OB 928 refresh

[Pefa]

Hi.

My name is Peder Fallbom and live in Sweden. I have been into Porsches for a long time and mostly the models up until 1998. Many of them transaxle cars of which I currently own 3 i different stages of rebuild/modification.

This thread is just to share and hopefully learn some from the refresh I will start of my first generation 928.
It is a 1979 manual non sunroof pascha interior car sold new here in Sweden (my dream spec) It has just a few owners and has 115000km on the odometer so a good base car.
However age and daily use and some neglect makes It needing work in just about all areas to get to the level I want it to be in.

It had a colorchange in the 1980:s to a odd red metallic color which I think is not a stock porsche color. I will return the car to the factory delivered Mocha brown color which can be seen in the pic below. A very deep brown color which I think is very cool and 1970:s.
Also the seats need to be recovered and the interior cleaned carefully.

Long term plan is also to get the engine and all other parts refreshed in some way so that the whole car looks and feels like its around 5 years old not 41.

Tonight I start taking it apart to prep for paint.

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20210824_182828.jpg (1.81 MiB) Viewed 18565 times

[Pefa]

The front seats vinyl and fabric is cracking and falling apart. Rear seats and the rest of the interior are in pretty good condition.

[dr bob]

Looks like a very fun project! If there's much refreshing due in the interior, you are certainly a candidate for removing everything in the car, and everything in the engine bay. Then clean prep paint while the seats and interior are refurbished and the engine refreshed. Know that the engine bottom end pieces are pretty durable. With the few miles on the engine and driveline, the focus should probably go to having the heads cleaned and maybe refreshed, and reassembled with new gaskets and seals.

With the early cars like yours sneaking up on 50 years old, look very hard at the rubber pieces especially in the suspension. New pieces will make the car a lot more enjoyable to drive.

The Pascha fabric panels in the seats may or may not be hard to find. Original stock has pretty much disappeared at this point, so you'll likely be hunting for a good replication. A decade or more ago, I looked at having some produced, but the minimum run volumes were way beyond my hobby budget, and there's more than one Pascha color. My later ('89) car doesn't have Pascha, so it would have been even harder to justify the spending.

Share project and progress pictures as you dive deeper into this project. I'm sure the car will be a rare treat to own when it's finished.

[Pefa]

Looks like a very fun project! If there's much refreshing due in the interior, you are certainly a candidate for removing everything in the car, and everything in the engine bay. Then clean prep paint while the seats and interior are refurbished and the engine refreshed. Know that the engine bottom end pieces are pretty durable. With the few miles on the engine and driveline, the focus should probably go to having the heads cleaned and maybe refreshed, and reassembled with new gaskets and seals.

With the early cars like yours sneaking up on 50 years old, look very hard at the rubber pieces especially in the suspension. New pieces will make the car a lot more enjoyable to drive.

The Pascha fabric panels in the seats may or may not be hard to find. Original stock has pretty much disappeared at this point, so you'll likely be hunting for a good replication. A decade or more ago, I looked at having some produced, but the minimum run volumes were way beyond my hobby budget, and there's more than one Pascha color. My later ('89) car doesn't have Pascha, so it would have been even harder to justify the spending.

Share project and progress pictures as you dive deeper into this project. I'm sure the car will be a rare treat to own when it's finished.

Hi Bob.

Thanks for your insight.

The interior is in pretty good shape so my plan is a really good cleanup. I have found and bought new pascha fabric and vinyl from Porsche saddler Southboundtrimmers in the UK. A local trimmer will recover them shortly.

The car drives remarkebly well and feels very tight and solid. More so than the 1989 GT I used to own (not as fast though)
However I will as you mention go through all rubber bushes and hoses etc that needs attention aswell as suspension and brakes.

The engine is very solid with zero leaks so will just refresh all serviceparts and rubber pieces for now.

I have never worked on a early 928 so I will certanly need help along the way.

[dr bob]

Sounds like you have a good handle on the scope of the work.


There's an inspection-list item that grabbed my attention in your front-apron picture, and that's the missing washer and circlip on the link for the headlight motor. No worries if you aren't going to be driving the car before the repaint, as the headlight motor and the crossbar and links will be removed anyway. If you do decide to drive it now, putting a new washer and clip on that link will keep it from coming off and puncturing the radiator. For cars with AC, the condenser is usually the first victim of a stray link. At least yours is missing just the bottom-end pieces, so less risk of serious damage.

Enjoy the project!

[Pefa]

Sounds like you have a good handle on the scope of the work.


There's an inspection-list item that grabbed my attention in your front-apron picture, and that's the missing washer and circlip on the link for the headlight motor. No worries if you aren't going to be driving the car before the repaint, as the headlight motor and the crossbar and links will be removed anyway. If you do decide to drive it now, putting a new washer and clip on that link will keep it from coming off and puncturing the radiator. For cars with AC, the condenser is usually the first victim of a stray link. At least yours is missing just the bottom-end pieces, so less risk of serious damage.

Enjoy the project!

Nice catch! I have not seen that, will fix it. Thanks

[Pefa]

Ok so I got the front seats back from the trimmer

I am very pleased with the result and the new Pascha and vinyl matches up well with the rest of the interior

[Pefa]

The car is coming apart for repaint and this is also a very good opportunity to clean areas that is hard to reach normaly.

The car is in good shape underneath with minimal corrosion on the body.

Mechanical bits here and there will need replacing.

Wheelareas very dirty in these pics.

[Pefa]

Used a hotwater pressurewasher which was handy so a bit cleaner at this stage

[Pefa]

I finshed preparing the car for repaint so now it sits at the paintshop. Next time it is back in the garage it will be back in its original Mochaschwartz color