Short Video about all the weird/useless/useful controls in a 911

[Joe Bob]

Porsche controls are like a new girl friend.....ya gotta feel around a bit to figure out what turns things on.

[dwelle]

Originally Posted by sugarwood

Many car guys are arrogant dicks.

huh, isn’t that cute.

you know a thing or two about that, do ya shug?...

[2jmotorsports]

Rad. I didnt know about the green rear wiper button, the front wiper delay, or the 2 position rear defrost.

[scarceller]

The heat system is simple if you understand that the 911 has a heat system and a separate fresh air system and they are independent of each other. Once you understand this the system makes erfect sense.

Let's cover the heat levers first: the levers between the seats simply direct heat from the heat exchangers to the cabin. So you pull these up first to get heat into the car.

Then the ONLY other lever for heat is the lower red one on the dash, move this full left and heat diverts to the floor, move it full right it goes to upper windshield vents for defrost.

That's it for HEAT, it's that simple.

OK so what do the other 2 black dash levers do? These are for fresh air and they are separate from heat, these are not heat levers! The top one diverts fresh air to the floor or window defrost.

Center lever activates a blower to assist fresh air into the cabin. This blower does NOT push heat, it only pushed fresh air.

So if you want max heat leave the 2 black top levers on the dash full left pos and pull up the levers between the seats and decide where you want the heat to go with the lower red lever on the dash. Do not activate the fresh air system! Do not turn the fresh air blower on, if you activate the fresh air system and the heat system at the same time you are mixing heat and fresh air from outside and you will not achieve max heat!

If you read the text on the dash lever panel it tells you that for max defrost pull seat levers up and move red dash lever full right. But leave black dash levers full left this send max heat to the defrost vents at the windscreen. But if you move the dash red lever full left it send full heat to your feet. It really is that simple.

Then the fresh air system works well when you do not have AC on and you simply want fresh air from outside at your feet or at the defrost vents.

The confusion happens because both the heat and fresh air systems share the same ducts and air box but other than this they are separate.

It's very rare that I ever use both the heat and the fresh air at the same time, actually I really never even use the fresh air system.

Then to make things even more confusing we have the AC system that's completely separate from the heat and fresh air system. That's another topic.

[ToySnakePMC]

The video was fun to watch, and you taught me a thing or two as a more recent newcomer in this fun corner of our collective car culture! With an owner’s manual in my ‘76 that has 80% of the pages fused together, lol, I can now attempt to seek out fresh air in my cabin. Local air-cooled friend did prove to me that my single center heat lever (did 912E’s only come with one??) actually worked —- if you just pull it up the full distance, lol. Good job! Look forward to your next video.

[scarceller]

Some 911s from the 70s had only 1 heat lever between the seats that opened/closed both both heat flaps, 1 lever for 2 heat flaps. I had a 1975 911 and it had just 1 lever but my 1984 911 has 2 levers.

MAX HEAT = levers up between seats and fresh air system off. Then simply move the red heat lever on the dash to distribute the air to your feet and/or the windshield defrost. Simple.

Originally Posted by ToySnakePMC

The video was fun to watch, and you taught me a thing or two as a more recent newcomer in this fun corner of our collective car culture! With an owner’s manual in my ‘76 that has 80% of the pages fused together, lol, I can now attempt to seek out fresh air in my cabin. Local air-cooled friend did prove to me that my single center heat lever (did 912E’s only come with one??) actually worked —- if you just pull it up the full distance, lol. Good job! Look forward to your next video.

[ToySnakePMC]

Thx Sal! Appreciate your input very much. My car had been on my lift for a month - wish I had looked at the cable routing for my heater flaps. I was pleasantly surprised by the amount of heat you can get off the motor.

[pampadori]

I really liked the video! nicely done, felt quite professional too. Keep 'em coming.

The fresh air slider actually should activate the fresh air blower fan too. It has three speeds, hence the different number hash marks on the slider. Most 911's don't have a working blower. It is a common for them to let the smoke out. Didn't know mine was dead for 3 years of ownership.

