DubsterACS
RMS Regular
Yes, a Porsche for £2600. What could possibly go wrong? Well when it was advertised it was actually a little more than that but it still got me thinking, that's a cheap Porsche - how bad can it really be? Would it be potentially good enough to turn into a track car?
So after a couple of phone calls with the owner, we struck a deal over the phone and i confirmed i would buy the car from him for the not huge amount of £2600. He was based in Norfolk so I couldn't test drive or see the car so yes it was a blind purchase, but i was happy with the information he had told me about the car, its HPI was clear so I went ahead with the purchase. The following weekend myself and fellow car-eejit Andy flew over to Luton, hired a car and drove to Norfolk. The car was completely as described with a few extras he hadn't mentioned, so deal was done and we headed on our merry way back to Luton airport to leave the hire car back. Before i go any further let me introduce to you, Project TrackBox:
2001 Porsche Boxster 3.2 S 6spd Manual with 163,000 miles
Lapis Blue
Grey Leather
18" Turbo Twists
Litronic light
DesignTek lowering springs
Pirelli tyres all round
Folder full of receipts of work carried out
Kenwood / Focal sound system upgrade inc Bluetooth and USB connection
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on Flickr
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on Flickr
At this point i was insanely over the moon with my purchase and feeling quite smug and formulating plans of what to do to the car - strip the awful grey leather interior out, 2 Sparco bucket seats, short shift kit, racing steering wheel, 17" wheels and track tyres - as we journeyed down the road back to Luton airport, me in the hire car and Andy in the Boxster. At the fuel stop nearly 2 hours into the drive we commented how good the car actually was, felt quite tight although clutch was a bit heavy and few squeaks from bushes etc but overall quite good!
But then..........
We pulled into the rental car park to return the Fiesta, i started swapping stuff over and Andy jumped out and said those immortal words "we have a wee leak". Sure enough a trail of water had begun to run from under the engine area....the coolant cap then started bubbling water out of it and steam started coming out both side air vents. Apparently i turned a funny shade of green / grey / red, as i looked beneath the car to find:
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on Flickr
The coolant was pouring out of the engine like a waterfall, all i could think of was "we have over 500 miles to cover in this". So they we were, stranded in Luton's Enterprise car park. I'm with Autoline for my classic policy so i did have breakdown cover although realised it was recovery to a local garage only. So after phoning their out of hours service, they wanted me to find out a local garage to take it to....at 7pm on a Saturday evening! After telling my woes to a very understanding Enterprise employee, they offered me a parking space for a few days until i could get it recovered properly which was very very good of them so got it parked up and the focus then turned to how on earth Andy and I were getting home. No more flights that evening, next flight from Luton to Belfast was the next night at a huge amount of money adding in the fact we would have to stay in a hotel adding to the cost of it all. So we came up with a bit of an idea to hire a car and drive the whole way home in it returning it to Belfast International Airport, Enterprise were out of cars...as were Hertz, but Europcar had a wee white Polo left so we paid what surely must have covered double the monthly lease cost of the car and started our journey back home via Cairnryan as we had the boat booked for Stenaline only to realise in all the drama that we weren't gonna make the 11pm sailing and the next sailing wasn't until 6.30am on the Sunday. Got re-booked on that boat, meaning we could take our time and we eventually pulled into my driveway at 9.15am on the Sunday.
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on Flickr
Parked up at Luton:
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on Flickr
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on Flickr
Anyways, drama over I hear you ask.....not so. The breakdown assistance company were extremely quick to help on the Monday, couple of phone calls and photos etc and the recovery truck was organised, I chose for the car to go to a specialist i had dealt with before in Surrey called ePorsch and they were primed ready to take delivery of the car. I phoned them at the end of Monday to be told my car had not turned up. Very strange, phoned the assistance co and they apologised to say they hadn't got the authorisation to the recovery truck in time for it to be lifted on the Monday but it would be lifted before lunchtime the next day, I had been told it had been lifted a few hours previous so was a bit confused but no matter. Very long story short - the car never turned up, I found out i had been lied to by the assistance company, then they lost my car as in couldn't confirm if it was still at Luton airport or at the recovery depot so for 24hours i didn't actually know where my car was. On the Wednesday evening i had had enough and found out the name of the recovery company who were very helpful in explaining what went on and were able to tell me they lifted the car on the Tuesday evening and would deliver it to ePorsch on the Thursday, which they did. ePorsch were a further 80 miles than my allowance for recovery but needless to say, I didn't pay anything for that recovery.
So, with it at ePorsch I was happy it was in safe hands and left them to it. They found the water pump had completely torn itself apart so fitted a new one, belt etc and tested it and it was fine. I went over last thursday to collect it and drive it home, realised on the way over I had actually only driven the car a total of 5 miles on the initial test drive! But thankfully it got me home, only throwing a check engine light on when i was driving onto the boat which has turned out to be an o2 sensor. The weather even was good enough for me to have the roof down for most of the journey home (the wind and upgraded sound system drowned out the squeaks and rattles from the suspension and brakes!) and I thoroughly enjoyed the drive in the evening across from Scotch Corner junction to the M6.
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on Flickr
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on Flickr
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on Flickr
So there you have it, I bought a cheap Porsche and it got me home (eventually!!) and seems to be ok so far. Its joins my other 2 although the other Lapis Boxster went to its new owner last night:
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on Flickr
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on Flickr
As I said before, the plan is to strip the car eventually turning it into a track car but i think for the next few months I'll refresh its suspension and brakes, get it driving really well then start stripping the weight off it and adding the track stuff in. Will keep yous posted about Project TrackBox!
