Great New Porsche 911 Book! (not written by me)...

[Wayne 962]

Hi folks. About a year ago, Lee at Motorbooks asked me to take a look at a new 911 Buyers' guide that they were going to be releasing this year. Reading through the text was incredibly dull and boring, and I thought that this book would be a real lemon. (talk about an introduction).

Well, the book arrived the other day, and it's really very good! It's got a lot of technical info and year-to-year changes. Plus every year 911 is looked at from 1965 through 2001. Each year gets it's own 'chapter' with complete photos of the car and the interior, and what to look for when buying that particular year. I learned some things reading it the other day.

Randy took over for Dean Batchelor on the Porsche Buyers Guide. That book was very glossy on just about every issue. This book is quite the opposite, with much, much more detail. It's actually a very interesting book to read on the different variences of the 911 across the years. Kind of puts it into more of a history category besides it having the buyer's guide title.

Anyways, we now have this book in stock, and I recommend it if you're looking for something new. Pick up a copy of 101 Projects too if you don't have it yet...

You can find it in our catalog here:

http://www.pelicanparts.com/catalog/shopcart/911E/por_911E_documt_main.htm

-Wayne

[epbrown]

Thanks for the heads up. The Illustrated Porsche Buyer's Guide was my first Porsche book, but I agree that it lacks detail; more would likely be impossible in a normal-sized book when you consider it covers the entire Porsche range, from 356s to the 959! It will be nice to see something specific to the 911 but more detailed than Pete Zimmerman's book.

That said, the book is apparently traveling incognito; the links to an image on your page don't work, nor does Amazon have a picture yet, and the book isn't listed on the Motorbooks.com site.

Emanuel

[Wayne 962]

It's on our site right now...

http://www.pelicanparts.com/catalog/shopcart/911E/por_911E_documt_main.htm

-Wayne

[Wayne 962]

Anyone seen this one yet besides me and would like to comment?

-Wayne

[nostatic]

Originally posted by Wayne at Pelican Parts
Anyone seen this one yet besides me and would like to comment?

-Wayne

Well, it depends on how quickly you ship it to me. I'll let you know in a day or so (unless you guys are pokey)

[ChrisL]

Wayne,

Saw this book at Border's last night. I agree, it is beautiful - nice thick glossy pages. But it's kind of weak on content. The author ends up rehashing info for year after year (since frankly there weren't a lot of changes in some years). Not sure I agree with some of the reliability data presented. Apparently I need a new alternator every 40k? It is cool that it presents a quick look at every year from 1965 to 1999 (I think).

I learned that I definitely don't want a 993 targa. The author can't say enough about how the sliding roof fails.

A neat book to look at in the bookstore, but I didn't feel I needed to add it to my collection.

Chris.

[Wayne 962]

It does have some redundancy that I found annoying, but the overall look and feel of the book make it a good reference guide (I thought).

Seems like it is indeed best used as a buyer's guide, or a guide for upgrading to a later model.

The one thing I didn't like about the book is the fact that if you read the section on inspection, you will find that about 99% of the *concours* cars that I know of wouldn't be good enough for purchasing. For instance, he said if the tach needle is bouncing around then "thank the seller and go home..." So, you're going to ditch a perfectly good car because the 25 year old tach is not operating correctly ($125 repair). Seemed draconian to me...

Like I said previously, the pictures and layout really make the book. There are a bunch of useful facts in there, and they are laid out pretty darn well in an easy-to-find format. If you don't know too much about the entire evolution of the 911, then I would recommend it...

-Wayne