Die unendliche Geschichte

Speedfab · 09:41 AM

OK, a couple weeks ago I told a few people I would start a thread about my car and its history, since I hadn't been on this site in a pretty long time and I don't think I ever did anything like this to begin with. I figure now is as good a time as any, because I'm rapidly forgetting things about it and I'd better reach back in those memory banks before the ol' human hard drive goes "floppy".

Somewhere around 25 years ago, I bought a German market '78 911SC from a friend who was stationed there when in the military and managed to bring his car home with him. He owned a small automotive shop that specialized in Porsches, and this one was well cared for and had some well thought out and useful mods already. I immediately began my own list of mods, and even installed a new set of headers and early muffler right there at his place before I took it home. I'll just leave this as a placeholder and see if I can find a few old pics when I get home, then I'll get into how the whole thing just snowballed out of control.

As to MY story, My name is Tracy and I own a dyno tuning and fabrication shop in northeast Florida. I have been doing this all my life - My grandfather emigrated from Germany and opened an automotive shop here sometime just after WWI, and my father followed in his footsteps and had a very successful general automotive business. I guess I was doomed to this life from the outset.

^My helper supervising the job. I have just recently rolled the car out after about a 15 year "hibernation" and started reassembling it... The last time it moved under its own power, the World Trade Center was still standing. It should be ready to crank up sometime this week! I'm pretty stoked about it right now.

lite75 · lite75's Garage

6 speed? Think I remember your car from way back..

Rawknees'Turbo · 07-27-2016, 06:45 PM

Can't wait to read the juicy details, Tracy, and yep, it's always nice to have a good ole', faithful "p___y" around to offer supervision and inspiration!!!

PS - I hear there's blue colored meds out there to help with the "floppy hard drive" situation - some of the older guys on here swear by them (when their cars aren't enough to do the trick)!!!

Speedfab · 07-28-2016, 06:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by lite75

6 speed? Think I remember your car from way back..

Yes sir, it has a G50-20 with a GT2 LSD. One of the best things I ever did.

lite75 · lite75's Garage

If I remember correctly you had EFI long before most had even considered it, glad to see its coming out of hibernation. Give us some details on the beast..

Speedfab · 07-28-2016, 05:47 PM

I wouldn't say that... Porsche already had 911s in production with Motronic way back in 1984. And even that was a couple years after I went to GM's first electronic engine management school in '82.

Damn I'm old.

I didn't have my hands on my first Haltech F3 (fuel only, it was like the Atari of EFI) until around 1990... That was back when you could call Haltech in Australia and actually talk to Steve Mitchell. The only hard part was paying the long distance bill, lol. It's pretty funny to think about what is available now compared to what we were working with back then. My car has had right around 10 different EFI setups since way back then... Technology is awesome!

Jim2 · Jim2's Garage

"Die unendliche Geschichte"

Brought to you by none other than the creator of this fine contraption:

SDS EM-3: Project Page

.

MikeD930 · MikeD930's Garage

Tracy...your story is too short (maybe need to expand...hint...hint!). Seriously I would like to hear more about the history about your car and its 6 speed gearbox. I had no idea that was possible. Interesting...

Speedfab · 07-29-2016, 08:27 PM

If you have a good fabricator, that's actually pretty easy. I can show you whatever details you want to see and/or tell you exactly how to do it.

Oh and I drove the old girl to work today. First time I have driven this car in 15 years. I was pretty happy.

Speedfab · 07-29-2016, 08:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim2

"Die unendliche Geschichte"

Brought to you by none other than the creator of this fine contraption:

SDS EM-3: Project Page

I still have the barstool Jim. It's in my office at the shop. I completely forgot about Ross having that on his site. They (the gang at SDS) are super nice people, I think I may pick up a phone and call them next week. I haven't spoken to Ross Farnham in a very long time, he is an extremely sharp guy.

Mr9146 · 07-29-2016, 09:20 PM

Cool car. Interested in seeing some engine shots...intercooler under the small tail?

Speedfab · 07-30-2016, 08:56 AM

The engine is a work in progress at the moment, don't worry I'll get to all that. I just temporarily threw a 3.2 Carrera manifold on there to run it while I finish sheetmetal intake version 3.0, the prior versions had twin throttle bodies and I want to go back to one central one. It doesn't even have any charge tubes on it right now, I'm turbocharging the world, lol. There have been a number of different intercooler setups on here, and yeah you can fit a pretty good size air to air core in a Carrera tail as long as it's a cross flow arrangement. When I changed it to twins we also put a water to air IC in the back seat area, but I'm redesigning that a little bit right now.

quattrorunner · quattrorunner's Garage

Speedfab · 08-07-2016, 07:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mr9146

Cool car. Interested in seeing some engine shots...intercooler under the small tail?

Marco, this is how it was 17 years ago. This IC was good enough to make just over 520whp at about 12 pounds of boost, which I thought was great at the time.

Then when things started going too far, it came to this and a lot more boost...

Right now, I'm after a happy medium. This car doesn't need to make anywhere near the kind of power it used to. I'd like a nice balanced setup that doesn't break driveline parts. I'm too old for that crap, and I have more reasonable expectations of what is "fast enough". I just want to enjoy my car.

Speedfab · 08-08-2016, 12:31 PM

Here are a couple pictures of the turbos and manifolds I just put back on it. I built the headers from 1.75 321 stainless tubing... Twice. I sold the original set when they were still on the car, but the customer didn't need turbos this big (they are Garrett GT3582R's). One of them ultimately got stolen when someone broke into my shop in 2008, so I recently bought a new replacement. Boy have these damn things gone up. They also have Tial 42mm wastegates which apparently are looooong discontinued... I can't even remember why I used these funky things in the first place, but they are top quality pieces.

I had honestly forgotten how much I love the "flat 6 with stereo exhaust whistle" sound, and this car too for that matter. Makes the pants fit a little tight.