I finally met one of the previous owners of my 911

For years, ever since I got into Porsche cars my guy talked about a guy who made steering wheels for old Porsche cars. His name was Norm. He apparently made these beautiful wooden, hand made steering wheels for the old 356 and 912 models. I'd never met the guy and year after year my dad would say "yeah you need to go meet him, he's a cool guy." I'd seen pictures of them but my dad said it just simply did them no justice. I "needed to go see them".....

 

So I get a call from my dad the other day, he wanted to hang out and suggested we drop by his place since he just finished a beautiful Walnut steering wheel. I finally said ok let's go.

 

We took my 911 and dropped by and were going to stay for a few minutes and leave. 3 hours went by. But the best part is that both him and I had a surprise. We found out that my car was owned by him about 10 years ago. Unfortunately, whoever he sold it to neglected it, but his pictures looked almost the same as it is now (even though it took forever to get it that way).

 

When we drove up he just stared at the car. He immediately asked if it was an '82. I said yeah. He asked if the tail was original, I said yes. He looked at me a tad skeptically, walked over, felt the Porsche script writing under the tail. Then he walked and checked out the dash, the seats and looked around at all the little odds and end. He turned to me with this huge smile on his face and went, "I'll be damned. This used to be MY car. I owned this car about 10 years ago."

 

He motioned us to his shop and inside on the shop was hanging up pictures of my car. I asked if I could take a picture of it, he just took the pin out of the board and handed them to me instead. My dad and I stayed for 3 hours and talked to him, just couldn't stop talking cars. Probably one of the coolest Porsche fanatics I've ever spoken to. He knows more about the 356 and 912 cars than I think I'd ever soak in, he's just enthralled with them. He had the last 912 he's owned there before it gets shipped off to germany. He's apparently retired now.

 

Anyway... figured it was a fun share since I like seeing some of the other car stories I've seen across forums. I'll never know the entire history of the car, especially what happened after he sold it and when I got it. But he gave me the story of the car back into the 90s.

 

 

 

Cool story, small world isn't it?

Cool story, small world isn't it?

 

I guess so! Apparently the car is originally from Seattle. So it's been in the area most of it's life, which is pretty cool.

Cool story. It must have been cool for him to see the car.

What kind of story is this without pictures of the steering wheels?

Very cool! What are the odds!

Very cool story!!

What kind of story is this without pictures of the steering wheels?

 

I'll snag some next time I'm there for ya Abolfaz. Probably next week.

I'll snag some next time I'm there for ya Abolfaz. Probably next week.

 

 

LOL! I wouldn't bust your balls if you hadn't done such a great job hyping the guys steering wheels!

LOL! I wouldn't bust your balls if you hadn't done such a great job hyping the guys steering wheels!

 

True, true. They are beautiful haha. I promise I'll get some pics for ya

That is a really cool story! It's fun learning the history behind the cars we own and who owned them before us. Glad you got to learn a bit more about your car and share it with your dad.

 

In for the pics of these amazing steering wheels!

I went out and hung out with the guy again today. He gave me some old Porsche magazines and books as well as the 911 Engine Rebuild guide (Written by Wayne D).

 

I asked if he'd be ok with me snagging some pictures of the wheels today so here you go. He said about 50 hours goes into perfecting the wood and finish.

 

 

 

SWEET!!

Those are cool.