larry kosilla: i love bringingsomething back that was once really, really nice and sortof faded over time. it's maybe a bit of ocd or-- i don't know what it is. but i love the idea ofcleaning something or vacuuming something. it's an instant gratification. you see it beforehand and it'sbeat up or bad or whatever. and then you do this process.
and at the end, youhave a gem. and it's nice to have thatinstant gratification within a day or two. and that's what i'mall about-- cleaning a car up andbringing it back and making it look beautiful. i think it is cool. but go out and getthem dirty again. drive them and experiencethat philosophy.
the heart and soul of theporsche is actually driving. and that's where mypassion lies. [music playing] all right. we're driving up north inconnecticut to find or to look at a car that wasfound in a barn. and pretty much all iknow is that it's a porsche and it's a 912. and it hasn't been drivenin 20 plus years or so.
he said the condition is ok. what that means is the ownerprobably doesn't really know what he has just yet. he knows it's a porsche. he knows it's a 912. but there's so much gunk on it,i would imagine, that my goal today is remove everything,strip it off as much as possible. and what we say is make the carnaked so you can actually
see what's goingon in the car. and then he can assesshey, am i a winner? did i lose on this car? can it be restored? can i drive it? all those sort of things-- sothe process today is to assess it, make sure it's safe for meto touch it and i'm not doing damage to it, like these littletricks i was talking about with the steam and themeasuring and whatever, and
then get into a condition wherewe can then decide what he wants to do in the future. am i going to totallyrestore it? am i not? things like that-- so that'swhat today's project's going to be all about. what's up, buddy? roger garbow: dude, howare you doing, man? larry kosilla: goodto see you.
long time no see. roger garbow: you too. come on. check this sucker out. larry kosilla: i'm excited. roger garbow: all right. larry kosilla: soit's in here? roger garbow: yeah. is that cool or what?
larry kosilla: yeah. it's really-- is it open? roger garbow: yeah, it'ssupposed to be. you wanna do it? here. wow. roger garbow: wow. man. larry kosilla: thisthing's wild.
look at it. it's got hair all overits-- or fur. it's like there was acat sleeping on it. the first thing i'm lookingat is actually the seals. look at these seals. those things are shot. well, it is-- it's been sitting forover 20 years. larry kosilla: was it sittingin mud or something?
roger garbow: no, it was justin a garage in a house. and it's just been-- it actuallyhad blankets on it. so it's just since the blanketscame off that their cat went on it. but there's no mice damage,apparently, which is cool. larry kosilla: this catexploded on this. look at all this fur. it's crazy. roger garbow: that's whathappens to cats in certain
environments. larry kosilla: can we open it? why not? larry kosilla: this is kindof a big deal right here. oh, see it? a little sticky. larry kosilla: oh, wow. yeah. these are toast.
roger garbow: but still, look athow good that interior is. larry kosilla: wow. roger garbow: it'sin great shape. larry kosilla: yeah, it isactually pretty good. there's definitely somethingliving in here, though. but you know what? this is a really nicelyoptioned car. larry kosilla: no. this is stuff that youcan clean and it's
going to come out. and look at thissteering wheel. roger garbow: you know what? that's an option. that's the wood wheel. that's worth a ton of money. roger garbow: and it'sgot the five gauges. this is a really nice-- look.
blaupunkt radio. larry kosilla: oh, yeah. look at that. roger garbow: thisis a nice unit. let's roll it outside andget it in the light and see what we have. does it have the porschedoor closed here? [door slams] roger garbow: oh,listen to that.
isn't that amazing? after all these years-- larry kosilla: look at this. roger garbow: --it stillsounds good. larry kosilla: lookat all this fur. roger garbow: wow,this is cool. larry kosilla: all right. well, i'm going to go out on alimb here and say that's not actually running.
roger garbow: supposedly, itruns, but i don't think we should start anything-- better off pushing it. larry kosilla: i'mgood with that. roger garbow: yes. larry kosilla: oh, hear it? roger garbow: oh, yeah. you're dragging. that's a nice green.
roger garbow: it'sreally cool. yeah this is called irishgreen, actually. it was not the most popularcolor, but about, i think, 14% ended up in this color. this was produced in '65, butit was late '65, so it was a '66 model year car, which theyactually split up the production in '65 betweenthe two years. larry kosilla: sowhat is it the-- roger garbow: that's thelast year it was
registered, which is-- 1990? larry kosilla: no, but whyis it a '66, though? roger garbow: becauseit was a '66-- it's considered a '66production year. what happened wasthey produced-- halfway through the 1965 modelrun of production, they switched over from '65 to '66 interms of what the cars were considered.
