November 2004 Archives

As you might be able to surmise, I haven't had much time to work on the 356 project for the last couple of weeks, since it came off the rotisserie. School and family have kept me jumping. I did have time to go and get the "C" engine with my friend Alex Maiolo last week, and we brought it back to the rental house. Alex laughed when we were able to fit the engine, the engine stand, and a large rubbermaid box of parts and pieces into the back of his Volkswagen Golf with only one of the back seats folded down. This really is a diminutive power plant.

Now the engine is sitting in the corner of my garage at the rental house, waiting for me to do something with it, which will be tearing it down completely. I just don't trust the condition of the bottom end, even though it is clear from inspection that the top end (heads) was completely re-done. Better safe than sorry, I think.
Speaking of garages, our house re-model project is coming along nicely, and I think we are on schedule to get back in our house in March or early April. Here is a picture of the new garage, which has (generous) space for three cars, or more if we squeeze a little. The left side will be the "work" bay, and it has a bump-out for my workbench, as well as 220 volt power, additional metal halide lighting, and enough ceiling height for a lift to be added in the future. It really should make working on both the restoration as well as general car maintenance a pleasure.

Bodywork on the 356 has ground to a virtual halt. A few weeks ago I started patching up one of the doors, but it is tedious slow work. I'll continue of course. Dee said I would soon be meeting his friend who he is recommending complete the remaining bodywork, but this hasn't materialized yet. I realize everyone is busy but I'm trying(!) to keep the car on schedule and I feel like I'm falling behind on that part of the project. I hope there is movement on this before too far into December, or I will have to start shopping around for another person I can bring the car to in order to complete the metal work.

My 356 is off the rotisserie after 8 months! It took quite awhile to complete all the bottom repairs, but the end result looks great and I have learned a lot.

Getting the car off the rotisserie was much easier than putting it on. Back in March, I enlisted six of my friends to help, and we lifted up the car on each end simultaneously while sliding in the rotisserie ends. It was heavy and awkward, and I didn't want to repeat the process again. Ever.

Fortunately, the shop I'm at has plenty of lifts. We just rolled the car sideways from the bay I'm renting over the adjacent one, which has a lift. Then we lifted the car up so that the load was just barely placed on the lift, and off the caster wheels of the rotisserie. Now I attached the front wheels, which I had left off the car until this point.

The next step was to cut some of the little tack welds I had made on the cross bracing that I welded on back in April, used to tie the two sides of the rotisserie together to help eliminate any potential flex. I just used a die grinder to cut the welds on one side.
Loosening the pinch bolt and pulling off the rear end of the rotisserie was simple. The front side quickly followed. Success! I left the rotisserie brackets installed on the bumper mounting holes "just in case" I need to put it back on for some reason, but they will obviously have to come off when the nose and tail repairs get underway.

The next step, while the car was still up on the lift, was to fill up the transmission case with gear oil. I purchased a gallon of Swepco 201 a long time ago because of all the positive results people reported on 356Talk. Now, it may be just a placebo effect, but maybe not. I'll tell you one thing though: It may be a pretty blue color, and it may be nice and slippery, but Swepco 201 smells just as bad as any other 90 weight oil. It stinks. I was using a leaky, messy oil syringe/pump affair to put the oil in through the plug in the side of the transmission, and I made a nice mess.

Transmission filled, I wasn't worried about rolling the car around any more. I attached the front tie rods, eyeballing the tire alignment, but I'll be fixing that properly later. The tie rods would allow me to "steer" the car on the ground by moving the tire by hand though. Without them, each front wheel has a tendency to want to turn in the opposite direction of its partner.

Time to lower the lift and put the 356 on its own wheels! The process was uneventful. Dee and Jerry Horton helped me push-pull the car from the lift bay back into my work bay, and after that I called it a day. The front of the car still seems to be riding very high, I think there must be an issue with the torsion bars, but nothing critical for the next series of projects.

Here's what I hope to get accomplished or at least started in the rest of November and December:

* Take the "C" engine and some tools back to my house to work on a full teardown and inspection. If anything really needs replacing or fixing, now is the time to do it. Re-assemble and bench test the engine.

* Get the door/rocker panel repairs completed.

* Commit to a course of action for getting the nose repaired. I'm leaning towards ordering the Stoddard repair panels.