I know our classic Mopars are expensive but...

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kiss

kiss

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...we need to stop for a second and be thankful that at least these aren't Euro cars of the 60s and early 70s, for more reasons than just cost.

My girlfriend's car is a 1969 Porsche 912. It's beautiful and well taken care of, but guys, I've never seen such bad engineering. I hate working on that thing. On top of that everything is expensive AF for it, or just flat out NLA.

Anyone else have any venting to do? Any stories of working on Euro trash of the muscle car era?
 
My attorney has one of those things. Bright red. Used to drive it all the time. I asked him about it recently when we were chatting about cars. Thought he sold it. Said the quit running on him and parked it. Said he couldn't figure out why and it's been sitting since. It's probably been 15 or 16 years since I saw it.
 
Imports in those years were generally rare in the US with a few exceptions (like the VW Bug). They all suffer from "Euro engineering" that is finicky at best or just plain horrible in most cases (they couldn't do electrical systems worth a sh*t).

I've worked on a bunch of MGs, Fiats, Alfa Romeos, Jaguars, BMWs and Opels from those years and they are all a pain. Easiest thing to do is to forget "factory correct" and modify with good old American engineering. I did a '68 Jag XKE 2+2 for a friend back in the 80s with a Chebby 350 and rewired electrical from scratch that was a reliable beast on the road for years.
 
Friend of mine is restoring a '76 911 targa. We stripped if for a complete repaint, interior refresh amd a new engine. NONE of the exterior electrical parts have plugs. All off the marker and signal lights, side mirrors, etc have to be cut or remove the whole wiring harness from the switches and fusebox. We chose to cut and solder them on reassembly.

The huge rounded back window is held in with a molded gasket. The wires for the rear defrost are ran through and inside of the rear gasket. And then have to be connected to the spade terminals on the edge of the glass. Extreme caution is needed to not break the terminals, unplug them, cut the gasket, or bust the glass.

He also bought a Porsche 944 turbo. Pain in the *** to work on. We had to replace a power steering line that was extremely tight to access. One of the bolts holding a hose bracket on went into a water jacket on the block/timing cover. That was a nice surprise and a quick scramble to reinstall the bolt and get a drain pan.
 
1994redram said:
Friend of mine is restoring a '76 911 targa. We stripped if for a complete repaint, interior refresh amd a new engine. NONE of the exterior electrical parts have plugs. All off the marker and signal lights, side mirrors, etc have to be cut or remove the whole wiring harness from the switches and fusebox. We chose to cut and solder them on reassembly.

The huge rounded back window is held in with a molded gasket. The wires for the rear defrost are ran through and inside of the rear gasket. And then have to be connected to the spade terminals on the edge of the glass. Extreme caution is needed to not break the terminals, unplug them, cut the gasket, or bust the glass.

He also bought a Porsche 944 turbo. Pain in the *** to work on. We had to replace a power steering line that was extremely tight to access. One of the bolts holding a hose bracket on went into a water jacket on the block/timing cover. That was a nice surprise and a quick scramble to reinstall the bolt and get a drain pan.
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I must be different; I have never thot the porcshe stuff looked worth a flip.
 
2 cars that seem to get everyone's juices flowing-Porsches & Vettes, neither has really ever appealed to me.
 
The Prosches, especially the 911 are performance cars. 200 MPH cars that handle well. The looks are an afterthought.
 
The closest I ever got was a '76 MBG.

Well, the body and interior was '76. The engine and trans was from a '67. I can't remember the year the rear end was, but it took me some guess work before finding the one year only parts it needed.

A customer of mine had it. Came in every spring on a rollback. She had an inclined driveway and set the parking brake one winter. Brakes froze. Told her to buy wheel chocks. The next spring it came in with a stuck clutch. She had forgone the wheel chocks and left it in gear instead of setting the brakes.

Lucas created darkness. That car has so many electrical gremlins. She turned on the wipers the radio went out. She turned on the headlights, the wipers stopped working. She turned on a turn signals the hazards started working.

I wound up tearing the damned thing apart and making a complete new harness for it, including a Painless fuse panel.

She was paranoid of Y2K. She called the MG her Y2K car because she was afraid her Lexus would stop running. When her fears didn't realize she sold the little POS in the summer of '00. Never been happier to see a customer sell a car so I wouldn't have to work on it except for when a customer sold his turbo Jetta. Another POS with major electrical issues.

Other than the MGB and my own Fiat 124 Spyder, the only experience I have with Euro trash is newer. I can probably still change both axle seals in a 944 in fifteen minutes and the lower engine mount in half an hour.
 
RogerRamRod said:
2 cars that seem to get everyone's juices flowing-Porsches & Vettes, neither has really ever appealed to me.
Click to expand...
I work with a Physicians Assistant that was talking about his Corvette, something about what the speedo goes up to. I butted in about my 86 Fox body and that the speedo goes up to 85 and I peg it all the time. He looked at me with a "how dare you mention a Fox Mustang in the same conversation as a Corvette" look on his face. It was priceless. yeah Corvette people think they are some sort of Hoity- Toity's they are far from it.
 
Now think about some of our European friends that are doing amazing things with "our" cars.
Just getting parts over there is bad enough and everyone I've seen from Sweden to Uzbekistan is someone doing a very high standard of work.
 
Always wanted a Citroen DS, fortunately, someone always beat me to them. I ended up with "just" a Duster, I'm probably much better off.
 
I owned a Peugeot turbo. It was a four door car, but the easiest to work on and very reliable. I enjoyed the car, but not as much as working on my barracuda
 
The only foreign car that I have worked on that I would consider good would be the 60's-mid 80's Volvo. One hour to do a timing belt and seal change, removed a 6 cyl auto diesel and installed a 4cyl gas 4 speed stick with overdrive in a weekend, all the holes for the pedals and other options where there already. Did i mention the two cars where three years different?
 
Never had a 60's/70's Euro car but had some 80's VW's and sn Audi. Audi had over 300k on the original 5cyl when I sold it.

Petrolicious made a few stories about Porsche 912's
 
Sell the 912 and buy a low mikes AMG E55 for about $15,000 - you should have enough left over cash for about 10 years of gas.
 
Friend had an old Triumph Bonneville. Spent many hours chasing parts. Found an original, unused harness. Third trip with the bike had a nuclear melt down. Gary literally pushed it off a stiff someplace in Sussex County NJ...
 
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