The Jedi 911SC

[TeeJayHoward]

Time to delete the sunroof! Here's the tray with the replacement skin sitting on top:


The first cut:


Removing the glue:


Removing more glue after cutting through the edge of the sunroof hole:


Garbage:


Much better:


Buddy helped clean up some of the bracket leftovers:


Then it was time to attach the skin:


Let's just wheel that over next to the welder...


And lay down some tacks in the corners:


To be continued tomorrow.

edit: "Tomorrow". Right. So the plan has changed, and I'm now talking to FVD about a carbon fiber roof skin.
edit2: Order placed. Over a grand in shipping costs for the combination of the new roof and the rear seat sheet metal. Ouch.

[TeeJayHoward]

Hey look, a box from Germany!


There's my rear seat sheet metal:


My CF roof:


Let's rip it open!


Hrm. Not what I expected. But I think I can make it work:


Clamps will be needed:



The weave will definitely be exposed (at least short term) inside!


On to the rear seat replacement sheet metal:


I'm guessing this'll work nicely.


Tomorrow a buddy's dropping by to help. We're gonna try to get started, but we DO have a habit of shooting the breeze instead of actually working.

[TeeJayHoward]

Chopped out the rusty rear seat, trying to get to as much good metal as possible:


Removed the old piece.


Yay! A hole in my car! (What have I done?)


Aaand, poop. See this area on the replacement sheet metal?


Notice the same area on the tranny hump?


Yeah, that ain't gonna fit. Not even remotely close. The transaxle hump is about an inch too far back and two inches too low. So, thinking up a plan B. But while that's happening, I had a buddy clean up some areas that were missed when sandblasting:


Right now I'm leaning towards removing the other rear seat and doing a parcel shelf in its place. A nice, tall, square box. Something I can remove if I ever need to access the upper part of the transmission or the starter. Thinking it over this week.

[Tom_in_NH]

You probably already know this, but that replacement piece is an early 911 panel. Restoration Design has the correct panel you need.

[TeeJayHoward]

Been going back and forth - Gulf blue and chrome, all shiny and clean? Or olive drab and a lift kit - make it look like it can take a beating. After laying down some etch primer, I think I've made up my mind.

[LukasM]

Originally Posted by TeeJayHoward

Right now I'm leaning towards removing the other rear seat and doing a parcel shelf in its place. A nice, tall, square box. Something I can remove if I ever need to access the upper part of the transmission or the starter. Thinking it over this week.

Do you have any kids or any plans to get some one day? It won't work for long but those rear seats come in handy for them, also in an emergency for an adult or two.

Originally Posted by TeeJayHoward

Been going back and forth - Gulf blue and chrome, all shiny and clean? Or olive drab and a lift kit - make it look like it can take a beating. After laying down some etch primer, I think I've made up my mind.

What did you decide on? The safari builds and colors like drab can be very cool, and you won't be as concerned about taking it on drives, dirt roads etc. At the same time they really limit your buyers in case you ever do want to sell it and lower the value, vs. a funky but original Porsche color from the old days. Gulf blue and chrome with some PPF would look super cool and timeless, so if you are going to the trouble of repainting it and not just doing some wrap on a beat up paintjob, would be my choice.

[TeeJayHoward]

Originally Posted by LukasM

Do you have any kids or any plans to get some one day?

Nope, no kids and no plans. (And I don't hate any of my adult friends enough to put them in the rear seats!)

Originally Posted by LukasM

What did you decide on?

Gonna go OD green. I just feel like if it had a really nice paint job I would be worried about hail and scratches and all kinds of stuff like that. Whereas if it's ugly but functional, I can just have fun with it. Another part of the paint decision was the direction I was going with the car. I was considering backdating the body (which is why the fenders weren't painted with the rest of the car) which costs about the same as the Safari lift kit.

Speaking of, I really need to get in that engine bay and start grinding off old nubs and things I don't need. And creating a shock tower reinforcement. And maybe doing some cleaning now that I can use water near the car again. Then undercoating... Then paint... You know, I just might have my next chunk of the project all lined up.

[Cobalt964ruf]

Good read, car is definitely coming along… happy motoring

[TeeJayHoward]

Scribed a line 70cm in from the roof edges, rounded the corners, traced in Sharpie:


Then I handed my buddy an angle grinder and told 'em to cut off my roof. Why not do it myself? He's not got a lot of experience working on cars and to be able to say he cut the roof off an old 911? That's pretty cool IMO. I've been trying to involve him in all of my project cars lately. So, he got to throw some sparks.


...A lot of sparks.


And in almost no time, the roof was off:

[TeeJayHoward]

I had asked him to be super careful of the inner structure. We could trim more after, but if he cuts into that, it's gonna look terrible. So he cut quite a bit inward:


Then we trimmed it up nice and neat with a finger sander and a Dremel for the corners.


We test-fit the roof to make sure we had the strategy down, and enough clamps.


Good thing we did. The strategy was fine, but the clamps? Off by 50%. So another trip to Home Depot was made, followed by a Chipotle run. Then came some 3M Scotch-Weld Epoxy Adhesive (DP420). 200mL of it. The intention was to smear half on the roof and half on the car, but... Well, it didn't happen. Still managed to get a nice layer down.


Then the roof went on for good.



