1965 Porsche 356C Coupe Complete Restoration into Outlaw

[Shane Balkowitsch]

http://webhost.btinet.net/~sharoncol/porsche356.htm (Complete Restoration Website)
http://www.hamiltonclassics.com/Balkowitsch.htm (Builders Photographic Webpage)
http://www.356registry.com/forum/album.php?user_id=3862 (356 Registery Picture Album)

I wanted to share my little build with everyone. Bill Hamilton at Hamilton Classics and I are restoring a 1965 356C Coupe. The build will take over a year to complete. I purchased the car from a gentleman in Connecticut on 7/4/2009. He took it completely apart 22 years ago and that is how it was sat, completely disassembled in boxes for over 2 decades. This is a complete bottom up restoration starting with media blasting the body. Every aspect of the car will be fully restored and detailed. The above website is going to completely document the restoration process. I hope everyone enjoys the information and the photographs and I welcome any comments or suggestions. I have also added some historical pictures that I have found over my months of research. It should be noted that I have never seen my car in person yet and I have never sat in a 356 let alone driven one. My first ride will be in my fully restored Porsche sometime in 2010 with Bill Hamilton by my side. I am a very fortunate to have this opportunity to save a piece of automobile history.

Thanks,
Shane Balkowitsch (356 Registry Member#: 31354)
(701)426-7630
shane@balkowitsch.com
www.balkowitsch.com
Original photograph of 356 as purchased in Connecticut

You can also find Bill Hamilton's website at www.hamiltonclassics.com. He restored his first 356 car in 1970. Incidently, that is one year after I was born. You will not find a nicer guy. He had time to talk with me on the phone for hours before I even had a Porsche 356 to restore. That speaks volumes about his dedication and love for these vehicles. He lives, breaths and races these early Porsche cars and his knowledge and expertise is second to none. He is a 356 veteran and can help anyone on all levels of restoration. You cannot go wrong with his services and I consider him not only my builder but my friend.

[Mark Pribanic]

Shane,

Why not create a build thread here on the 356 Registry site. You have around 4000 people who will be following your build on this site. Look at Rusty's build thread. It is the highest viewed thread on the site with 59,8xx views.

http://356registry.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4080

There is no interaction on the site you provide for your build. It is a one sided exchange of information. Hope you choose to create a similar thread as Rusty's for your build here.

I look forward to following your thread here.

[Carl Zapffe]

Hi, Shane,

I agree with Mark in philosophy, but with caveats. Your build sites are fine, so go with them for the complete picture, then add the link, or links, that you like best under your 356 Talk signature. This also will work with your signature in your emails to other car fans not connected to the 356 Registry.

Finally, post a periodic summary of the work on 356 Talk to keep us looking forward to each new update. This can be especially useful if you have questions. You will have lots of extremely valuable advice offered here by the true experts in the 356 business, and the further good news is that almost everyone who posts on your thread will be notified each time it is updated. It really is a win-win situation.

[Shane Balkowitsch]

Had a good conversation with Bill this week about the paint scheme, looks like my Outlaw will see paint this month with any luck. We are going to paint the car the same historic Silver that K45-286 is painted as it sits in the Porsche Museum. I talked with one of the curators of the Porsche Museum and he gave me all of the manufacturer codes and numbers to get the paint to match. I was amazed at how helpful and supportive they are over in Germany. They thanked me for restroring the car and told me that they will provide me with any information I need. There will be a wide white race stripe that runs from the front of the car to the back. It will be a Porsche white also, think it will be a 911 white, since I want it to be a stark white instead of an off-white. I am going to do something a little different with the dash. I want the dash to be the same white color as the stripe, to kind of tie the exterior and the interior together a little bit. I know it is conventional to paint the dash the same color as the exterior but I think it will look nice. We also discussed the brake calipers and they will be a Porsche Brake Caliper Red and they should show up nicely behind the MiniLite wheels I have chosen. Thanks for following my build.

[Shane Balkowitsch]

Well I received my paint samples from Bill and am very excited. The Porsche Silver is amazing and I am very happy that the car will be the same color as K45-286, my little way of paying honor to the first Porsche ever. The white on the other hand is a bit of a struggle. The wide race stripe is going to be white, and I wanted a Porsche white. We looked at the 911 white which is on the sample I just received and it is "Just not white enough". I am looking for a white, white. Bill calls it a refrigerator white and this 911 white by no means is beige, eggshell or an off white, but it is just not the stark white I am looking for. I really would like to keep both colors official Porsche colors but we may have to look elsewhere for the white. The white will be applied to the race stripe, the GT Mirror, the Spyder License Light and I am going to mix it up a little bit and have the dash only painted white. I understand that the dash would historically be the color of the car but I thought the contrast may be nice. Black seats with white stitching, white dash, white headliner, it should be nice. So the car should go to paint any day now and the verdict for the white is that we need to finder a whiter white.

We have posted some new photographs to the site mocking up the paint stripe. We are also addressing placement of the Spyder license plate light. I am awaiting paint samples from the painter. The car will be in historic K45-286 Silver, we got the paint codes from the curator of the Porsche Museum and a Porsche white race stripe will run down the length of the car.

Talked with Bill late yesterday and my 356 is off to the painters. He took some pictures of loading it and I will have them posted to the website shortly. Very exciting. K45-286 Silver awaiting the car. I appreciate everyones help with trying to find the correct Whiter White for the Race Stripe. We have a week or two before that needs to be determined. As you can see from the photographs, the car looks excellent even in primer. Told Bill slap some wheels and throw in the motor, I will drive it around as is. Again our scheduled completion date is sometime in late summer. But it seems like we have only begun. We have the mechanical parts to deal with next. I have everything in my head and Bill and I have a Build Task List that we work off of. Seems like we have come a long way in a short period of time. What we are not going to do is rush it. If it takes longer, so be it. A one year restoration timeframe I feel was a little ambitious to begin with but time will tell.

