Ger's 2003 Porsche Boxster S

[particlewave]

What size are your bypass pipes?
They sound great!

[tommy583]

Yeah that exhaust sounds pretty sweet, car looks great as well

[geraintthomas]

Originally Posted by particlewave

What size are your bypass pipes?
They sound great!

1" pipes

Originally Posted by tommy583

Yeah that exhaust sounds pretty sweet, car looks great as well

Thank you!

[Nine8Six]

Nice car and hobby you got there. Please post more (subscribed)

[Nine8Six]

dbl-post sry

[geraintthomas]

No worries. About the pre-edited post, the bulbs are from a separate company that were built and designed by a specialist HID company - it's just the lenses that are from ebay, so don't worry

[Nine8Six]

Digging the Black Edition. Think its bad ars

Let us know how you've managed to get the tailpipe blacked out, I intent to do the same to cancel the shinny butt of my car. Just don't know where to begin with this (powder coat, hightemp paint, tar coatings, etc...).

That'll be interesting

[geraintthomas]

Originally Posted by Nine8Six

Digging the Black Edition. Think its bad ars

Let us know how you've managed to get the tailpipe blacked out, I intent to do the same to cancel the shinny butt of my car. Just don't know where to begin with this (powder coat, hightemp paint, tar coatings, etc...).

That'll be interesting

I'll be doing it with matt black spray and matt lacquer to be honest, I won't be using anything high temp. They're only tips so they wouldn't get that hot. I've used standard paint on calipers before and it has lasted years - unless you're putting it onto a rocker cover or actual exhaust pipes, then I'd just use normal paint

Matt black is ridiculously forgiving, you can get a stunning finish to it without even trying. Going to wait until the summer though to do it in one fell swoop.

[njbray]

I painted mine in barbecue paint - it dries to a mat charcoal color and handles the heat.
(they can get hot, especially after a hard drive).
The tips are custom made slip-on fitting. (when I go for smog I can remove them so the exhaust looks standard, so hopefully they don't notice it's bored out and has secondary cats removed!)

[Justin327]

I just sat here and read this whole thread, so much excellent work going in to a very low key package. Absolute class 100% of the way, I love the way it turned (is still turing) out!

[geraintthomas]

Originally Posted by Justin327

I just sat here and read this whole thread, so much excellent work going in to a very low key package. Absolute class 100% of the way, I love the way it turned (is still turing) out!

Thanks very much Justin, much appreciated

[heliguy]

Originally Posted by geraintthomas

Got some wheel nut covers:

Before:


After:


I also ordered some caliper decals to replace the faded ones on the calipers, but had quite a lot spare.

I decided to place one of the larger ones on the wind deflector (sorry for the average photos):







And now onto the caliper. Here's one of the faded ones:



Removed the remains using Meguiars Ultimate Compound and a soft foam applicator:



Applied the decal:



And finished:



Far better.

Did you clear over the decals?

[heliguy]

Originally Posted by geraintthomas

You absolute star.

Thanks to you suggesting to wet sand and polish them rather than lacquer them again, they now have come up as if they've been professionally refurbished. I've done a few sets of wheels before but I've never wet sanded them. I've always thought that if it's just spray cans and me doing it, I don't need it. But jesus christ, after doing a small section of one I had to do the rest. They've come up like a mirror! Thank you!

Have a look:





















Now the the car's clean, do you guys think it suits the darker wheels?

Those wheels look great!!!

[paulofto]

Those pictures look like they came from a sales brochure. Beautiful car Ger!

[BenWillok]

Hi Ger,
I just acquired a 986 from 1997 and after following since several months your amazing posts, DIY tuto, comments, etc., I'm just totally over-excited to start making the old lady look young and great again!
But I just don't know where to start, while thinking that the engine and other mechanical parts should have my attention before starting to work on the looks, right?
Problem is that the car is 20 years old, only 65.000 miles and not having been on the road for more than 2 years, except for a few rides within the compound of the car seller (shop seller, not private), which means not more than 3rd gear and 2k rpm
When I got it last Friday and took it on the highway, it wouldn't go higher than 3k rpm and 60 mph, until I used the tiptronic to pass from 5th gear to 4th and create a small bang from the exhaust, hence dusting out all the exhaust line, brutal but effective
Anyway, engine oil is new, that's about all that has been done to the car by the seller
And problem here is that I can't ask Porsche workshop for a checkup and service as the car is older than 10 years and they don't take responsibility for it blablabla usual BS to make you pay extras
And experienced independent Porsche workshops don't exist here either
So, being quite handy, I'm thinking of doing it myself but would greatly appreciate some guidance from you guys!
Well, that's about all I have to say for now, sorry for the long post hahaha
Ben (Belgian guy living in Malaysia)

[geraintthomas]