so if you have a number undera certain point, it's considered a '65. if it's over certain point, eventhough it was produced in the exact same year-- larry kosilla: really? roger garbow: it's weird. it's the way they did it. larry kosilla: that is weird. but that's cool.
that's authentic. so this is late '65 productionfor a '66. larry kosilla: can you pull--while i'm pulling this can you lift that? roger garbow: yeah,absolutely. larry kosilla: i'm guessingthe spring is not-- roger garbow: yeah, that's notstaying up on its own. but-- larry kosilla: the big thingis looking at that number.
roger garbow: yeah, there'sthe engine number. larry kosilla: 7,4-- well, yeah. it's all there. wow, look at the spider webs. roger garbow: it's cool. larry kosilla: that is cool. i think we're the first personto open this in a long time. cool. well, let's measurethis paint.
the porsche 912 was manufacturedfor four years, between 1965 and 1969. it had an efficient flat fourcylinder engine and a low weight of 2,100 pounds, alongwith new aerodynamic upgrades, getting it close to 30miles per gallon. with its new styling andattractive price, porsche sold nearly 30,000 912s. but by 1969, porsche turned itsfocus on building the 914, thus ending the 912'sproduction, but certainly not
its place in porsche history. all right, roger. what we're going to do isi'd like to tape that. roger garbow: cool. larry kosilla: we're goingto take some tape. we're going to tape upthe areas like this. this has got a hugehole in it. roger garbow: ok. larry kosilla: now, it's notreally going to prevent a
whole lot of water or moistureor anything. but it just gives me a headsup, like all right, be conscious of this area. roger garbow: got it. larry kosilla: don't-- i get so engrossed in the carsometimes, you're focused on one thing, and as you comeacross, you might take a little bit off. so there's some rusti see over there.
if you take a little bit oftape and just map out that area to give us a heads up. roger garbow: absolutely. larry kosilla: it'smy first little-- i'm still feeling thiscar out, so to speak. roger garbow: check outthese tires, larry. back then, you didn'thave a tire rack. you didn't have allthese places where you could get tires.
so sears was a real big retailerfor michelin and for some of the other brands. and that's where you went. and look at this. isn't this cool? little porsche feature. roger garbow: yep. larry kosilla: i can't believeit's all intact. it's amazing.
rog, check this out. i'm going to measure the paintis my next little step here. so it's 3.53. so are you actually looking forwhen you do that, larry? larry kosilla: i'm looking fora certain amount, or a depth, that's going to allow me-- sothis is all consistent-- that's going to allow me tohave enough paint so i can restore it, because if there'snothing there, i can't. roger garbow: sure.
larry kosilla: so a lot oftimes, i'll show up somewhere and i'll do one of theseor something rarer. and i'll say to the customer,i can't do it. there's just not enough. roger garbow: what's the minimumthat you want when you're doing that? larry kosilla: well, it's reallyabout how much you want to take off, which is usuallyabout 0.2 mils, 0.3 mils, depending on howbad the car is.
but when i measure it,i'm not really flying blind at this point. so if i just approach the carand i didn't have any crazy machines, i'd have no ideahow much paint is here. larry kosilla: so i can put amachine on there, blow right through the paint,you're done. it helps me. so the big thing is right now,i'm seeing there's about three and a half to four, 3.6, whichis kind of low but
understandable on this. and the big thing is what it'smeasuring is everything going to the metal. so what i have to do is deducehow much is there. clearly, this isn't-- there's no clear coaton this car. it's a '65. roger garbow: right. larry kosilla: but i've got tosee how much paint is there.
and the way that you check-- it's a rough way to do it, buta way to get a number in your head is i go to thedoor seams. and you put it on there. so we went from four to three. so inside here hasgot three mils. it's even less as you go down. this is at almost two. so if this has four and thishas two, the difference
between the two of themis obviously two mils. so i know in my mind,ok, i have something there to work with. now, an example-- if i was going around andconsistently, this was one and a half, one and a half, oneand a half, all around the car-- which i would go, whoa,there's nothing there-- and i went in here and this said oneand a half, i'd know that there's not anythingfor me to repair.
sure. larry kosilla: so i would go tothe customer and say, hey, the car is going to look as goodas it can look right now. well, maybe, the tiniest lightpolish, wax it, seal it, it's good to go. so that's a good way of makingsure that the car is what it is or represented. if the guy said it washit, you can verify. great.
