Opinions wanted on body condition on this car...

[dotorg]

So, I posted the other day that I was looking at a '68 911L... I had a PPI today, and although there were some minor issues with the car (needs basically all new hoses for the air vent systems, for example), it generally got good marks.

The car had some underbody corrosion, though, that while not actually penetrating the body, certainly needs some attention. It seemed to me to not be all that bad, and likely easily fixed with some cleaning and a liberal application of POR-15, but I thought I'd post pictures and solicit opinions.

The floor of the car: (interior is already cleaned and POR-15'd)


Belly pan, under the gas tank:


Two more:



The engine (newly rebuilt, and a big reason I think the car seems to be a good deal even with some minor rust):



200 miles since rebuild, and was rebuilt with S-cams and other updated parts.

Also, anyone have any idea what color that is? The original car was white and sometime in its murky past it was painted that color. (Murky past because although its a 911L, its got a german dash, clearly swapped out at some point!)

Opinions? I'm pretty new to the whole 911 thing, but my impression and the impression I get from the inspection is none of the rust is terribly problematic, and none of it is structural. There is some minor bubbling in areas of the body, but nothing that seemed too severe to not be easily corrected with some time with a wire brush, some primer and either repainting with this mystery color or an eventual repaint of the whole car...

[john70t]

Yikes! The engine looks beautiful but that rust is scary.
From the pics it kind of looks like metal is missing from behind the front T-bar mount(?). If that is the case it would definitly be a stuctural thing.
Also, the rust on the rockers looks like it is poping up through the paint and should be a big red flag. The painter didn't prep the body before application and there is cancer spreading under that shiny exterior.
I would spend a couple days with a DA sander40 grit/media blaster and take the entire underside to bare metal, the screwdriver test for soft spots, followed by POR15's MetalReady and POR15. POR15 will seal it up and slow down the rust but it won't stop it if it's present. Take the carpet out if there has to be any patch welding done.
That 30 year old undercoat is toast. Mine looked pretty good at first glance, but it peeled away from the metal in dry sheets and in front of the rear tire the screwdriver went strait through the underside in a 10in strip, resulting in a softball sized pile of rust and showed part of an internal reinforcing structure had rotted out. This was a Cali car.

The paint may be metallic blue or robins egg but it's hard to tell from the pics. Good luck and keep us posted.

[B D]

There is a lot of rust to deal with on that car. It will take a lot of time and effort to remedy all that rust, and imagine this what you can see. I have a 68 911L myself so feel free to shoot me some Q's about what things should look like, 68 was a very unique year and the L is even more unique. Get all the car you can upfront for the money you can spend, repairs and parts add up fast.

As far as the color it is Smurf Blue!

[dotorg]

Thanks John...

The carpet isn't currently installed in the car (it comes with a brand new carpet set, though), so that shouldn't really be an issue if things needed to be fixed.

Elbow grease spent fixing it is okay... the current owner is a friend of mine, isn't going to stiff me on it and conveniently has a lift in his garage, so we can take care of the surface cleaning, prep and POR'ing prior to me taking the car, figuring it'll stop the problem, or at least slow it down so the car wont' rot out from under me in a matter of a year or two.

Google searches seem to indicate people have a really high opinion of POR's ability to stop these sort of problems, but this ungalvanized antique car thing is new to me!

[Tim Walsh]

POR is definitly good stuff but I would definitly want to take care of some of that rust. Those rockers look like it's going from the inside out. I'd really watch out for that.

[dotorg]

Originally posted by B D

As far as the color it is Smurf Blue!

Smurf blue, is that an authorized Porsche color?



Thats a better picture of the car with its actual color. I saw a photo of an early 70's 911 in that color, so it appears to be a Porsche factory color, just not accurate for the year. Unfortunately the one picture I saw that was in that color didn't give its name.

[dotorg]

Thanks for all the help guys!

I went up this weekend and put the car on a lift and looked at it myself. Turns out the rust wasn't bad at all. 100% of the belly pan rust was just surface rust. The area just ahead of the gas tank is pretty crunchy on the surface but is structurally sound. In a year I may need to cut and replace that area, though. Body rust is all just tiny spots in paint chips.

In all, a very acceptable condition. I spent a few hours scraping aspault off the underside of the car with two friends... next weekend we're going to finish the job, fully wirebrush the entire belly pan area to a high shine with a wire brush and POR-15 the whole thing so it'll never rust down there again. I'll scrape and POR the support member in front of the gas tank, and everything else under the car while I've got it on the lift -- probably hit the supension components, too.

Winter project will be to drop the engine and finish doing POR in the engine bay. Most of it was done by the previous owner when the motor was out and being rebuilt, but he missed the back of the rear seats. Probably pull the fenders and do the underside of them as well.

My plan is to drive the car first, worry about how it looks second. She won't be a garage queen (even if she does sleep there at night )

[Zeke]

Don't forget to use POR Metal Prep prior to painting.