In reply to Mike924 :
Ok, that is awesome. Congrats!
In reply to Mike924 :
Ok, that is awesome. Congrats!
Mike924 said:
Our local Porsche dealer and Region here in Ottawa Canada helped celebrate the 70th Birthday of Porsche. They wanted to get at least 1 model from every year. I was informed by another club member that they were having problems finding a 924! So I offered my little car. It was given a prime spot inside the building. Even got cleaned up with the White Glove crew!
nice!
Just so that you all don`t think that I have relegated the old 924 to a garage queen with show here and there. The local track was having an open lapping night. 21 corners 5.05 km of fun in the summer. I took the car out to blast it around for a while. Even though it is not a power car, I was able to keep it close to some of the higher powered machinery that was running around. Even got the point by from a friendly 
Honda Civic. LOL
Nice. Once I'm satisfied I have any remaining bugs worked out (and get some bigger swaybars!) I fully intend to take the 924S to the track....
I added a link from my facebook page of a quick fly-by taken by my wife on the front straight. I hope it works, otherwise I will download it from my phone later and post it up. I also have some in car footage up on my Youtube channel. Search out mikekirby, and ignore the little Pink Guy videos.
https://www.facebook.com/mike.kirby.9235/videos/pcb.2006562899396185/10155357907832331/?type=3
Enjoy.
I really want to get back up to Calabogie, I raced my bicycle there a few years ago but I want to experience the track properly in the car. I'll likely end up with the BMW club when I do go (next year hopefully), what clubs/organizations do you run with there?
Adam
I normally run with the 1MoreLap group that is a part of the Calabogie Motorsports Park team. If not them, then I run with the Porsche Club.
Both are run really well and it is rare that anything out of the ordinary happens. It is all point by passing, and dare I say it, very Canadian and Polite. LOL.
We have been getting the 924 ready for another run at Watkins Glen. To that end we took it out and ran it through a quick Tech Check to make sure it was still up to snuff. Even though it made an appearance last year at the race track I knew it was time to do some rear brake maintenance. We took off the passenger side rear drum and found that the wheel cylinder was leaking, so we didn't bother to take off the drivers side, we are going to be replacing both rear wheel cylinders. I did note, however that the shoes are almost spent.
You can see in the picture above that it is wet on the right side. I am also going to be replacing the hardware while I am in there. With the time getting close (Track weekend is the long weekend in May (16th - 18th) I need to get these parts quick. I don't normally order from Rock Auto but for this and the cost it was worth it. All other suppliers seem to have the wheel cylindars listed as Unobtainium.
So knowing that the drums needed some attention I turned to the rest of the check. We retarded the ignition from 15 Degrees BTDC to 10, we had it advanced for the past several years because the Warm Up Regulator doesn't work. Seeing as how it doesn't get driven in the winter we backed this down to the optimum specs as per the factory. We also replaced and gapped the spark plugs, and replaced the front brake pads. The pads that were in the car still have some good life left to them, but we will keep those as spares just in case.
Here is the 924 in the wild:
Up on the lift:
Great project! I love how big the Mini looks compared to your 924. These cars don't get enough love. It's nice to see an early 924 in decent shape. Most of the ones I come across are just sad and neglected.
The older ones don't get much love. Always the "Bastard" child car. However they do run well and are great momentum cars.
Enjoy yours it looks to be in great condition.
Went looking around the rear of the 924 yesterday. The brake light wasn't working on the right rear. Continued looking found out that the tail light wasn't working either!! checked the signal light and it works so that is good. Then went to verify that all the lights worked, seems to be a burnt low beam headlight, also on the right. Looks like I need to see where the bad ground is or add a new one as a temporary fix. But man did it give me a scare thinking that I had done something earlier in the winter that may have taken out the whole right side lights.
I will start by comparing the left and the right when I get home from the office tonight. This will give me a starting point as to what it should look like in the back end.
The one thing that I can say is, I really hate wiring.
I'm temped to look at the 924s that I posted in the cars for sale section. What should I look for on a running driving car specifically other than the usual see what works and what doesn't.
akylekoz said:I'm temped to look at the 924s that I posted in the cars for sale section. What should I look for on a running driving car specifically other than the usual see what works and what doesn't.
There is a normal rust hole that is normally found under the battery on the right side of the engine compartment. Seems to be a regular thing on most of the 70's Porsches. You can get new or stronger battery trays pretty readily from cars that are not salvageable. Other than that normal rocker panels, floors that kind of thing. The shifters may be a bit sloppy, like stirring porridge but that can be fixed with bushings. The early 924's really are tanks. Great momentum cars, I have found mine to be pretty much bullet proof. Just little things.
And with any older car, try to get as much history on it as possible. Some Porsche owners are sticklers for keeping records. It can tell you how it has been cared for.
Took some time tonight, because I am running out of it before my trip to Watkins Glen. May 16th is now 14 days away and I needed get my tail lights working properly. As I was missing one brake light on the right hand side as well as the running light when the Headlights were on. After working on it for about an hour and half with turning the car on and off, signal lights on and off, moving wires so that they match the working side I was able to get the brake lights working and the signal lights working. But it is finicky and sometimes a bump may move the bulb, so I will need to work on that and switch out a fuse that is now burnt.
Progress is being made though, so that is good. Now to tackle the rear brake cylinders so that I can keep all the fluid in the lines and get my hard pedal back, which hasn't happened for a couple of years.
