into a PowerBall ticket. Might be inclined to keep the shark if I win the jackpot. Keep your fingers crossed…

The new gears arrived Fri afternoon so yesterday I began replacing the snaggle-toothed gears. Turns out both gears were missing teeth and ordering both gears was the proper call.



Both were held in place by small snap rings. I was trying to decide how to remove them without having them fly across the garage. Both came off with relative ease. Got the new gears on and the snap rings back in place. It took some effort to get the final snap ring on that held the gear in seat frame (the one that went flying). I needed more hands than I had available. I ended up wiring the gear to the frame and popped the snap ring on. Took quite a bit of effort but I got it.




I laid the seat on its side so I could use gravity as my friend when resetting the seat switch. Took a couple of attempts to get it where I liked the movement of the switch.

I’m ready to put it back in. Get it dropped into the car and plug the cable back in. Put the 4 rear bolts in. Hook up the battery to allow me to move the seat back to expose the front holes. It moves backwards just fine. I try moving it fwd. NOTHING. Crap. I need to take the seat back out to see what’s wrong, but since it won’t go fwd, THE REAR BOLTS ARE COVERED! Double crap – I’m right back where I started. I’m thinking I’m going to have to tear it all apart again and use the drill to get it to move fwd. Dadgummit. Then I realize I have the manual crank, so I give that a try. It moves fwd enough I can access all 4 rear bolts. Whew!

After removing the seat, I laid it on its side and popped the switch out of the case. It looked like the fwd motion copper blade had some solder or JB Weld or something on it. Must have had some issue before and was “fixed”.



Remember back in April I pulled the new switch out of the new case so I could pop it into the old case in the seat. It looks like I need to replace the old case with the new case. Now that the seat is out, that’s not a big deal, just have to document where the 6 wires go, cut several zip ties that hold it to the other switch wires and pull it out of the enclosure holding the case. It gives me a little struggle but succumbs.



I popped the new switch into the new case and decided to call it a day since I needed to mow the lawn. I used that time to plot how to fish the new switch wires through a very small area.

Today I began by tying a 12” twist tie to the wires and snuck the twist tie exactly where it needed to go. The wires came thru perfectly. Referenced my documentation pics to be sure the wires went where they belonged. Of course the new wires were different colors but thankfully were the proper length for the various locations they belonged. I guessed on 4 of the 6 wires as to polarity but thought I had them. Put the seat back in, connected the power cord, and put the 2 rear bolts in hand tight. Did a tiny rear motion, then fwd. It worked. Pressed the up portion of the switch. It went down. Pressed the down button. Nothing. Hmmm. Removed the rear bolts and swapped the wires on the up-down motor. Put it back with the 2 rear bolts hand tight. Pressed the up button. It went up. Pressed the down button. It went down. Perfect! Everything was working as it should. I removed the rear bolts 1 more time and stuck a couple of zip ties on the wires. Put all 4 rear bolts in, moved the seat back and put the 2 fronts in. Done and working as the good DR intended. And a job done that I wasn’t looking forward (pardon the pun) to tackling.

[PaulE]

Thanks for the update! I don't know how you'll be able to even think about selling this when you're finished with it!

[husker boxster]

Sometimes you should leave well enough alone…

Since 928s are known for their sketchy electrical connections, I decided to clean all the fuses by removing them 5 at a time, sanding them with an emery board, then spraying the fuse spades and socket with deoxit to clean the connections. There are 44 fuses but I did them all. Only found 1 that was blown and it was for some non-important function. I also pulled many relays and sprayed their sockets.

Then I decided to test my brake lights. I attempted to hook up the battery in the dark (I had the garage door down and no lights on in the garage). There was a big spark when I tried to connect the negative cable. Huh? Tried again – another spark. I turn on the lights and see I had the battery charger hooked up to the battery but it’s not plugged in. Removed the cables and connect the battery, turn out the lights and am surprised to see the light that illuminates the dash is on. OK, just adjust the wheel under the dash to turn it off. Nope. The wheel spins but never turns off the light. Looks like I’ve found the drain on my battery. Test the brake lights and have 2 working out the 3. Good enough for govt work.