if the guy said, hey, thiscar's brand new. i have had it since the day igot it out and it's never been hit, and then you do it, thenyou have to be a little bit of a detective and figure outwhat's going on there. larry kosilla: allright, roger. the next step is i'm going touse a steamer on the outside of the car. now, i know we've talkedabout this before. i just never, ever, ever use asteamer on the outside of the
car for a normal car. but because this one is sounique and all the seams are-- if i put a water on it, it'sgoing to go right through the car and i'll spend more timeremoving the water from the inside of the car that the out--you see what i'm saying? larry kosilla: so i'lluse a steamer, get these little areas. and i don't know if you everplayed with steam before, but [inaudible]
full blast. look at my hand. so it doesn't really gethot until right here. so if you hold it out, youget this moisture. roger garbow: very cool. larry kosilla: it takesforever to do this. larry kosilla: but i'm blowingoff a lot of the dirt. and i'm not introducinga lot of water. it takes forever, but see howit's a little bit wet?
and i'm just going to scoopall this gunk up. again, i would normallyjust wash the car. but i just can't. it would just take me forever. larry kosilla: the problem isnow, i'm going to go through tons and tons of microfibertowel. so this obviously is a veryspecial, unique situation. so i'm just going to keepworking my way down. and you can see, it'sgetting cleaner.
this is just to pick up-- roger garbow: right-- theheavy, dirty stuff. larry kosilla: thatwas one swipe. so nobody washes their car andhas that much, unless you're mud bogging or whatever. so i'm just to keepgoing through and blow out these seams. and it just takesa long process. so it's a bit of patiencewith a car like this.
roger garbow: so larry, youmentioned this is not something that you wouldnormally do. how often do you end up havingto steam clean a car? larry kosilla: well, that'sa good question. i steam clean a lot of cars, butthe interior or the wheels or the engine, the actualengine compartment. never, ever, ever do the outsideunless it is in a condition where it's basicallya barn find, which is very rare, of course, or for somereason, just caked on mud,
because it takes foreverto do this. it's not super safe for thepaint, meaning i am installing some scratches here. but the paint is so bad thati'm about to go restore it. so it doesn't really matterat that point. roger garbow: sure larry kosilla: the bigthing here is that the seals are shot. so i have to decide in my mindhey, is it worth me washing it
down and then cleaning out allthe water and finding and getting my fingers and towelsinto all these little spots, or doing it this way, which is alittle bit painful to do it? so to answer your questionon a normal car, on an every day-- no. roger garbow: never. larry kosilla: this is perfectfor engines, perfect for wheels, and perfect forinterior, but never, ever, ever on the outside, becauseif the paint is in halfway
decent condition, you aregoing to scratch it. it's just not enoughmoisture, i think. but it's good to blow outthese little areas. i love this machine, justnot for the outside. so you're using water now. as a matter of fact, we are. because it's not part of thepaint, so to speak, and there's really no seals oranything down here, the water's hitting the groundand running off.
and any time you have theopportunity to use water, you should use it, because it's tonsof lubrication, and it actually carries awaya lot of dirt. so i'm not going touse the steamer. a lot of times, i'll useit on [inaudible] wheels or something that they'rereally intricate i can't get any toolsback there. i'll use the blowing actionof the steam to clean out those areas.
but this is as straightforwardas you possibly can get. so i'm just going to put alittle cleaner on the actual tires, which are unbelievable--that they're still inflated. roger garbow: amazing. i was thinking the dirtwas holding in here, but maybe not. larry kosilla: i'll letthat sit a minute. i'll take one of my--
roger garbow: i love thesmell of that stuff. larry kosilla: yeah,it's good. i'll take one of my littlebrushes and just get behind the rim as i'm letting thecleaners-- you can see, it's starting to turn purple here. it's really eating away all theiron deposit build up from years and years. see all the gunk comingout right now? roger garbow: so do you alwayswater and wet them down first
before you put thespray cleaner in? larry kosilla: yeah,absolutely. get them-- you want to take themajority of the dirt off. if you think about it,the cleaners and the products are tools. and you want to give them thebest fighting chance. larry kosilla: if there's tonsof dirt on that spot, they're going to be fightingthat dirt. why do that?
get as much junk off andthen put it on there. let it fight the next layer ofdirt, if that makes sense. larry kosilla: a lot of times,people with soapy buckets, they go to go clean their carsand wash all that stuff, but they forget that there's junkon the bottom of the bucket. so they'll put the soap inthere, and then it'll get sudsy, but not as sudsyas it was before. and they'll say, i understand. why is there no suds?
