Progress
We hope you all had a happy holiday; we did. Most of the work this month has been preparing parts for the big swap meet February 1st in Anaheim, California. We look forward to the road trip and the stop in Las Vegas. We also get to see friends and customers from all over the world. Robert is from Amsterdam and always buys a lot of parts from us. There is a guy from New Zealand that carried some side window glass back home on his lap. There are lots of people that know us and it is fun to put faces to names.

We have quite a few parts this year as we parted out that damaged ’63 Coupe. We will keep the engine and transmission and sell most everything else. Eventually we will take the sawzall to the body and get a few clips for future restorations. Our philosophy has always been that parts should be used to restore these great cars and not set on the shelf.

Michael’s ’62 Coupe has gone to the painter and instead of silver he is going with Oslo Blue. After seeing the color on Gene’s ’62 Cabriolet. Since we had a space in the shop we brought down the Shop ’60 Outlaw. There is a lot of metal work to do on this car in addition to the outlaw modifications. While BJ worked on the battery box, floor and longitudinals, I chopped the top. I used a Speedster windshield to determine the new roof height and grab the side cutter and sawzall and chopped it off! Looks neat; sort of like a Speedster with a hardtop. This also moves the rear window down for better visibility but it also means I will have to section the rear deck lid to get it to fit in the smaller opening. The next outlaw modification will be to re-arch the wheel wells to look like an American Roadster.

Note: Phil Carney has written an excellent article detailing the history and status of each of the seventeen America Roadsters. The article was printed in the last few issues of the 356 Registry magazine. We were very pleased to have S/N 12336 at Porsches and Pastries a few years ago. The America Roadsters are aluminum bodied 356, manufactured in 1952 and are very rare. Any way, I like the round wheel openings and will duplicate them on the Shop Outlaw.

Believe it our not; it looks like we are booked up for this year. We will have Michael’s and George’s Coupes to reassemble after paint. We will be restoring Tom’s ’64 Cabriolet. We have a 356 coming up from New Mexico and another from Arizona. Plus we want to finish the Shop Outlaw and convert the ’58 race car to a street car. And of course the Shop ’57 Carrera sits on the back burner.

While we have requested newsletter recipients to let us know of any 356 project cars, we have had no response. Is it possible 356RESTORE has done all the 356’s in Colorado? We doubt it but have worked on over sixty Colorado 356’s.

Restoration Book
The print date will be in March. Next month we will have ordering information., I plan to take samples and order forms to the Anaheim swap meet. We will also have a table at the Speedster Fest in Monterey in June.

Flasher
Mark Kutner purchased a new Bosch flasher unit for his 356 from Zim’s Autotechnik (817.267.4451). Mark is really impressed with this electronic flasher. His turn signals are bright and react immediately. At $49.95 it is more expensive than the $5 NAPA unit (part #535). As a safety item we would recommend you get this electronic flasher.

Another safety item you should have is the third brake light from the Lereyn Company (www.thirdbrakelight.com or 831.636.3046). We have done enough rear end repairs to 356’s to know you have to be seen when braking. The 356 will still stop quicker than most of the other cars on the road.

This brings up the dual master brake cylinder option. There are kits for the 356 to convert from a single to a dual master cylinder. If you had a wheel cylinder or brake line fail you would still have half your brakes. Do you need this option? If you do periodic brake maintenance probably not. If however, you have never bled your brakes or don’t even know where the brake fluid reservoir is, then probably yes.

Events
The Carquip annual Swap Meet (and breakfast burrito feast) will be February 22, (Sunday) in Boulder.

The RM356PC has a full schedule of events this year. We will have details next month.

(Whoops! No newsletter next month as it is time to leave the fun of 356 restoration and enjoy the fun of Maui. Aloha!)

The Porsche Rennsport Reunion II is April 23-25.

The 356 International meet is May 20-23 in Deauville, France.

The Emory’s Campout is June 11-13.

The Speedster Fest is June 25-27.

The East Coast Holiday is September 29-October 3 in Williamsburg, Virginia. This will be a big event! It will celebrate thirty years of the 356Registry.