I think I did something stupid

pope · pope's Garage

My car has a tow hook under the license plate, immediately forwards the tank. One night last week I had to tow the car so I used this hook and had a friend tow me for 4-5kms. I took the cable off and all seemed well until last night. When I opened the trunk and removed the carpet, I saw a gaping hole through which I could see my garage floor

I've unfortunately lost my camera so I can't take pictures but there's a lot of rust in that area which was cunningly hidden with silver paint on top and a layer of tar (?) on the bottom. What has happened is that the hook has peeled off a layer of metal as it was pulled forwards leaving a crack about half an inch wide and 4-5" long. I poked with a screwdriver around the area and it seems that the rust is not spread out (although I'm not an expert in this stuff). Initially, I believed that I had a serious rust issue in an important and rigid part of the car but I now think that some ass put a hook in the wrong place. This, coupled with the rust, coupled with the fact that I took it for granted that this was a factory placed hook, resulted in the current mess :/

It is important that I fix it of course and I'm sure there are ways. What is critically important now is that I find some other way of towing it by TOMORROW. The reason is that the engine is erratic and there are times when it stalls and tomorrow I'm going to take it to a garage. If it stalls I'll need to tow it, or flat-bed it, both of these methods needing a tow hook of some kind.

Is there ANY way of towing the car now? Is there a tow hook in the back somewhere? I just thought about towing it up the truck backwards and I haven't checked if there is a hook in the back.

Zeke · 08-29-2007, 10:26 AM

You can tow the car up on a flatbed w/o the factory hook. The driver wouldn't use that thing anyway. It's more of a tie down than anything else although it serves as a tow hook on level ground. Mostly, they up to the control arms at either end.

If your hook came off (or peeled back some metal) and you can see the ground, you are looking through the gas tank support AND the front suspension pan. I'd look into this further if I were you. It's a common area for rust on a 911.

pope · pope's Garage

The frame in front of the tank which looks like it's its support looks pretty much intact. The crack has opened immediately in front of that, where the fore part of the floor is welded to that frame. I'll get pix soon enough.

So, just to make sure I got this right, they should tie a soft cable around both of the control arms to tow it up the ramp?

Mo_Gearhead · 08-30-2007, 03:47 AM

So, just to make sure I got this right, they should tie a soft cable around both of the control arms to tow it up the ramp?
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That will work.

pope · pope's Garage

Here are a few pix of the damage.

pope · pope's Garage

I'm taking it to a bodywork shop next week. They will most probably never have seen a car like this before. Anything special I should tell them they may need to know?

berettafan · 09-23-2007, 01:56 AM

holy **** are you lucky that didn't tear completely out!

you will be replacing the front pan. very common. parts are not expensive though labor can be.

it may be possible that you don't have much rust in the support and the welds on the hook were poorly done (burned through maybe) but it is not likely.