well, i say, was there junkon the bottom of you-- oh yeah, there was. that soap is actually attackingthe dirt that's in the bottom of the bucket, notin the car or on the-- see what i'm saying? so same idea-- see howit's all purple now? roger garbow: yeah,that's cool. larry kosilla: yeah,it is nice. so that's my reason behind--
roger garbow: that's howyou know it's ready? larry kosilla: yeah, that'show i know it's ready. roger garbow: that's cool. larry kosilla: yeah, but that'smy reason for rinsing everything down first. roger garbow: so do you everuse a pressure washer? or is that too much? larry kosilla: you can. you can on wheels.
you can on paint, as well. but you know how i specializein the older cars? so i don't use it a whole lot,like this one, clearly-- use a pressure washer. the whole car willturn into dust. but yeah. you totally can, especially ontrucks or jeeps or guys that do a lot of mud driving andall that kind of thing. but i don't really use them allthat often, just because
my part of the business is theserare cars, where you'll accidentally blow things off. so we'll take my littlebrush here. roger garbow: that'sa killer brush. larry kosilla: yeah,this thing's nice. these are made in germany. roger garbow: kindof like this. larry kosilla: perfect. roger garbow: it says right inthe owner's manual, only use
german brushes. so i'm just going to get inthere a little bit more. and then we're going to rinseit down right now. so now, instead of the dirtand rust, we just are left with rust. but we'll get in there. we'll try it off. and then i'll come back andplay a little bit more. so now i can kind of-- the wholepurpose of doing this is
to see what we have. larry kosilla: because whenthere's that much junk on the car, it's like wearingall your clothes and going to the doctor's. you've got to strip down tosee what's going on inside before you-- this is what we're doing here. so this one lookshalfway decent. we'll move onto the next wheeland keep the process going.
roger garbow: that's great. so the next step is you takea little bit of clay. we're going to clay everythingdown on the car before we polish it. a few squirts on the clay barand the section you're working with motions back and forth-- it actually works on friction,not pressure, which is something that people confuse. i'm barely--
it'll just fall. i'm barely touching it. but it's the friction. so do that-- little boogers come out. wipe her down, and we'll justdo the rest of the car. this will help save my pads wheni'm using the machine to wheel this car and dowhat i've got to do. when it gets all gunked up likethis, instead of getting
it in the clay bar, it'll gointo the pad and make my pads get dirty much faster. and it doesn't get a reallygreat shine out of it. so this is your quicklittle step. it takes no time. and if you drop it andhits the ground, it's basically garbage. all the little particleson the ground will get jammed in here.
and then if you go back up anddo it, essentially, you have sandpaper at that point. so any time it hits theground, throw it away. so i've just completedthis little section. and now, i'm going to starton this section here. as you can see, there's apretty big difference. but what i first spent probablyan hour doing is figuring out what it's going totake to remove all the junk out of this paint, meaning
basically giving it a facelift. and the way i start out is leastaggressive and go to the most aggressive, where the limitis that is getting me this is beautiful complexion,if you will. so what i started off with is a regular, dual action polisher. i went to the three inch[inaudible] garage. and it took a while, but itfinally got me to the position like this.
it looks fantastic. it just took forever. so i said, all right, if i bumpup to the regular, the six inch dual action-- and then it was working a littlebit faster, a little bit faster. and i said, ok, it'sstill safe. and i said, let's go upa little bit more. and so now, i'm using the[inaudible], which is a dual
action, and it hasa larger throw. it has a 21 millimeter throw. what that means is the dualaction is spinning. while it's spinning, it is doingcircles inside the spin. that's a regular dual action. so i was doing on the paint. and it was coming out justa little bit slow. but if the paint was reallythin, it would work out perfect, if that makes sense.
so i said, let's bump itup so we can grab a little bit more speed. so now, i have a machinethat's spinning, doing circles, but it's alsothrowing now. so it's a huge throw. so as this machine goes,it's going to move. and as it covers more realestate, it builds up a little bit of friction and will cut thepaint a little bit faster. so those are the steps that itook to get to this position.
and now, i have my formula. so i've done all the math andsaid, ok, this is what it takes to get the paintin this condition. and now i'm just executingmy formula. so here we go. on the door, i've put a littlebit of what i call leveling fluid on there. we're going to takeone squirt-- spray wax.