We’re heading into Labor Day w/e and I get a few email ads from various tire stores about sales. Unfortunately, they’re selling tires brands I didn’t want to buy for the shark. Looked at Firestone’s website and found a set of Indy 500s that would cost me $100 / tire and $513 out the door. Checked Discount Tire for a set of BFGs and they were slightly more expensive. Discount was giving away a $50 credit card but only if you bought Michelins. I decided to go with the Indy 500s. There’s a Firestone store just 2 miles from my house, so even better. Except the last time I had the Mistress running, her idle was bouncing up and down and when it finally stabilized, it was very low and she usually died. I needed to see if this was still the case and would I trust her to go 4 mi.

Hook up the battery, turn the key, hear the fuel pump energizing, and then nothing. Engine doesn’t turn over, no clicking, nothing. Just silence. The first thing that runs thru my mind is I’ve shorted my $500 rebuilt computer with the big spark. Lots of things run thru my mind at that point, but none of them were good. Am I going to have to send it back to AZ for another rebuild? Will it cost me another $500? Can I maybe take my computers to my friend’s house and try them in his S4? I’m not happy. After I calm down a bit, I realize this is different than before my computer was rebuilt. Prior to the rebuild, the engine would turn over, it just didn’t have any spark or fuel. Now the engine wouldn’t turn over. So it’s probably something else, but what?

Labor Day night I had requested an appt for Wed at Firestone. Very early Tue morning I get a call from them. They say they don’t have the tires at their store but the tires are at their warehouse. If I can bring my car in after lunch, they can install them. Since the Mistress isn’t running, I have to devise a way to get the 928 wheels to Firestone. I get busy after breakfast getting the shark up on jack stands and the wheels off. Thankfully I have the Cayman at my house so I can load 2 in the back and take them over. I was trying to get this done before the apocalyptic rains began and was ready to load just as the skies opened up. Decided to wait until after lunch to maybe catch a break with the rain. No luck so I load 2 and head to FS. Their guy greets me and I say I’m going back home to get the 2nd pair. He asks if I live far. I said no. He thought they might be able to have these 2 swapped by the time I get back. Cool. Sure enough, when I get there with the 2nd pair, the first pair is done. I pay for them and take them home. Come back and the 2nd pair is done and waiting for me. Got the job done in 3 trips rather than 4. And now baby has a new pair of shoes.





I return back to my no-start conundrum. If it’s from the big spark, maybe I’ve blown a fuse so I check all 44 again. None blown. OK, maybe a relay. Electricity is not my strong suit but I do have a multimeter. I google how to test a relay and it doesn’t look too bad. You hook 12 volts to two of the prongs. You should hear a clicking noise. Then have your multimeter on ohms and poke the other 2 prongs. The meter should jump around with values less than 1 but isn’t a constant number 1. Run thru many of the relays, making sure to test the start related relays while skipping some of the not-as-important ones. A single relay is iffy so I replace it but it wasn’t directly related to starting. The rest test well. Not feeling confident that I’ve done anything positive but I put the multimeter away and hook up the battery again. The fuel pump energizes and the engine turns over and immediately starts! Yay! And the idle seems to be hunting less but still a shade low. Post mortem, I think a relay may have been stuck open and me zapping it with 12 volts jarred it loose and allowed it to close the circuit. At least that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

Today I started to put items scattered around the basement and garage back on the shark. Our club is hosting a car show and meal next Sun and I want to display the Mistress. I finished cleaning the interior and mostly put it back together. Late in the afternoon I called an audible. I was planning to drive her around tomorrow to build up some confidence but decided I should do it this afternoon as my neighbor across the street was home with his pickup. Thought it might be wise to have him available to tow me home in case there was a problem. Asked him for his cell #, said I was going out for a drive, and I was leaving a log chain out by my garage door. He said he’d be willing to pull me home if need be. I reloaded my NAPA 5 gal bucket with H2O along with my fire extinguisher and was ready to go. Drove around the neighborhood for at least 15 min with no problems. Tomorrow I should be able to put the air cleaner and snorkels back on the engine. I might tear into the dash to look for some remaining problems, but I’m trying to decide if I should heed the advice I began this post with. I will defn be doing some polishing before the big event on Sun. The Mistress needs to look good for her coming out party.