Originally Posted by BenWillok

Hi Ger,
I just acquired a 986 from 1997 and after following since several months your amazing posts, DIY tuto, comments, etc., I'm just totally over-excited to start making the old lady look young and great again!
But I just don't know where to start, while thinking that the engine and other mechanical parts should have my attention before starting to work on the looks, right?
Problem is that the car is 20 years old, only 65.000 miles and not having been on the road for more than 2 years, except for a few rides within the compound of the car seller (shop seller, not private), which means not more than 3rd gear and 2k rpm
When I got it last Friday and took it on the highway, it wouldn't go higher than 3k rpm and 60 mph, until I used the tiptronic to pass from 5th gear to 4th and create a small bang from the exhaust, hence dusting out all the exhaust line, brutal but effective
Anyway, engine oil is new, that's about all that has been done to the car by the seller
And problem here is that I can't ask Porsche workshop for a checkup and service as the car is older than 10 years and they don't take responsibility for it blablabla usual BS to make you pay extras
And experienced independent Porsche workshops don't exist here either
So, being quite handy, I'm thinking of doing it myself but would greatly appreciate some guidance from you guys!
Well, that's about all I have to say for now, sorry for the long post hahaha
Ben (Belgian guy living in Malaysia)

A gorgeous example, and I'm very jealous of the roof and interior colour! It's lovely.

That's quite alarming that a 20 year old Porsche never got driven the way it should have. But thankfully it sounds like its new owner will start driving it the way it should!

You're absolutely right in stating that the mechanical condition comes first. My honest opinion would be to change the oil again. The seller has changed the oil, but you've no idea the condition of the engine before hand. The oil could have had metal shavings in it for all you know, indicating that there could be big problems. Do a small service yourself on it that includes:

- Transmission Oil
- Transmission Oil Filter
- Engine Oil
- Engine Oil Filter
- Engine Oil Washer & Plug
- Spark Plugs
- Air Filter

By changing the oil and filter, you can check for any shavings, and if there aren't any, you're good to go and at least you know you've checked everything yourself. The transmission oil and filter will breathe new life into the transmission.

Doing all of the above is quite easy and can be done in a couple of hours. While you're at it, check the condition of your brake discs and pads all round, and make sure the tyres aren't cracked. Even if there's decent tread on tyres, they deteriorate if too old or stood too long, so check for cracks.

If all that's good, then you can go nuts on cosmetics, but you don't want to just mask up problems

Also, get that 'S' badge off the boot. You don't want to be one of those people who tries to make the car into a fake by being something it's not.

[geraintthomas]

So I'm in the middle of doing a radio upgrade...

I've decided to go down a different route to everyone else. I've got a CDR-23 so it's not an easy swap, but thankfully I've not got an amplifier so that does simplify things if only a little. I've gone down the route of an Android head unit by a Chinese company called Xtrons, as I wanted to make use of things like Google Maps, Spotify, and customise it completely to create a Porsche branded radio. Granted, these are made on the cheap but there's been great reviews, and I can tell you that so far it's incredible. Build quality is outstanding, and it's speed is fantastic. It just has to stand the test of time, but to be honest, what electrical component isn't made in China anyway? This wasn't an Ebay jobbie either, and was from the company themselves. They do a lot of custom radios, and are quite common.

It's not finished yet - I've ordered a custom surround as the Porsche double din one doesn't fit these which is a shame, so it won't be a perfect flush fit, but it'll look good nonetheless. I also need a radio antenna adaptor.

Here's the radio I've got:


It's got some incredible features. Being Android it's completely customisable. It's very fast, there's no horrible chrome buttons, the hardware buttons on the left and right are illuminated by RGB LED's and can be changed using any colour you can think of. It's lovely.

I powered it up using a laptop charger that I hacked into, so that I could customise it before fitting it.

Here's the home screen, with a custom Porsche background that neatly places a logo at the top left:


Customised the Android start screen to show my own designed Porsche startup logo:


Trying to make it feel OEM.

Got round to adding some apps (Google Maps, Spotify, etc)

Spotify:


Google Maps:


Notice the 'Porsche' app?




That's the Torque app, but I've customised the shortcut to show that. Torque now opens up custom designed layouts that match the car's interior, and gives me useful information.





Got round to fitting it:


The bezel should be here tomorrow, so it'll look a little nicer.

The awesome thing about it being android is that it's 100% customisable. I can install Netflix if I wished (obviously not going to). I can download Gmail, SoundCloud, even Facebook if I wanted to. It's perfect. The car radio can now diagnose its own problems through the OBD2 port and show real time information as shown above.

And the price? £190.

Now before anyone things "Awesome I'll order mine!", this was far from a plug and play job. I've had to run custom wires from the fuse box, cut the radio harness wires and wire them into the cars adapters myself while soldering spade connectors onto them, I've had to remove the plastic surround and dremel it to fit the new radio, etc. It's not pretty behind it all, but it's finally working.

The bezel is custom fit to the radio and not to the car, so as said before there won't be a flush fit, but it should look a lot better. I may even make a custom made one to fill the gaps, but I'll have to see. I'm also going to remove the alcantara on the horse shoe surround. It's alright but it's not perfect, and I don't want to sound like a snob but I'm not aiming for 'alright' with this car. It needs to be spot on.

As soon as the bezel's fitted I'll take some better photos!

[Nine8Six]

MAJESTICALLY AWESOME X1,000,000

Sooooo want the same

[geraintthomas]

I'm more than happy to help you if you want to buy the same

[Nine8Six]

Well, at that price + look & feel I'd be a fool not to do the same. I'll be in touch for sure - too kind bud

Seriously. It is by far the BEST dash unit I've seen so far for the 986. Speechless...those typeface & colors. ouch. Thanks for sharing this post