'66 911 suspension refresh, part III

[Rich Lambert]

The good news:
I got my A-arm brackets back from the machinist and I’ve almost finished putting the front suspension back together. All that’s left is to connect up the brake lines from the struts to the calipers and put in the torsion bars. My wrists, arms, and shoulders are all hurting from bolting up and unbolting the A-arm brackets trying to get the perfect poly-bronze bushings aligned to my imperfect mounting points (let me reitereate; the bushings are precision works of art...my old car is out of spec). I think I got it, except for the flan-bloc bolts. There’s no freakin’ way that bushing is going to move freely with those things torqued down to 37lbs, so we’re torqued to a wee bit less. Pictures to follow tomorrow.

The bad news…and it just sucks:
I found rust in my rust-free car. I was tapping the front A-arm brackets forward with a ball peen trying to get one more .001” so the bushings would turn more freely and these little puffs of dust were falling off the pan. I thought…bugs? So I got out the trouble light, put on my reading glasses, and looked real close. There are little tiny pinholes all over. Man, it just broke my heart to see that.

So…%@$^!!! It looks like a new suspension pan is looming on the horizon. That’s going to put a dent in the 2.0 rebuild fund.

[911s55]

Sorry to hear of the rust!

Welcome for real to the pre-galvanized era!

Rust Never Sleeps!

[Rich Lambert]

Yeah...I really thought I dodged the rusty bullet with this car though.

[Rich Lambert]

Here's some pics.

Front before:


Front after:


After again:


Here's some rust pics.






sigh...

[304065]

Mwahahaha! You call that RUST! That ain't RUST!

Step into my parlour. . .



But seriously, I would hit that vigorously with the wire wheel and spray some Eastwood Rust Encapsulator on it pending a front pan.

A pan replacement is kid stuff for a 911. Just make sure you get the pan and gas tank support for the SWB car. There are a lot of SWB cars out there rolling around with the sheet metal from an SC, owners unsuspecting.

You are still about $20,000 ahead of the rust repair tab a typical "Rust Free California Car" must undergo to be perfect.

That said, until that fix is accomplished, you may want to keep it out of the triple digits, that being the suspension mounting point and all.

[berettafan]

that looks like a REALLY nice swb. i don't think i'd be driving it until the pan is fixed.

that said i wouldn't sweat it too much. howzabout some pics of the trunk?

btw i never realized the swb's didn't have undercoating on them?

[kenikh]

Can't wait to see it, Rich.