and then i'll pat, putit on, two or three. get it around like this-- itjust minimizes the splatter. i'll spread it in with two. it's kind of slow. you hear the machineis barely moving. right now, i'm justquickly massaging it in to avoid splatter. you notice i don't have to tapeeverywhere all over the car, just because if you workit this way, you don't just
sling things everywhere. then i'll bump up to five orsix, put it on the paint, and go to town. so what i want to workis a two by two area. see how this is two by two? you don't want to do any morethan that, because your products will dry out. see how that has somegouges right here? you want to make sure to becareful not to put a lot of
weight on your machine,because you'll open up those gouges. see, it's starting to come-- one of the big mistakes ispeople don't work the product long enough. so what will happen is theproduct will start out this big-- a big product. and it's working on the paint. and then it breaks apart,breaking into finer pieces.
and then it startsto get this-- see how it's startingto get shiny now? but if you don't work theproduct until it breaks down, it'll stay this big and actuallymake more scratches in the paint. and that's a lot ofemails i get. how come i can't levelthe paint? it's because you didn't workthe product long enough. there you go.
clearly, it's singlestage paint because we have paint transfer. if i had had clear coat on it,you wouldn't see this. it would be a white pad. so we'll take our microfibertowel. and look at that. see how it pops again? our plan is to just level allthe scratches and all the oxidation in the 20, 30 yearsit's been sitting underneath a
cover and all kinds of animalsin it and whatever. so that is the first step-- leveling the paint. when working on the interior ofa barn find, it's vital to remove rodent droppings and moldas soon as possible to avoid potential health issueswhen inside the vehicle. be sure to wear gloves whenremoving mold and mildew, and don't reuse the towels usedto clean these areas. once the interior is cleaned,it's a good idea to use an
ozone machine for three to fivehours to help kill any leftover bacteria. so larry, what are we goingto do with the tires here? larry kosilla: well, whati have is a water-based moisturizer for these reallythirsty tires, so to speak. they haven't had anythingon them in 20 years. so as soon as i putit on, it's really going to absorb in. the big difference is a lot oftire shines that you see are
very, very shiny. those are solvent-based tiredressings versus water-based tire dressings. the big difference is solventshave a tendency to make rubber very, very hard anddry it out. so the upside is they're very,very shiny and they sling everywhere, whichis not great. and the water base is-- as you can see, it'sstill pretty shiny.
but it's not going to hurtthe rubber, especially on something this old. roger garbow: yeah, these weremanufactured in 1972. roger garbow: so you think--and i'm surprised they're still holding air. larry kosilla: itis pretty wild. so we're going to let thatsoak it in, and in a few minutes, it'll absorb in. and we'll just put a few morelayers on it just because this
hasn't seen tire shine oranything in so many years. larry kosilla: for most carguys, hunting down and uncovering a barn findis a dream come true. and i certainly fall intothis category, as well. but my true obsession is seeingthrough the dirt, rust, and mold and revealing thecar's real beauty. every car has a unique storythat can be told through the condition of its parts. the engine, interior, paint,and even tires
can narrate its history. there's no doubt more work needsto be done over time. but what makes these restorationdetails so challenging is understandingthe limits of the materials you're working with. paint, chrome, rubber gaskets,and even leather have breaking points. and knowing where to draw theline allows you to rejuvenate the appearance while preserving
the historical integrity. although this 912 sat forgottenfor over 20 years, after a few hours of attention,it was clear to me that the porsche spiritwasn't lost. it was merely covered in dust. so what do you think? roger garbow: larry, thecar looks amazing. roger garbow: i'll tell you,when we first got here, i had some doubts.
it looked a little rough. but it really looks fantastic. larry kosilla: yeah, itcame out pretty good. the idea was to get it in acondition where the owner can look at and say, hey, doi want keep this car? do i want to sell it? what am i going to do with it? and it was so packed with gunkthat we just needed to unwrap everything and seewhat we have.
and there's a bit of rust hereand there, but essentially, it's looking pretty good. the big thing i was concernedabout when i went inside, i saw some mold, and of course,there was rodent feces and things like that in the car. so he wanted to remove all ofthat so he could drive it around and experiencethe car without having any health issues. so we put an ozonemachine in there.
we cleaned it with ammo latherand wiped everything up. so it's in good condition. and of course, the outside wecompounded and polished. and the results arepretty good. i think he's goingto be happy. roger garbow: he's going to bereally happy now he's got a really nice driver. roger garbow: it looks great. larry kosilla: that'sexciting.
for all the ins and outs and allthe details that we did on this, the step by step-- there'slots of information at ammonyc.com. i want to thank rogerfor being here. and thanks for watching thisepisode of "drive clean" right here on the drive network.
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