[husker boxster]

I began the week by reassembling the interior and engine compartment with items laying in my basement and garage. It always takes longer to reassemble because you have to clean everything before replacing it. It was fun and enjoyable to see both the interior and engine bay back together. You get used to seeing her with no carpets or air cleaners.

The exterior make-over is next. Started with clay barring everything, followed by taping all the areas that don’t need to be hit by the buffer or its slop. The Mistress is ready for step 2.





Next up is buffing with mild rubbing compound. I normally do this step to remove swirl marks and minor scratches on my Wheeler Dealer cars but this was more of a shine restoration attempt. She came out looking pretty good. Step 3 is a polish. Wow, she’s starting to look really good. Final step is wax. Dang, I think I’ve knocked at least 2 feet off that 10 footer paint job. She’s looking very shiny. Once again, I’m so used to seeing her dull and covered in dust, it was nice to see an actual shine. I’ll add pics in the next post.

A while back I looked at the rear lights, investigating several outages. I had a left brake light and right turn signal light not working. I also discovered the 4 tail lights were out too. The tail lights are single filament bulbs and 3 of the 4 bulb tabs in the sockets were rusted off. I decided on Fri to tackle this job, but first...

***DISCLAIMER***
I am not an electrician. I am not very good with electricity. I don’t play an electrician on TV and I didn’t stay at a Holiday Inn Express. At times electricity baffles me. I got chastised on RL for using an emery board on my fuses. They said I should just go ahead and replace all of them since I’ve probably ruined them. I have a friend who has been encouraging me to start YT channel to document my WD adventures. The RL chastisement is why I don’t want to do my own channel. I do things my way and it might not always be correct. I don’t want to deal with being told I’m an idiot. OK, now back to our regularly scheduled program…

Here’s what 3 of my single filament sockets looked like. The tab is missing.



Here’s what a dual filament socket looks like. The tabs are still in this one.



Here’s the replacement single filament socket I bought.



Not exactly what I need, but I devised a way to make it work. I pulled the wire, plastic washer, and spring out of the replacement socket. I then drilled a hole thru the center of the 928 socket and fed the wire with the washer thru the hole. Put the spring in the socket and tried putting the bulb into socket. Couldn’t get to the latch portion of the socket, so I needed to remove the two ridges in the bridge across the socket (see 3 pics back). Dremelled them down and tried again. Success! The bulb caught and was tight. I clipped the hot wire on the back side of the socket and soldered my new wire to it. Here’s what my handywork looked like (2nd pic is before I soldered the wires together).




I repeated the process on the 2nd tail light socket. Then plugged the light back into the pigtail, connected the battery, and turned on the lights. They worked! Undid everything and shot a few drops of glue on the wires to keep them solid in the hole. It was getting to a point in the day where I had to decide if I wanted to do the other 1 after supper or wait until Sat afternoon. I chose Sat afternoon. Got the 3rd one done easily now that I have the process down. Was looking at the 4th socket. It had a tab in it and I was debating whether I should upgrade it or not. I got my answer when I pulled the bulb out – the tab came with it. So I fixed it too. The test went well – all tail lights are glowing. Not bad for an idiot electrician. Still have the brake light and turn signal to track down. The brake light is vexing as the socket looks good and I have a new bulb installed. Have to give it more thought. I now have a turn signal on the left side (which I didn’t have before) but the right side is still inoperable. I think it might be the front bulb / socket, so that’s my next place to investigate.

[PaulE]

Hi Husker thanks for the update, great work! I saw this website posted on one of the Facebook Boxster groups, maybe you already know about these kinds of places but if not maybe next time you need some electrical bits you can find them here. The website is www.octopart.com. The guy who posted it on Facebook said if there is a number on the connector you can enter it and search in their database. Hope it is useful and keep up the progress reports!