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Brighten up your 911 on a Budget

This article applies to Porsches 911, 912 or 930 built between 1965 to 1989

If your Porsche is looking a bit old and tired, there's a few relatively inexpensive things you can do to bring your Porsche back to life and add back some of the original sparkle. In our six part series we show you have to brigthen up your Porsche on a budget. In Part One of this series we take a look at the front of your Porsche.

Headlights

The headlights can really make a difference to the look of your Porsche. The lenses often get cracked, smashed or generally faded. New lenses are quite cheap and will make a huge difference. If your going to change the lenses that its worth changing the sealing ring gasket that sits between the headlight units and the headlight bowls. Depending on the condition of the reflectors it might be worth either changing them for new, or just generally cleaning the originals up or even spraying them using chrome effect paint.

Front Fog light lenses.

65-68 cars used Hella 128 fog lights as the optional under the bumper foglight. Replacing the lens is fairly easy and new lenses are readily available. These lenses come in yellow or clear (white), the color is your preference or what came originally on your car. 69-73 cars used Hella 139 foglights mounted under the bumper. The 139 lenses come as a combined reflector/lens assembly and were available in yellow or clear (white). The 118 lenses can be replaced separately and come in clear (white) or yellow. These were also available in a driving light version that has a lens which had almost no fluting in the glass, giving it a longer, narrower beam than the fog lights (they were also available in clear (white) or yellow). Replacement lenses are very difficult to find for these lights. If you cannot find a replacement, your only other option would be to purchase new or used foglight assemblies and have them mounted. 74-89 cars have fog lights mounted under the bumper with easily replaceable lenses, also available in clear (white) or yellow. 74-83 fog lights are mounted to the front of the valance; 84-89 are recessed in the valance. Two screws hold each frame in place, and the lens is easily accessible from there.

The Bonnet Crest.

Porsche crest fades over time and loses its colour. It's also used by many owners as a pressure point when closing the bonnet. Replacing crest is fairly simple and quite cheap. You need to take your time and take care not to damage the paint work. Here's our guide to changing the Porsche crest.

Windscreen Wiper blades.

Not just an essential item for keeping the winsdreen clean and visibility at its best, but a tatty pair of wiper blades immediately ruins the appeal of an otherwise beautiful Porsche. It takes only a few minutes to change the blade assemblies on the wiper arms. It's not really worth trying to restore the wiper arms, and is much more effective t simply replace them along with new wiper blades.

Indicator lights.

Porsches built between 1965 and 1968 cars have lenses that are integral to the housing assembly. Replacing the lens requires replacing the entire housing assembly. There are some aftermarket replacement lenses that can be used, but it will require some modification to get them to fit correctly.

Porsche 911 and 912 built between 1969 and 1973 fortunately have replaceable lenses. Buy origina the original Bosch lenses if possible as they are a perfect. They come in USA and European combinations, and black or silver trim.

Replacing the lenses is simply a matter of taking the screws out of the old lens and screwing on the new lens. Make sure you use new screws. Old rusty ones reuin the effect. Also make sure you don't over tighten the screws or you'll end up with cracked lenses.

On 911 and 930 built between 1974 and 1989 (the so called impact bumper variants) the light units are located in the bumper assembly. The lenses are also replaceable. Each is held on with just two screws.

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