The Official 356Talk Forum

My car is returning to the road after more than two decades of storage. The 356 world has certainly changed in the mean time. Given the nature of the cars and their owners, the details sparkle for many. I am no different.

In the last couple of years I have been paying attention again and learned a lot. Several helpful members have lighted the way on most of these points. I am very grateful! Some are old news to many if not most, but all were news to me. There are other fascinating details about this model, but I knew of them last century

Here goes:

Battery cover is similar to later hard plastic cover, but made of fiberboard.

Headlight lenses have no script horizontally close to the bottom. All script follows the curve of lense bottom.

Moll 6-volt batteries sold by Porsche for our cars are incorrect. Should be 84 ah, not 77. Moll does make the right specification, so it is a mystery why Porsche doesn't import the correct battery.

Most say tool kit bag is made of light grey vinyl. Others say blue vinyl from T-5 is (also?) correct.

Front torsion bars are 15 mm. Good idea to switch to C 16 mm bar or Willhoit's 17.5 mm.

Porsche sells new original Fuchs brake drums, front and rear, but they aren't cheap. Over $2,000 list price.

Porsche just recently talked Pirelli into making CN36 tires in our size of 165-80.

Fuse box has two posts and a corresponding cover with clips to mate. Early model year 1962 only.

Porsche did supply a VDM slotted-spoke dished wood wheel, but it only works with the deluxe horn ring.

There are locksmiths who can make keys for transmission locks (which don't have a working key) without damaging (cutting open) the lock. Also can determine FE code just by measuring the profile of a working key.

S90 camber compensators are held in low regard.

Lifting hooks showed up on C engines.

Original Hella 128 lenses are subtly different than current reproductions (which are not made by Hella).

Bodies at the rear are tighter on the right (seemingly without exception).

Roadsters came with vinyl interiors.

Some of these observations were surprising even to experienced 356'ers. Others are old hat. I welcome emendations.

Edwin.....congratulations on getting you car back on the road.
Best
Jim

Yeah I just heard about the bodies being "dressed left" in the rear for no apparent explanation, thus being tighter on the right. No idea why a car would have asymmetry like that......cool list!

The '62 also has some other unique differences. The emergency hood release cord is green; the fuel tank is a bottom sender; the fuel guage is slightly different; the mirror access cover was an opaque white (I believe on Roadsters only); the windshield washer bottle has the pick up tube inserted into the bottle itself rather than through the cap. My guess there are more differences.

Thanks for sharing your observations, Edwin. I wonder if the body deal was common to all D'Ieteren Roadsters or just the T-6 models? Also, I have a factory camber compensator on my non S-90 Drauz Roadster and I like it FWIW.

Jon, I think the body asymmetry holds for all models: coupes, cabs, and roadsters. Thanks for your opinion about the camber compensator.

By "tighter at the right" in the rear, are you referring to the passenger side? I can confirm that my car is definitely tighter at the rear wheel well than the driver's side. I just assumed the car had been hit and poorly repaired at some point in its life.

So we're saying this is normal!?

Sean M Rooks wrote:By "tighter at the right" in the rear, are you referring to the passenger side? I can confirm that my car is definitely tighter at the rear wheel well than the driver's side. I just assumed the car had been hit and poorly repaired at some point in its life.

So we're saying this is normal!?

Seems to be. You can imagine that some jig used to put together chassis was a little out of whack for some short period of time. But this phenomenon stretches out over years.

Asymmetry ? Can you specify where and quantify this "tighter area" ? Do you mean the wheel opening to the tire clearance? That distance is controlled by so many factors, it is hard to identify them all !

Edwin,

By front torsion bar" you mean the "anti roll bar" or "Sway Bar" as opposed to the "suspension torsion" bars which in the front are square in cross-section!

Sean M Rooks wrote:By "tighter at the right" in the rear, are you referring to the passenger side? I can confirm that my car is definitely tighter at the rear wheel well than the driver's side. I just assumed the car had been hit and poorly repaired at some point in its life.

So we're saying this is normal!?

My '59 T2 Coupe is exactly the same way. I had assumed right rear corner damage had been repaired incorrectly, but an inspection under that area, and the bracing, reveals no telltale signs of any repair.

Brian

Symmetrical upper body 356? Fender openings clearances are different side to side regardless of the manufacturer. 1/2 inch in the rear is not uncommon. Folks forget these cars were not put together by robots. Back in the day, allowed dimension variances were large (larger in US made autos). Today in most, variances are "0". Some of the variances in assembly of 356 bodies are huge, but most of the time are not "visible" until you are down to the nitty gritty trying to put a body together from scratch. As in, 3/8 inches of lead to fill the gap between the door and quarter.....and that is just for starters.

Roy Smalley wrote:Symmetrical upper body 356? Fender openings clearances are different side to side regardless of the manufacturer. 1/2 inch in the rear is not uncommon

Roy, random variance at disparate locations is one thing. Here we are talking about what seems like a common trait with just the right rear corner, and a lot more than 1/2 inch. It's not the arch of the opening (that I'm mentioning, anyway) but the horizontal distance from the tire to the lip of the opening.

Could others of you be more specific?

Brian

Brian R Adams wrote:

Roy Smalley wrote:Symmetrical upper body 356? Fender openings clearances are different side to side regardless of the manufacturer. 1/2 inch in the rear is not uncommon

Roy, random variance at disparate locations is one thing. Here we are talking about what seems like a common trait with just the right rear corner, and a lot more than 1/2 inch. It's not the arch of the opening (that I'm mentioning, anyway) but the horizontal distance from the tire to the lip of the opening.

Could others of you be more specific?

1/2 from the opening to the tire on one side versus one inch on the other is not uncommon. But it could be either side.

Norm Miller made an interesting point in another thread: the cars were tied down on the left rear during shipping. So maybe the ocean did the stretching

European delivery cars that made it here under different circumstances could provide a clue.

Jacques LeFriant pointed out that the driver sits on the left always (on LHD cars of course). Maybe Porsche was fine tuning for that. RHD owners speak up.