[pampadori]

Just thinking about the headlight switch. Do a video on how it has 14 wires coming out of it! it turns on the lights. What else is going on there?

[shadowjack1]

Good video. Thanks.

[GH85Carrera]

Originally Posted by kamaro

My oil level and temp gauges are working and accurate enough for any driving condition, and no, I'm not lying.

Originally Posted by shadowjack1

Good video. Thanks.

It a decent video. My temp gauge and oil level work perfect.



I changed mine out to a calibrated gauge 25 years ago shortly after buying my 85 911.

My Carrera comes with heated outside mirrors. The rear defogger has just one pull out for full power, but I can rotate the knob one click and it turns on the outside mirror heat to de-ice or defog them. In 25 years I have used that once.

I also have cruise control, but it if fairly intuitive.

I instantly knew how to operate the heat levers as I bought a new 914 2.0 way back in 1974. It uses the exact same heat levers and controls.

The headlight washers only operate if the headlights are on. And they really pump the water.

[jchris]

While I have been enjoying this thread I have been doing so with the feeling that I had already learned all this in my own time.

Alas!

After reading Glen’s last post I had to go out to the garage to check my defrost!

I did not know it all after all! My defrost knob indeed does twist to the right!
Nine years of ownership and still some fun things to learn!


Thanks all!

Chris

[Gretz]

Loved the video! Very well made and fun. And as others have said, ignore the haters. I'd like to think I'm part of the younger, hipper crowd on here (some will disagree!) and we need more content like yours. Love the car too!

[Canada Kev]

Originally Posted by jchris

After reading Glen’s last post I had to go out to the garage to check my defrost!

I did not know it all after all! My defrost knob indeed does twist to the right!
Nine years of ownership and still some fun things to learn!


Thanks all!

Chris

I believe that same 'pull but also turn to the right' defroster switch was also sometimes used on the RoW cars that had rear fog lights: pull to turn on front fogs, twist to activate the rears. My RoW is slightly different in that it has a separate pull switch for each of the front and rear fogs.

[Canada Kev]

Originally Posted by pampadori

Just thinking about the headlight switch. Do a video on how it has 14 wires coming out of it! it turns on the lights. What else is going on there?

Don't want to get off on a tangent here, but the headlight switch, despite the number of wires connected, is actually pretty logical. Each of those wires just controls a separate group of lights. Each light group will operate in a different manner based on circumstances like ignition position and light switch position.

For example, if your car is running and the headlight switch is pulled to the second detent, pretty much all the lights are on. But if you turn the ignition switch OFF without changing the light switch, the headlights go out but all the others except for the license plate and ashtray light will stay on. That's because the headlights are connected to terminal number 56 which is only energized when the light switch is in position 2 as well as the ignition switch turned on. Parking lights are connected to terminal 58L and 58R (for, you guessed it, left and right parking lights) which has power whenever the light switch is in any position other than off. The parking light indicator on your tach (terminal 57) has power with ignition on and light switch in position 1.

There are some circuits run out of that light switch that are further regulated down stream.

The fog lights are one example. The fog switch takes the power from the grey wire at the headlight switch, probably connected to terminals 56 or any of the three 58s, and switches it on or off, passing the current down the line to the fog light relay. I moved my grey fog wire to terminal 75 so they could work any time the ignition was on, regardless of the headlight switch position, and would also turn off with the key out.

Another case, and likely why the parking lights are separated left and right on the switch (terminals 58L, 58R), is that when the car is completely off, you can flip the signal light lever and the parking/running light on that side will illuminate steadily, not flash.

I have a light switch matrix showing the terminals and how they act under all the conditions of light and ignition switch position that I've also posted below.

And here's a thread showing my headlight switch adventure a few years back.
Headlights not working properly?

[Bicykiller]

Everyone starts somewhere, it’s a beautiful thing to discover and learn things about your vehicle. Some do it alone in their garage at night and are content with that, but we’re living in a content driven world where the desire to share and entertain is more prevalent.

[stevej37]

What??...no mention of the European parking lights when using the turn signal stalk?
Must be he hasn't discovered them yet.