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Posted by: phillstek Sep 25 2014, 06:08 AM

Earlier this year I was involved in accident that damaged my car substantially.

Fortunately, no-one was injured and everyone concerned had good insurance. I originally thought the car would be totalled but it was assessed as repairable.

Parts for 914s are few and far between over here, so it was decided that a trip to Ca. would be best to get what was needed to complete the repair.

Hooked up with Bruce in Riverside in mid July, he’d already started to gather the used parts for me and together we cleaned, packed and delivered them to a freight company for shipping back to Australia.

Shipping the parts turned into a nightmare as a few of the suppliers of the new parts were less than co-operative when it came to the required documentation. The lack of appropriate documents delayed the shipment by a month while I waited for a ruling from US Customs and after much frustration the parts arrived here earlier this month.

Since then however lots of progress has been made and I’m amazed by the skill and craftsmanship of the Zag Automotive guys.


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Posted by: cn2800 Sep 25 2014, 06:28 AM

Is the front-most vertical panel, the one to which the bumper attaches, new? If so, where did you source it? I'm just beginning to undertake the repair of a near mirror image of your damage:

Posted by: edwin Sep 25 2014, 06:38 AM

Looking really good Phill
Any changes while the repairs are being done or leaving the car as it was?
Would be really interested to see the price breakdown on a repair like this.
Cheers
Edwin

Posted by: bdstone914 Sep 25 2014, 07:12 AM

QUOTE(cn2800 @ Sep 25 2014, 05:28 AM)

Is the front-most vertical panel, the one to which the bumper attaches, new? If so, where did you source it? I'm just beginning to undertake the repair of a near mirror image of your damage:

Posted by: matthepcat Sep 25 2014, 09:27 AM

Hey Phil,


Good to see your hotrod getting back together. Hope the rest of your CA tour went well.


Matt

Posted by: phillstek Sep 26 2014, 02:14 AM

"Is the front-most vertical panel, the one to which the bumper attaches, new? If so, where did you source it?”

Yes, the panel is NOS and came from Glen (of G&R infamy) through Bruce, if I recall correctly Glen found it amongst some NOS parts at Pelican and was the only one he had. They are available through Stoddard though. Be advised that there are 3 different types with subtle differences between each. The one I got turned out to be for MYs 74-75 and had to have a small strip that’s spot welded to the top of the panel removed to allow proper fitting of the early bumper. Also some modifications had to be done around the light bucket. Of lesser issue is that there are no mounts for the fogs or horns. It may be worth the trouble of finding a good, early one from a donor and drilling out the spot welds on it.

"Any changes while the repairs are being done or leaving the car as it was?”

Yep, I’m upgrading the front suspension to a full ER coil over set up as the suspension was damaged in the smash (bent a strut). The valve guides in the 3.2 were pretty worn and the engine was consuming too much oil and blowing smoke so it’s getting a top end overhaul including new Mahle Euro Ps and Cs, lumpier camshafts and a chip.

"Good to see your hotrod getting back together. Hope the rest of your CA tour went well’.

Thanks Matt and thanks also for the ride down to Monterey. It was a very interesting trip and one I won’t forget that’s for sure. I look forward to paying you back if you ever make it down here!


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Posted by: Cairo94507 Sep 26 2014, 05:42 AM

Wow! That is terrific. I am glad to see you were able to save your car and in the process do some nice upgrading. Looking forward to seeing more pictures as it all comes together. Best wishes and many many more safe miles.

Posted by: RobW Sep 26 2014, 06:05 AM

Good luck with the reconstruction. If you need any bits and pieces let me know.

Posted by: rick 918-S Sep 26 2014, 07:58 AM

Looking good! Bruce is a good guy! Glad you were able to source parts.

Posted by: phillstek Oct 13 2014, 05:16 PM

Thanks for the comments and offers of help everyone, Bruce [/b]is[b] a great guy and was extremely helpful getting the parts together and helping out with the paperwork (when other suppliers wouldn’t) for export. I would highly recommend him to anyone looking for parts.

Car has been media blasted and epoxy primered and will sit for 3 weeks while that fully cures. Had the wheel wells done too as they were covered in a tar coating that looked like crap.


Still needs to be planished in places and have a smear of bondo here and there. The repairer is saying early December for completion.




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Posted by: eric9144 Oct 13 2014, 05:45 PM

So glad to see this coming back together, after all of your hard work getting this build on the road is was really painful to see it smashed!

Posted by: Johny Blackstain Oct 13 2014, 06:00 PM

Posted by: PlantMan Oct 13 2014, 06:26 PM

WHAT A SAVE!

LOOKIN' GOOD!

Posted by: RobW Oct 13 2014, 07:53 PM

Nice work! We're going to start shipping our cars over for work if you keep this up!

Posted by: ThePaintedMan Oct 13 2014, 09:08 PM

Slight hijack... maybe Scotty or Rick can clarify...

Does it really take three weeks for epoxy primer to cure?




Very nicely done! Should be good as new when finished.

Posted by: JRust Oct 13 2014, 09:18 PM

Those repairs look great! Congrats on getting it back together. I know thats a good feeling. Can't wait to see it finished. Way to be patient & make sure they do it right

Posted by: SirAndy Oct 13 2014, 09:56 PM

Did they pull the chassis on a bench before they started the repairs?

Even with your cage, that hit DID bend the tub, no question about that.

Posted by: phillstek Oct 13 2014, 10:46 PM

"So glad to see this coming back together, after all of your hard work getting this build on the road is was really painful to see it smashed!"

Thanks man, I look at it like this: it’s an opportunity to fix the things that weren’t right about the cheap paint job, at least the front half that is.

