Pelican Parts Forums - My Introduction and a Hello to the Pelican World. My first 911

Hello! I’ve been an active reader on this forum for some time now, while looking for my first Porsche. I found her last December, right after my 30th birthday. Happy Happy Birthday for me. So I thought I would introduce and become an active contributor to this forum as well.

I come from a 4x4 background. Growing up in the desert I would outfit International Harvest Scouts for rock crawling and Rallye Racing in Mojave. I moved up to Portland about 11 years ago and left my obsession with big trucks and my go anywhere attitude in California. Keeping my obsession with going fast.

In Portland I run a popular bar slinging nothing but German bier. When my friend and owner expressed interest in getting the bar a Bus for advertising and special event transportation I was immediately first in line to start the search. We put together a 1977 VW Bus in the beginning of 2012 and used it all throughout the year.
In the summer of 2012 my daily driver (2010 Subaru Forester) needed all new tires (one tire had sidewall damage thus needing to replace all 4 tires) again for the third time since I bought it new. A good friend, and avid Porsche enthusiasts, mentioned that I could have bought new tires for a Porsche with the amount of money I’ve spent on replacing tires on the Subaru. Sounded like a logical comparison so the search began. In all actuality it began with searching for a BMW 2002 tii but with the going prices for a tii I could afford a 911sc or Carerra. See you later 2002 hello Porsche.

I decided I need to learn and gather information, as much as possible. Besides being addicted to this site I’ve acquired the following books: How to Rebuild and Modify Porsche 911 Engines, 101 Projects for Your Porsche 911, Haynes 911 Automotive Repair Manual and Owners Workshop Manual, Porsche 911 Buyer’s Guide, Porsche 911 sc Service Manual from Bentley, and Porsche 911 Performance Handbook. I’ve read through most of them before I purchased my Porsche but not until I had a vehicle in front of me did I really start to grasp certain concepts.

So without further ado, here is Mina, my 1978 Porsche 911 sc. The previous owner took good care of her and the engine has had a top end rebuild about 13k miles ago. She currently has around 140K on the chassis. Since I’ve gotten her I’ve had to do a number of minor repairs that needed addressing right away.

First and foremost I did an oil change with a local shop (the on that did the rebuild) and had them do a good once over to make sure there weren’t any building problems. I needed her to pass smog so I had them attempt to tune her to pass but they were unsuccessful (more on this later). There was a squeaking from the alternator belt so I had that replaced as well, squeaking gone!

Knowing I needed to get her to pass smog I contacted Steve from Rennsport Systems here in Portland and chit chatted with him about a shop that would take on this project for me and getting some new seats (I’m a taller driver), amongst other specific questions. He’s a great guy. The next day I set up an appointment with the shop. That same day the passenger side window malfunctioned and needed addressing so this gave me something to have the shop do as well while they were tuning the engine to get it to pass smog. They got her to pass smog, replaced the window channel guide and she was ready for me to start doing the things I wanted to do.

First I detailed the hell out of her, carpets out, greased, lubed and cleaned everything, from seat belt receivers to window arms, all the hinges, basically everything that actuated was addressed. This took me a few days. Then I gave her a good washing and good waxing making sure to get into all her nooks and crannies. Now she shines but needs a few more things.

The heater blower motor was seized so that needed to be replaced, DONE. The door stay metal in the door panel of the driver side was busted out like many are, reinforcement plates installed, DONE! Driver seat back lock was all busted up in the bottom part of the seat, that came out, cleaned and bent back to working order and took advantage of the seat out of the car and bent the bottom S springs according to Peter Brownhill’s “For Tall Drivers” article to give me a little more head room. DONE! While I was in the door panels I replaced the speakers as the original ones were 35 years old and sounded awful.

We are experiencing some colder weather right now and I wanted to start using Brad Penn oil on the next oil change anyways so I took this as a perfect time to do my own first oil change. I ran some Techron gas treatment through a full tank of Ethanol free gas (that’s all she’ll see) and changed over from the Total 20-50W the shop uses to the Brad Penn 10-40W I want to use for the winter (I’ll change back the 20-50W in the spring keeping with the Brad Penn).

The only thing I have left to do as far as small annoying things is fix the ventilation controls in the dash. The middle level is stuck in the middle. Its not really effecting me so its on the bottom of the list of things to do. Right now I just want to drive her and save some money up for SSI upgrade (need to get soon before Dansk starts filling the inventory shelves). I also plan to replace the seats at some point too, I’m not sure what I want just yet. I’m between stock Porsche Sport Seats or an aftermarket sport option of that era. Feel free to chime in on that if you’ve got an opinion either way.

So here I am now, I have very well sorted 1978 Minerva Blue Porsche 911sc and a new disease of the Porsche variety. Thanks to all that have contributed articles and posts that I’ve read, I wish I could name you all but there are so many.

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