BARGAIN OF THE YEAR?

You might have spotted that my 924S, which during the early days of my ownership I tended to refer to as simply ‘grey’, I now describe as Stone Grey. Why and how, then, this new-found precision?

Because, thanks to Porsche Cars GB, I have a piece of paper that tells me this, and much else besides. For two years running, in 2014 and 2015, the press office at Reading generously organised for we Porsche-owning journalists a late-summer barbecue at the Experience Centre at Silverstone. And in 2015 the company presented each of us, free of charge, with one of its well-known Certificates of Authenticity for our chosen vehicle, signed by managing director Chris Craft. At the time they normally retailed for £65 each.

The basic characteristics of the car need little explanation. It is unequivocally a 924S. But there is a lot of useful additional information that can be gleaned from that single A4 sheet. Such as, for instance, the fact that it was completed at Audi’s Neckarsulm factory on 28th November 1985, and first registered here in the UKO n 6th February 1986. The Porsche Centre that sold it new was Charles Follett in Mayfair – hence the central London ‘YN’ registration mark. (And, by a strange co-incidence, the left-hand-drive 944 came to me with both a London ‘YF’ mark and its own Follett-badged plates.) The 924S’s exterior colour – which had always been a source of some confusion to me – is officially the aforementioned Stone Grey (or Stone Greymetallic, actually), and the interior is in black leatherette – although the now completely shredded seats have what I would call ‘pinstripe’ centre panels.

The engine, type numberm44/07, bears the serial number 43G05350 (I must check some time to see if it’s still the original unit; matching numbers, and all that…), and the type G016J transmission is numbered OK12115. Optional

and made plans to return the following week, when I would have more time. In the event, both bulbs were OK, which suggested either the fuse, or possibly the switch on the pedal. (Or, even less helpfully, some part of the wiring.) The fuse was eliminated – or so I thought at the time – by fitting a new replacement, and the switch by pulling off its connector block and bridging

afterwards. Thanks, Porsche. Another utterly brilliant piece of design. Not.

Yet again, though, I feel I was led astray – or at least seriously misled – by said Driver’s Handbook. It quite clearly states (as does the 1987-model edition that I also possess) that fuse number six protects the brake lights and the emergency (ie hazard) flashers, and fuse number eight the direction indicators and the brake-circuit warning light (which I presume to mean the one on the central part of the fascia, to the right of the cigarette lighter). Which is wrong – or at least it appears to be so in this particular car. As far as I can tell, fuse six protects the hazard lights alone, and it is beyond doubt fuse eight that protects the brake-light circuit. And neither appears to have any effect on my car’s brake-circuit warning light. Either way, it is hardly the most helpful of technical documents.

With the 924S finally back at home I was able to make progress on a few other niggling faults – but at the same time forced to take backward steps in other areas. The driver’s window had developed a habit of opening but often failing to close, for instance, and I soon traced that to a displaced – and surprisingly easily refitted – contact inside the switch (see photo, right). But removing the door card to access the switch revealed that the waterproof membrane between the shell and the inner trim had previously been torn to shreds – and also that in places the trim panel itself is quite badly damaged – so that will have to be addressed before reassembly. I shall obviously have to work out some way of beefing up the door card, too.

Having discovered, while doing this, that there was no radio speaker in the righthand door, out of curiosity I took the cover off the one on the passenger’s side. This revealed a unit of the correct dimensions, but after taking that out I realised that someone had previously tried to install an oversize device by simply bending the edge of the aperture in the door shell, presumably with a large hammer. Oh, well, it’s only a cheap old Porsche, isn’t it? (Although it probably wasn’t quite so old, or quite so cheap, when this particular atrocity was carried out.) Give me strength!

My final and ultimately no less disappointing task was to replace the rear bumper. The original had suffered some minor impact damage before I bought the car, back in 2012 – luckily without any adverse effect on the nearby bodywork – and having in the meantime acquired a couple of spares, albeit both completely the wrong colour, I was keen to set the replacement process in motion; to get at least something constructive done before I went off on holiday.

Knowing from previous experience how difficult it can be to remove the rubbing strip from these bumpers, without the M6 securing studs breaking as you undo the nuts, I had already bought from Porsche a couple of new mouldings – the other one is for the 944. (I forget the precise cost now, but at around £60 they are surprisingly inexpensive.) Good job, too, because predictably all but one of the studs was so corroded that, even after being soaked in penetrating oil, they snapped like carrots. You can, in theory, prise out the studs and fit new ones, but I’d question whether it’s ever going to be worth either the effort or ultimately the visual compromise.

And fitting the new strip was only marginally less frustrating. Logic suggests first attaching it – as loosely as possible – along the flat centre section of the bumper, and then gently bending it round the two curved ends. Trouble is, you can then easily pass only the two studs at one end of the strip through the allegedly matching holes in the bumper – the opposite end becomes slightly too ‘short’ – and although there is some lateral movement around each of the studs, trapped inside the two flanges on the inside of the rubber, even cumulatively this doesn’t allow that final stud easily to pass through its assigned hole.

I managed it in the end, again with much swearing (well, honestly, why can’t they make this bloody stuff SO THAT IT ACTUALLY FITS?), and to my satisfaction without having to enlarge any of the holes, but it wasn’t the most pleasing of jobs. I shall have to take the bumper off again to replace the temporary mild-steel washers that I fitted beneath the (stainless-steel) nuts with some suitable stainless jobs, and eventually it will all have to come apart again for painting. But for the moment it looks OK, and does at least suggest that the car is being loved and cared for.

I shall also have to do something about the bumper’s alignment against the body shell. All of these transaxle cars have famously large (and variable) panel gaps, designed to allow quick, easy and thus cheap assembly, and in truth the old bumper was no great shakes in that respect. But even faded Guards Red against Stone Grey Metallic shows just how haphazard the original manufacturing process was, way back in the 1980s. PW