So after a couple of phone calls with the owner, we struck a deal over the phone and i confirmed i would buy the car from him for the not huge amount of £2600. He was based in Norfolk so I couldn't test drive or see the car so yes it was a blind purchase, but i was happy with the information he had told me about the car, its HPI was clear so I went ahead with the purchase. The following weekend myself and fellow car-eejit Andy flew over to Luton, hired a car and drove to Norfolk. The car was completely as described with a few extras he hadn't mentioned, so deal was done and we headed on our merry way back to Luton airport to leave the hire car back. Before i go any further let me introduce to you, Project TrackBox:
2001 Porsche Boxster 3.2 S 6spd Manual with 163,000 miles
Lapis Blue
Grey Leather
18" Turbo Twists
Litronic light
DesignTek lowering springs
Pirelli tyres all round
Folder full of receipts of work carried out
Kenwood / Focal sound system upgrade inc Bluetooth and USB connection
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on FlickrProject TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on FlickrAt this point i was insanely over the moon with my purchase and feeling quite smug and formulating plans of what to do to the car - strip the awful grey leather interior out, 2 Sparco bucket seats, short shift kit, racing steering wheel, 17" wheels and track tyres - as we journeyed down the road back to Luton airport, me in the hire car and Andy in the Boxster. At the fuel stop nearly 2 hours into the drive we commented how good the car actually was, felt quite tight although clutch was a bit heavy and few squeaks from bushes etc but overall quite good!
But then..........
We pulled into the rental car park to return the Fiesta, i started swapping stuff over and Andy jumped out and said those immortal words "we have a wee leak". Sure enough a trail of water had begun to run from under the engine area....the coolant cap then started bubbling water out of it and steam started coming out both side air vents. Apparently i turned a funny shade of green / grey / red, as i looked beneath the car to find:
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on FlickrThe coolant was pouring out of the engine like a waterfall, all i could think of was "we have over 500 miles to cover in this". So they we were, stranded in Luton's Enterprise car park. I'm with Autoline for my classic policy so i did have breakdown cover although realised it was recovery to a local garage only. So after phoning their out of hours service, they wanted me to find out a local garage to take it to....at 7pm on a Saturday evening! After telling my woes to a very understanding Enterprise employee, they offered me a parking space for a few days until i could get it recovered properly which was very very good of them so got it parked up and the focus then turned to how on earth Andy and I were getting home. No more flights that evening, next flight from Luton to Belfast was the next night at a huge amount of money adding in the fact we would have to stay in a hotel adding to the cost of it all. So we came up with a bit of an idea to hire a car and drive the whole way home in it returning it to Belfast International Airport, Enterprise were out of cars...as were Hertz, but Europcar had a wee white Polo left so we paid what surely must have covered double the monthly lease cost of the car and started our journey back home via Cairnryan as we had the boat booked for Stenaline only to realise in all the drama that we weren't gonna make the 11pm sailing and the next sailing wasn't until 6.30am on the Sunday. Got re-booked on that boat, meaning we could take our time and we eventually pulled into my driveway at 9.15am on the Sunday.
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on FlickrParked up at Luton:
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on FlickrProject TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on FlickrAnyways, drama over I hear you ask.....not so. The breakdown assistance company were extremely quick to help on the Monday, couple of phone calls and photos etc and the recovery truck was organised, I chose for the car to go to a specialist i had dealt with before in Surrey called ePorsch and they were primed ready to take delivery of the car. I phoned them at the end of Monday to be told my car had not turned up. Very strange, phoned the assistance co and they apologised to say they hadn't got the authorisation to the recovery truck in time for it to be lifted on the Monday but it would be lifted before lunchtime the next day, I had been told it had been lifted a few hours previous so was a bit confused but no matter. Very long story short - the car never turned up, I found out i had been lied to by the assistance company, then they lost my car as in couldn't confirm if it was still at Luton airport or at the recovery depot so for 24hours i didn't actually know where my car was. On the Wednesday evening i had had enough and found out the name of the recovery company who were very helpful in explaining what went on and were able to tell me they lifted the car on the Tuesday evening and would deliver it to ePorsch on the Thursday, which they did. ePorsch were a further 80 miles than my allowance for recovery but needless to say, I didn't pay anything for that recovery.
So, with it at ePorsch I was happy it was in safe hands and left them to it. They found the water pump had completely torn itself apart so fitted a new one, belt etc and tested it and it was fine. I went over last thursday to collect it and drive it home, realised on the way over I had actually only driven the car a total of 5 miles on the initial test drive! But thankfully it got me home, only throwing a check engine light on when i was driving onto the boat which has turned out to be an o2 sensor. The weather even was good enough for me to have the roof down for most of the journey home (the wind and upgraded sound system drowned out the squeaks and rattles from the suspension and brakes!) and I thoroughly enjoyed the drive in the evening across from Scotch Corner junction to the M6.
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on FlickrProject TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on FlickrProject TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on FlickrSo there you have it, I bought a cheap Porsche and it got me home (eventually!!) and seems to be ok so far. Its joins my other 2 although the other Lapis Boxster went to its new owner last night:
Project TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on FlickrProject TrackBox by Graham Thompson, on FlickrAs I said before, the plan is to strip the car eventually turning it into a track car but i think for the next few months I'll refresh its suspension and brakes, get it driving really well then start stripping the weight off it and adding the track stuff in. Will keep yous posted about Project TrackBox!
.
TrackBox cleanup
TrackBox cleanup
TrackBox cleanup
TrackBox cleanup
TrackBox cleanup
TrackBox cleanup
TrackBox cleanup
TrackBox cleanup
TrackBox cleanup
TrackBox cleanup
TrackBox cleanup
TrackBox cleanup
TrackBox cleanup