Now for a 24 hour break. Garage heater will be keeping the space at 70*F for the rest of the night while it cures.

[TeeJayHoward]

Etch primer'd the fenders today. Goes on glossy:



Dries matte:



I'm kinda digging the dings and dents. I think I'm gonna leave 'em, give the car some character.


Back on the car. Not bolted in or anything, just a convenient place to store 'em.

[Phil1980]

Wow, big step on cutting the roof off! Did you get the inspiration from Island Works on Youtube? He installed the same type of FG roof (might even have been carbon) on his amazing 964 build.

Are you going to combine it with a roll bar later?

[TeeJayHoward]

Originally Posted by Phil1980

Wow, big step on cutting the roof off! Did you get the inspiration from Island Works on Youtube? He installed the same type of FG roof (might even have been carbon) on his amazing 964 build.

Are you going to combine it with a roll bar later?

No plan for a roll bar.

Actually, the inspiration came from this very forum - that LBDC fella and Rennch. Seeing the pics Chris did made me think it wasn't as impossible as initially thought. Watching Rennch do the whole thing on video really gave me confidence.

Since I'm trying to involve my buddy heavily in the project, no real progress has been made since my last update. He's only available once a week, and over the course of January, I've had plans on that day once, twice it was a snowstorm, and the last time his daily driver needed an oil change, so we did that instead. This weekend he's supposed to drop by and we're going to figure out how to remove the dried panel bond that squeezed out from the roof. Then it's on to the rear seat delete, laying down some undercoating, cleaning up the engine bay...

Yeah, I don't really wanna finish that list. It is long.

[rowingone]

If you use a grinder on that excess epoxy bond wear a respirator . . .that is really bad for your lungs!

[TeeJayHoward]

Originally Posted by rowingone

If you use a grinder on that excess epoxy bond wear a respirator . . .that is really bad for your lungs!

I believe in PPE. I've got a nice 3M setup for me, and even bought some full-face stuff for my buddy. So I'm with ya on that!

I could have looked up the right way to do this. I didn't. I could have laid down tape to prevent the panel bond from gooping everywhere. I didn't. Instead, my buddy and I grabbed some power tools and did a terrible job trying to grind away the panel bond and knife-edge the roof panel:




Turns out little strings of carbon fiber/kevlar jut out when you do that. Who knew? Well, I obviously can't blend that in, so I needed to utilize a little body filler. (Or a lot? Way too much? Yup. WAY too much.)


Some sandpaper knocked the excess off:


I tried to use more of the etch primer as a guide coat:


Good lord, that looks terrible. Okay, well, more sanding I guess:





Better, but it's not there yet. I don't have any pics of how it sits right now, but I figure I've got at least one more pass before I'll consider it good enough. The rear window upper lip does NOT look as bad right now as it does in the above pic. There's some air bubbles that got trapped in the Bondo I need to fill. I've ordered some spot putty and am hoping that'll take care of it. If not, I'll need to pick up some fiberglass resin to mix with the Bondo to turn it from a paste into a drizzle.

[TeeJayHoward]

But hey, the roof is the same color as the car now!


(I really should have taken some pics before I left for work today. Doh.)

Oh, and my garage laptop died. Can't work without tunes, and the utility when wiring is second to none. So, I picked up a used one - supposedly this one's almost immune to dust. Dell 7330 Rugged. IP65 or something like that. I'm not sure if it really fits in the build thread or not, but I'm pretty chuffed with the purchase, so I'm going to brag about it.


Also, new toy arrived. But installing it? Might be a bit of a chore:



The whole red area needs to be chopped out and replaced with flat planes. Too many curves in it by default.

[Winter]

WOW, amazing write up, awesome mechanical skills + I truly hope to meet you and your 911 at some point this summer on the Front Range.

Thanks for sharing the journey!

[chrisbalich]

Originally Posted by TeeJayHoward

...

The whole red area needs to be chopped out and replaced with flat planes. Too many curves in it by default.

It's likely much less work to bring the floor up to the height of the red area.
Then, you can make the whole footwell flat...or you can just raise the area where the pedal box lives and have a little more room for big feet. (like my size 12s)
Food for thought.

[TeeJayHoward]

Originally Posted by chrisbalich

It's likely much less work to bring the floor up to the height of the red area.

There was a reason I didn't want to do that, but I can't recall what it is. Maybe the master cylinders wouldn't fit if it was too high? Bah. Brain no worky.

Got the roof "done". I could absolutely spend another 10 hours getting it perfect, but I really don't care enough to. You can no longer tell that it's glued in and that's good enough for me. Turns out, after all that Bondo work, the secret sauce is actually a different kind of Bondo:


A super thin layer of glazing putty took care of all the pinholes, scratches, and that annoying area in the drip rail where the fibers from the roof refused to be glued down (as seen in the above pic). Should never have tried to blend the carbon. Body filler and sharp edges would have been so much better.


This stuff sands SO FREAKING NICELY. 400 grit is all I needed.


And of course, the same buddy who helped me hack the roof off was involved. Here he is throwing down some etch primer as a substitute for guide coat, in order to see if we needed another layer.


The final result:


FINALLY ready to move on to something else. Right now I'm thinking maybe scraping all the old glue residue off the inside of the car might be next.

[Queefchief]

Moving along! Looking good