[notmytarga]

You are embarking on the same project I finished in 2008 when a broken exhaust valve forced the rebuild of the 1975 911S engine in a car I had otherwise finished restoring.

These cars didn't come with the trombone cooler unless equipped with AC. I live in HOT Redding CA and I chose to add the finned oil line setup to a 28 tube brass cooler. Opinions seemed to support that for a 2.7 engine the radiator cooler isn't necessary for non-race use. I can motor about on 100 F days and see temps run up to 180F fast then the thermostat opens, temps drop to 160F then slowly climb no higher than 200F. Before the cooler setup was added to the rebuilt (clean block and attached oil cooler) 220F was easily a problem. In the Pac NW you could likely get away with the extra oil volume and finned lines to a trombone cooler - if you don't add AC or track the car.

The rebuild 30,000 miles ago is a bit suspect because they didn't do headstud inserts and you have all the leaking too. Did they do valve guides? Your list addresses items that would suffer in the oil pump failure but not all the reliability updates. And how do you really know that the inserts weren't done - it is really hard for a novice like me to tell without removing a stud and checking with a magnet.

What is the total mileage on the car? And do you have a rear reflector? The 1975 is a year when they had threaded studs and CAN'T be pried off and left intact. I got really lucky and found a NOS reflector to replace the original that was loosing the reflective paint that I couldn't restore satisfactorily.

Looking good!! I too would want to get it on the road soon. Perhaps drive that engine until other problems require total teardown.