Thanks all - I definitely agree, I'm not one to really care about originality unless the car has some special history - mostly, I just want to assemble a car in a way that makes me excited about it. I usually do my best to avoid any body work/paint on my projects, so this really was the best scenario and candidate for me to update some things and not feel too bad about messing with the originality.
The story continues...
Not long after getting the car back on the road after the rear axle situation, I was offered a really great opportunity that would require me to relocate to the Boston area. With 5 cars and 4 motorcycles in tow, the first keyword on my search for housing was "Garage," as I'm sure you could imagine...
Fortunately, I found a place very close to my new office almost immediately that is run by a father-son duo and is more or less a car club and storage facility. A quick phone call confirmed that it would be a great fit, and I'm pleased to say that almost a year and a half later, it has been fantastic.
With that, everything got loaded up into a trailer and shipped to my new life in Boston. Huge shoutout to Paul J from Goodspeed Logistics in Chicago for getting it all hauled out to me safely and quickly!
Now the project can really begin...
But first, I took advantage of the last nice fall weekend last year and drove out to North Salem, NY to visit my nephew for the weekend, and took him to his neighborhood cars and coffee in the car at Hayfields. Always a good stop if you're in the area on a Sunday.
And, of course, have to stop by and see the guys at 1600Veloce...
Okay, now back to Boston to start digging into the car for real!
And it's a good thing that was the plan, because on arrival back at the car club I noticed a sizable oil leak from the Carrera cooler in the front fender. I guess those finned Elephant Racing oil lines are going to have to come sooner than my wallet anticipated...
When I moved to Boston, I quickly (and unexpectedly) met a great gal named Kristen. I remember one of the first weekends we knew each other she asked me what my Friday night plans were, and I told her I had this car project I was going to work on and it's at this garage by my work and she could come if she wanted to, but told her to bring a folding chair and a book or something to keep her busy while I tore into the oil system (and ripped the AC that was left half-installed out while I was at it).
"I'm not just going to sit there, you're going to teach me how to work on cars with you!"
That's when I knew...haha.
So, she ordered us matching coveralls, because you can't work on cars together if you don't look the part, and we were off to the races with project Freddy.
Seriously, how lucky am I?!
While she was getting the AC lines out, I popped the windshield out, as I knew I was going to put a new dash in. Upon doing so, I found that this car is in fact a 911...classic.
So, a quick mask-off, sand-down, and epoxy primer job was in order. Fortunately in a spot that the new windshield seal would completely cover, so I wasn't worried about the body shop this time around.
Now that I have space to keep the car and really start disassembling, that also means that I have the space to start collecting parts for the re-assembly...that's to come with the next update!