Thanks everyone for continuing to follow me and my car.

[Barry Brisco]

The topic that Shane started about his 356C Coupe project is available for posting.

Please observe 356Talk rules when posting. As always, the rules are available at http://356registry.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=111

Thank you for your cooperation.

Barry

Other posts that were in this topic are shown below:

You might consider a thin black stripe (a boot stripe in boat world) between the silver and white to lend contast.

Shane, I think perhaps the "911 white" you refer to is really light "ivory" and that may be why you are not seeing it as "white white" (pure white).

Something that might be interesting for you to consider is a 57-959 356 color "Glacier White" (Reutter paint code 713) which is a pure white with a very faint tinge of green in it. Might be interesting with silver. Or maybe the 54-55 color "White" (603) which is pretty much a straight white as far as I know. See John Wilhoit's site at http://www.willhoitautorestoration.com/PaintChart.htm you can get paint card samples from that site, just call them to order. All the 60's Porsche "whites" are really light ivories.

If you want the whitest of whites, use white tint. If you've ever seen a car done in white tint, its really does stick out.

There is a later 911 color, "Grand Prix white" which is much whiter than the light ivory. Sort of like a pure white with one drop of black in it.

It is, however, impossible to photograph. It tends to looks silver or gray in pictures.

http://www.912registry.org/restore/pcode.htm

It is shown for the '76 912E in this table.

[Shane Balkowitsch]

Good evening everyone, thanks for your patience with my thread. We are now back online as we should be and lets continue to discuss my build. Pros and Cons, does not matter to me.

My car arrived at the painters today, Bill snapped a couple of photographs of it, you can find them at

www.hamiltonclassics.com/Balkowitsch.htm

We are still working on finding the correct Whiter White (if there is such a thing) for the car but I will have some spray samples in a week or so. The 911 white was just not white enough. Thanks everyone for your suggestions on other alternative whites for the race stripe, they have all been passed onto Bill.

Received a very nice email from Rod Emory today giving me some words of encouragement. Was very nice of him to take time out of his day to offer support to my build.

Thanks again for following my build and I have made to promise to many Registry Members to keep posting updates about my build. We will be getting started on the mechanical aspects soon and we have many decisions to make in these areas.

Thanks again and please keep following our progress.

Sincerely,
Shane

[Shane Balkowitsch]

Good morning, one of the issues we were looking at, even though more of a personal preference than anything, is the correct placement of the read License Plate Light in relationship to the Porsche Logo,




Again I know this is a personal preference but Bill did some mocking up with the Logo and a blank license plate frame on the car and I think it looks pretty good, don't want it to be too low but not too high either. Obviously because we are no longer using bumpers the exact placement of this is just a judgement call. I know not a big deal and nothing will be finalized until back from paint, but if someone cares to comment, I would welcome it. The only thing not being presented in the "C" script.

Thanks,
Shane

[Shane Balkowitsch]

I almost forgot to mention if it is not obvious, the Spyder light will be also white so as to blend in with the stripe. I knew that I wanted a wide race stripe and the light was able to help us dictate how wide we really needed it to be. The GT Mirror on the drivers front fender will also be the same white, think it will look kind of cool.

Thanks,
Shane

[Jay Darlington]

shane, you might look at this its not porsche but it is white!
dupont chromabase
85-06 toyota super white
code-040
allso you can play with mixing colors. white with a drop or two of blue to a gal. of mixing white will britten it up with out seeing the blue . best of luck man ! 8)

[Thomas Canty]

..

[Shane Balkowitsch]

I hope we are not spending too much time on the paint color for the stripe, but I want a Porsche white. Bill is actively looking into the Grand Prix White used on some of the 912 cars. He is going to get a sample, I want to stay with a Porsche color if at all possible, and this may be our color, I will let you all know.

Thanks,
Shane

[Thomas Canty]

..

[Shane Balkowitsch]

How are you?

http://www.fibersteel.com/

Talk with Russ over there, he is a very nice guy and was very helpful. Got my seats, my GT Mirror and the Spyder license light from him. I figure if the light was good enough for James Dean 550 Spyder, good enough for my little outlaw.

Tell Russ Shane sent ya.

Thanks,
Shane

[Guest]

Shane,
There is a 996 Turbo white that is very white. Your body
shop should be able to blend your own color of white.

Alan

Shane Balkowitsch wrote:

Good evening everyone, thanks for your patience with my thread. We are now back online as we should be and lets continue to discuss my build. Pros and Cons, does not matter to me.

My car arrived at the painters today, Bill snapped a couple of photographs of it, you can find them at

www.hamiltonclassics.com/Balkowitsch.htm

We are still working on finding the correct Whiter White (if there is such a thing) for the car but I will have some spray samples in a week or so. The 911 white was just not white enough. Thanks everyone for your suggestions on other alternative whites for the race stripe, they have all been passed onto Bill.

Received a very nice email from Rod Emory today giving me some words of encouragement. Was very nice of him to take time out of his day to offer support to my build.

Thanks again for following my build and I have made to promise to many Registry Members to keep posting updates about my build. We will be getting started on the mechanical aspects soon and we have many decisions to make in these areas.

Thanks again and please keep following our progress.

Sincerely,
Shane

------------------------
Shane Balkowitsch
1965 Porsche 356C Outlaw
http://www.btinet.net/~sharoncol/porsche356.htm
http://356registry.com/forum/viewtopic. ... 2623#72623
http://356registry.com/forum/album.php?user_id=3862

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