Mike924 said:We have been getting the 924 ready for another run at Watkins Glen. To that end we took it out and ran it through a quick Tech Check to make sure it was still up to snuff. Even though it made an appearance last year at the race track I knew it was time to do some rear brake maintenance. We took off the passenger side rear drum and found that the wheel cylinder was leaking, so we didn't bother to take off the drivers side, we are going to be replacing both rear wheel cylinders. I did note, however that the shoes are almost spent.
Here is the 924 in the wild:
I saw that pic earlier today in one of the Porsche groups on FB ;)
I am a moderator on the 924 Outlaw FB Group. that is probably where you saw it.
Update on the brake situation. We spent all day yesterday replacing the wheel cylinders, retaining springs and shoes. Plus cleaning up all the reusable bits. I have some pictures that I will post later. Unfortunately when it was all said and done and we did bleed the brakes, the pedal was down at the floor. Not where I want or need it to be with the Track weekend coming up in two weeks. I had to leave the car at my Dad's garage where we were working on it. I will be going back out to continue adjusting the drums and give it another bleed to ensure we have no air left in the system. We did drain as much of the old fluid out as we could.
We have brakes again.
It looks like due to retracting the brake shoe adjusters all the way in, and not having a great understanding of which way they needed to turn to properly adjust them after, it took about an hour to rebleed the system, properly adjust the rears and now we have brakes. So much so that , I now know I was way out when I attempted to adjust them previously. Add to that the bad wheel cylinders and the car was not at or near optimal when I last had it out on the track last year. This year should be much better.
We made it Watkins Glen last weekend. And even though the motor ran pretty well we still had some brake problems. In fact we wore out a set of brake pads on the first day of the weekend.
It didn't stop me from running and the rotors were no worse for wear. I adjusted my driving to compensate, but going into a couple of corners, like corner 1 and the left hander into the boot got a bit scary as i was unable to scrub off the speed I thought I needed. I made it but it kept me focused. I still lapped under 3:00 minutes this way.
I found speed in areas I didn't think I could. But also figured it is time to retire the car from track duty for a while. It spat out the idle adjuster screw at the end of day 1 and then the rubber mounts that hold the exhaust up in the back split and I was given the meatball flag to bring it in. That was the last run of the weekend for me. In all it was a great weekend. Lots of track time. Great weather, in the 80's I think, and sunny. Plus we were still able to drive the car home the 5 hours and 430 kms to Ottawa.
I have some video that I will be posting both in car and from a couple of the corners. Should be up later today or tomorrow.
No video yes, we are still working on piecing that together. I did get time to work on the 924 and piece the exhaust back together the proper way. Which means we removed the temporary fix and added the bushings in again. Here in pictures is the repair.
Replacement exhaust bushings.
The Fix to drive the car home.
And now repaired and back to what it needed to be.
Here are the last two sessions from the May 18th and 19th weekend at Watkins Glen.
and
On Saturday, I decided it was time to figure out why the drivers headlight wouldn't work on the low beam. We had tested earlier and the light itself was good. There is a tool that will send power through the wires and it did light up. I even tried a known good head light and had the same issue. So I was fairly certain I had a wiring issue. Looking at wiring there are / were two ground wires on the frame in the 924 (which is the same on the 944) and the decision was made to start by cleaning these grounds. As with all old cars I gave it a squirt of de-rustifier, and pulled out my ratchet, and quickly broke the nut off the bolt that holds the ground wires.
Cursing ensued, but I decided that since this was now broken, I would power through. I cleaned a spot behind the headlight and drilled a hole to reattach the ground wires. While there I cleaned the connectors on the grounds as well. Might as well, and better now than later.
With the new ground location I now have all headlights working, both high and low beams. Now to do the same on the 944.
Mike924 said:As promised just a few pics of the car taken while on track.
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Mike Kirby 1976 924
Thanks for sharing and that's a great shot. Just curious about how much you spend in your over all maintenance to race?
I will be honest DIYKing. With the 924 it has been a solid and reliable car. Other than gas, brake pads and oil changes I don't spend that much on it. I would say less than 500.00 Canadian per season.
As we get deeper into the summer months I have been driving the 924 at least once a week. As always the car has been running like a tank. My daughter is volunteering at the local Cruise Nights every Tuesday so I show up there, park the car with all the hot rods and other Classic/Historic cars. It has got me thinking that I really need to fix up the interior. Starting with the rear trunk carpet. It is really faded due to the sun hitting it, and while most of the interior is black this is now gray and kind of dingy looking.
What do you folks recommend in terms of bringing it back to the black it should be?
Mike924 said:As we get deeper into the summer months I have been driving the 924 at least once a week. As always the car has been running like a tank. My daughter is volunteering at the local Cruise Nights every Tuesday so I show up there, park the car with all the hot rods and other Classic/Historic cars. It has got me thinking that I really need to fix up the interior. Starting with the rear trunk carpet. It is really faded due to the sun hitting it, and while most of the interior is black this is now gray and kind of dingy looking.
What do you folks recommend in terms of bringing it back to the black it should be?
I think I used some of the VHT fabric and carpet paint/dye. It's just a rattle-can and seems to be holding up pretty well, no fading so far after a year or two. It does make the carpet feel a little less 'soft" but since I'm not sleeping in the hatchback, I don't much care lol.
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