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Yesterday @Zirconocene and I met up with Ken, who is new to the 928 World and had recently acquired a very early 928. Check it out below. The car is a 1979 5spd Black & Cork interior. The build date on this car is 11/1978 but notice this car seems to originally built for the US market. Notice side markers and rear bumperettes are OEM and not the federalized add on's. I thought all 78/79 models were imported to the US market?. The car has 90k miles on it and looks to be fairly original. We noted all the glass was stamped with"West Germany" which I thought was cool.
We were hoping someone with knowledge of these early cars, like @Rob Edwards , could help with some information on production numbers, options, etc. Here is the VIN: 9289200806
Ken is working to get this car rolling on the road again. He is not sure about keeping the car long-term but seems to be having fun with it for now. The motor starts and runs quite nicely now after he cleaned the tank and added a new pump. At the moment he is chasing down a non-functioning auxiliary air valve system which seems to be failed fully open.
Anyway, it was cool to get a close look at a very early car and see how they were put together.
Awesome find. It was built 5 cars before mine (9289200811) also built in 11/78. Mine is currently black with cork interior (black carpet), but originally oak green. I'm finding most of the parts are of 10/78 vintage. It is cool to find these old buggers in relatively unmolested condition.
BTW, the "2" in the vin after the 9289 signifies US build. 928 then build year (8 or 9) then euro (1) or US (2) followed by the serial number XXXXX. They built both Euro and US versions for 78 and 79.
Yes, this is a US market '79, production number 2017 out of the worldwide '79 production of 5324 cars. Black, two mirrors, alarm, sunroof, and was originally a tourist delivery car. As we all know, Cork is the best.
Sunroof? Hard to tell from the pics, but I'd think that is pretty rare for an OB? Any numbers on '79s with sunroofs Rob?
Also, were the manhole rims (look like platinum) available before 1980? I'd think it should have come with 16" phone dial rims?
Sunroof? Hard to tell from the pics, but I'd think that is pretty rare for an OB? Any numbers on '79s with sunroofs Rob?
Also, were the manhole rims (look like platinum) available before 1980? I'd think it should have come with 16" phone dial rims?
Ken's car does indeed have a sunroof. The rims were the platinum anodized but Ken thinks they were added, not OEM.
So I went out and grabbed a pic of the "tape" on the glove box (you have to pull the glove box insert out and look at it). I think this signifies the sequential build number if I remember correctly. Have Ken pull his and see if it matches with what Rob is saying.
MIne seems to be "2111". Ken's is supposed to be "2017". That's a lot of 928s built (94) between 5 US VIN series? Very interesting!
Ken's car does indeed have a sunroof. The rims were the platinum anodized but Ken thinks they were added, not OEM.
Looking forward to seeing what Rob has for numbers on 79 sunroof cars.
The thread on my 79 (that I'm slowly updating as I go through it) is here: https://rennlist.com/forums/928-foru...uld-i-buy.html
Might be of some use to Ken as he goes through his.
MIne seems to be "2111". Ken's is supposed to be "2017".
The production numbers are in no way linearly related to the VIN#, the factory was assigning production numbers to cars way before the VIN was assigned, and they're split between US and ROW production.
Ken's VIN 0806, production number 1292017
VIN 0807 is # 1292098
VIN 0808 is #1292015
VIN 0809 is #1292001
VIN 0810 is # 1292003
Tom, your VIN 0811, production number 1292111. So there were a lot of ROW (and US) cars with the intervening production numbers. In the '78 production there are adjacent US VINs that are separated by as many as 650 production numbers.
At the moment he is chasing down a non-functioning auxiliary air valve system which seems to be failed fully open.
Should be fully open if placed in the freezer. It closes as it receives 12v from the plug when the engine is running. Make sure someone hasn't mixed up the plug to the cold start injector with the one to the AAV. The cold start injector plug has 3 wires under the rubber boot as it connects to the coolant temp switch which makes the ground to fire the injector. That one only sees 12v when the engine is turning over on the starter.
The plug to the AAV only has 2 wires under the rubber boot and sees 12v whenever the ignition is on.
Both plugs are the standard 2 contact versions.
If the plugs get mixed up, the AAV will never close as it will only see 12v during the few seconds of cranking.
Mixing up the WUR and AAV plugs doesn't matter as they both get 12v when the ignition is on, but doubt either the cold start or AAV plug will reach the WUR.
My 1979 928 is a US model and has an assembly date of 9/78 and is production number 315. So they started the Porsche 928 1979 model year likely just after the 1978 German summer holidays. It is a 5-speed manual and has no sunroof.
Rich
928 Owners Club Membership Chairman
1993 928 GTS cover girl - see her at Porsche Parade 2023
1987 928 S4
1979 928 5-speed rescue cover girl
1979 928 Euro track beast
06-04-2023, 01:55 PM
early 1979 US market car