"Does it really take three weeks for epoxy primer to cure?”

That’s what the repairer told me. I’ll take their word on it, I’m in no rush.

"Way to be patient & make sure they do it right”

My thoughts exactly.

"Did they pull the chassis on a bench before they started the repairs?”

Absolutely. The first pictures in this thread show the car bolted to the “Car-O-Liner” (similar to a Cellette system) and it was extensively measured. The suspension pick-ups had not moved.

Posted by: carr914 Oct 14 2014, 06:25 AM

Posted by: CptTripps Oct 14 2014, 08:22 AM

Just curious: Did you move and re-weld the old VIN when you changed out that section, or use the VIN from the new car? I guess you could go either way.

Posted by: phillstek Oct 14 2014, 01:09 PM

QUOTE(CptTripps @ Oct 15 2014, 01:22 AM)

Posted by: Rob-O Oct 14 2014, 01:39 PM

QUOTE(ThePaintedMan @ Oct 13 2014, 07:08 PM)

Slight hijack... maybe Scotty or Rick can clarify...

Does it really take three weeks for epoxy primer to cure?




Very nicely done! Should be good as new when finished.

Posted by: Harpo Oct 14 2014, 05:15 PM

Yes, but it can be scuffed up with a scotch brite so the next layer of paint will not
have any adhesion problems.

Dave

Posted by: phillstek Nov 3 2014, 10:19 PM

Went out to Zag this afternoon to see if there was anything happening to my car and was pleasantly surprised by what I saw.

The paint is finished under the fenders, inside the frunk and the closing panel. Both sides of the car are going to be repainted as well.

Re-assembly has begun with the oil cooler etc in place. The A arms and other suspension pieces are due back from the powder coaters tomorrow. Also doing coil overs with the ER bushings, camber plates and other goodies.

The guys at the shop have been extraordinarily helpful and nothing is too much trouble for them. If ever anyone local needs paint or panel work done to their Porsche, then I would strongly recommend you talk to John or George at Zag. They only do Porsche and they do them very well.


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Posted by: Mikey914 Nov 3 2014, 10:27 PM

WOW
Nice work

Posted by: rick 918-S Nov 3 2014, 10:44 PM

Posted by: Cairo94507 Nov 4 2014, 07:03 AM

Excellent work. That is one fine car. Keep posting.

Posted by: Dave_Darling Nov 4 2014, 10:09 AM

Consider reinforcing the strut towers. They weren't really designed to take the weight of the car, and can have problems over the long term with a coil-over conversion.

--DD

Posted by: blackmoon Nov 4 2014, 12:32 PM

QUOTE(phillstek @ Nov 3 2014, 09:19 PM)

Posted by: phillstek Nov 11 2014, 11:46 PM

WOW indeed! Went out to Zag today for my weekly visit (I have to stop myself from going there anymore frequently) to find the car very close to being done.

The standard of work is so good that I’m afraid the car might become a garage queen.

While I was there the guys were frigging around with the door as it turned out to be a late one and they had to modify a few things so they could get the early regulator to work.

The pictures are pretty self explanatory and show the skills they have. They told me that they’d never worked on a 914 before working on mine and that they really liked them now. Coming from someone that does nothing but 911s , I thought that was a pretty cool thing to say about our cars.

They were also very impressed by the coil overs and other ER bits, so much so, that they and a couple of their customers who’d seen the quality and simplicity, would be converting their cars to suit. I’ll keep a close eye on the strut towers though.

Got the Boxster callipers from them too, having paid $500 for the pair which I figured was a pretty sweet deal.

Thanks for all the comments.


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Posted by: PlantMan Nov 12 2014, 12:19 AM

I love quality craftsmanship!
Nice work indeed!

Posted by: boogie_man Nov 12 2014, 10:22 AM

Wow !! Awesome workmanship that looks great !!!

Posted by: phillstek Nov 17 2014, 12:42 AM

Big day today, the car came off the stands and is rolling




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Posted by: veltror Nov 17 2014, 02:06 AM

Ripper !

Posted by: Cairo94507 Nov 17 2014, 07:29 AM

Beautiful car.

Posted by: pilothyer Nov 17 2014, 08:14 AM

Beautiful car, and Superb Workmanship !!

Posted by: 02loftsmoor Nov 17 2014, 10:05 AM

WOW, what a Job. better man than me..

Posted by: 396 Nov 17 2014, 10:26 AM

QUOTE(Dave_Darling @ Nov 4 2014, 08:09 AM)

Posted by: phillstek Nov 28 2014, 05:48 AM

Thanks to all for the compliments and kind comments I’ll pass them on to the guys that did the work

Very happy to have my car back home at last and I’m really pleased with the way it turned out.

I had the car painted about 3 years ago and it always bugged me that it was a pretty average job. The frunk was particularly bad having had this soft black undercoat stuff that never went hard under the paint. As well, the paint had lifted in places on the floor around the oil cooler shroud.

Now it looks pretty much perfect in there.

The engine has yet to be assembled as a result of a small but significant problem with the cams.

We put the engine together, went time the cams and had a valve to piston clearance issue. Pulled it all apart and we could tell by just looking at them that the lobe centres did not match the cam specs supplied with them.

Long story short, someone at the manufacturer pulled the wrong profile, put them in the box marked as the profile I ordered with the timing specs for same.

Needless to say, I was not happy and contacted the manufacturer who promised to send the correct profile cams earlier this week.


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Posted by: RobW Nov 28 2014, 06:58 AM

Looks museum quality...

Good luck with the motor reassembly!