Rear suspension I have conquered thee! (well, for the moment)

I have found a miserable job, I found myself trying to think if any of my engine rebuild caused me nearly as much cussing as I have done this week at the ass-end of my car (and I couldn't think of any point).

First, as I tend to do with all of these projects I pour over my books, then internet threads, then I go out and start getting filthy.  As I approached my now elevated and de-wheeled automobile I notice (for the first time in 3 years) that there are no covers bolted onto my spring plates (that was step 1 in all my reading, I was somewhat disturbed my step 1 wasn't available for doing).  Now logic (and evidence) tells me that I have blissfully, ignorantly bobbed down the road in this puppy for all this time it's obviously held together pretty well by all the other bolt-age but still, those in the know insist these are very important metal pieces.

So I trudge on, get the spring plates off of the trailing arms without injuring myself (always good) and proceed to tinker with rotating those plates on the splines of my torsion bar (I found out here I have a 28mm bar instead of the stock 23).  I ultimately made a 5° change (down) which by my calculations and on-line research bumped the backside UP by ~1.5"

Thence commenced the profanity....and the bruises....and the blood....and the general questioning of my decision making paradigm in the true love of this 37 year old German mistress of mine.  I tried for 2 hours to get one spring plate back on it's swing arm to no avail, exhaustion and exasperation won that night.

With a fresh head, a few tips I drudged up on the internet and some re-assuring knowledge that seems everyone accepts touching the rear suspension to be nothing less than a royal pain in the ass I went back to work.  This time after 2 hours I had both sides fully re-assembled.

What's funny is a post on the internet got more than a few "why don't you just take it to your local Porsche race specialist shop" replies.  Well 1) I never leave myself enough play budget for labor (I do well to sweet talk the wife into ignoring the plethora of UPS deliveries that show up :D) and 2) Lower Alabama is not exactly a hot-bed of Porsche specialists, [outside of the dealer's master wrench, @ $1xx/hr]  the only one so far I've found, lives and works several hours North of here.  If someone has to "figure out" how to wrench on this old beast, it might as well be me and not pay crazy rates for their education.

With the addition of a new set of slightly higher profile front tires I now have my car (if I'm not mistaken) at about 1/2" lower than "Euro Height" with tires that are still low profile but not nearly as small as what came on the car.  It certainly does ride better.

Next I revisit my alignment lessons from a couple of years ago as I just don't trust anyone around here.  I did ask where I had the tires mounted, and got the usual "uuuuuhhh wayuhhl brang it on een and we will see if we can figer out how to do it"  To which my thought is no thanks, I'll do it myself, save some coin and likely do a better job than they manage  (see above thoughts on local monkeys).

Before:

After:

It may look like a small change but it matters to me and the car's driving dynamics are SOOO much better by this little addition of rubber and suspension travel.
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I did my 500 mile oil change & valve adjust this weekend too, happy to be able to leave the valves alone for another 10,000 miles, not a hard task but not particularly enjoyable with the motor in the car. I found nothing but clean oil when I strained it and everything is purring beautifully.