Hi -
I didn't know it was appropriate to tell a build story here until I was asked to share my Instagram posting by a member. The beginning is a bit long but then the pictures with shorter descriptions take over. So here goes.
It all started when a longtime friend of mine and I came back in touch. He had been the guy that told me in 1973 I had to check out a friends Porsche 356. Well, that friend took me for a ride on a very winding uphill and now 15+ Porsche's later I've had a wonderful Porsche life! My friend later in the 70's bought a 1966 912 that had been converted to a 2.0L 911. As some of us older folks know this was done quite a bit back in the day. Fast forward to 2012 and I found out my friend's Porsche had been side swiped by a delivery truck while parked in front of his house. So he parked the Porsche next to his house with a cover and left it there
for over twenty years. GRRRRRRRRRRRRR. So upon inspecting his Porsche it was in very sad sad sad shape. As expected the bottom was rusted to the point of large pieces of the floor where gone and major rust every where. The interior was moldy and soggy. YUCK. The cover had split above the engine grill so you can imagine what the engine looked like.
After my shock, and being the crazy Porschefile I am, I was obsesssed with what could be done to bring this sorry sad sack back to life. So I worked out a deal to pay to have the Porsche picked up by my mechanic and for he and me to inspect everything and see what could be done. The long and short of it was that the 912 body and interior was too far gone and not valuable enough to be restored. DAMN. The good news was that the 2.0L engine was all original with the Solex's!
My friend and I worked out a price for the mess and I figured (back then) it wouldn't be that hard to find a SWB 911 body for the engine/trans and restore it to a nice, fun 911. Then another crazy thought came to mind...........Wouldn't it be cool if I could find a 1965 body with a matching engine case? Never happen........
Then it did on Samba! The early 3008XX with matching engine case in California. But what a price. UGH.
So I flew out to see this miracle body and engine case and was greated by this 911 body called swiss cheese. OH Boy..........But the engine case did match the COA but the transaxle had a blank serial number. Wasn't sure on this but after some research it was possible the transaxle had been replaced from th factory at some point and the factory replacements had no seial number. OK. Another interesting note is that the restorer I bought Swiss Cheese had bought it from our friend and colleague Magnus Walker. But wow, the cost to restore Swiss Cheese was going to be big. Decided to take the plunge and worked out a deal for Swiss Cheese.
So here's what I was going to tackle. Stay Tuned..........