Interior - What's Brown and Biege, and Confused All Over Options

[DennisV]

I’m trying to determine how much, if any, of our interior is original or at least factory correct.

* CoA from Porsche: Brown Leatherette/21
* Pateman vehicle description: Interior Trim: 21 Interior panels & seats Leatherette Brown, Seat inlay basketweave, Carpet Brown

Below is a photo from the car as I received it.


If I look at Jeff Bowlsby's Paint and Fabrics resources "brown" would be a darker more chocolate color. Photos I can find online of "brown" 914 interiors seem more reddish.

My questions:
1. What are the chances that the factory info is incorrect? It seems like someone would have needed to go to a lot of effort to swap not only the carpet, but also the seats, door cards, and vinyl to change from brown to beige.

2. Are there any definitive labels or markings on the body that could be used to confirm the original interior color?

3. Does anyone have photos of an original Brown felt and Leatherette interior? I've gone through the Interiors thread, but most of that is black and later year cars.

To further confuse things, the car came with a plastic tub containing a mish-mash of carpet. The tan looks like carpet and has finished edges. Maybe this is Feintuft Velour? There are a few darker brown pieces that look more like soiled padding. Only a couple have finished edges. Perhaps the later is the original felt?


Best I can tell from Authenticity book:
* Black trim pieces (dash vinyl, door grabs, center deposit trim, middle cushion) is correct for beige / brown interiors.
* 1970 914-6 should have had felt carpet. This is synonymous with Perlon?

Thank you.

[wonkipop]

I’m trying to determine how much, if any, of our interior is original or at least factory correct.

* CoA from Porsche: Brown Leatherette/21
* Pateman vehicle description: Interior Trim: 21 Interior panels & seats Leatherette Brown, Seat inlay basketweave, Carpet Brown

Below is a photo from the car as I received it.


If I look at Jeff Bowlsby's Paint and Fabrics resources "brown" would be a darker more chocolate color. Photos I can find online of "brown" 914 interiors seem more reddish.

My questions:
1. What are the chances that the factory info is incorrect? It seems like someone would have needed to go to a lot of effort to swap not only the carpet, but also the seats, door cards, and vinyl to change from brown to beige.

2. Are there any definitive labels or markings on the body that could be used to confirm the original interior color?

3. Does anyone have photos of an original Brown felt and Leatherette interior? I've gone through the Interiors thread, but most of that is black and later year cars.

To further confuse things, the car came with a plastic tub containing a mish-mash of carpet. The tan looks like carpet and has finished edges. Maybe this is Feintuft Velour? There are a few darker brown pieces that look more like soiled padding. Only a couple have finished edges. Perhaps the later is the original felt?


Best I can tell from Authenticity book:
* Black trim pieces (dash vinyl, door grabs, center deposit trim, middle cushion) is correct for beige / brown interiors.
* 1970 914-6 should have had felt carpet. This is synonymous with Perlon?

Thank you.

i can answer some of your questions.

for a start that is a beige (or what might be called tan) interior not brown.
the factory did call it beige in their literature.

i have a 74 with a brown interior. not sure if the brown is the exact brown color that it was in 70 but i think the leatherette colors were pretty much unchanged. things did not really begin to alter a lot until later in 74 and into 75 MY. brown is what you would call chocolate brown.

could the factory have gotten the build info incorrect? i suppose they could have?
but less likely. dave p has access to the build sheets - (kardex) so the primary documents are very reliable for the 6s. ( i think it is less accurate for the 4s as its based on different files which are not kardex but VW North America files). what is more likely is the interior could well have been changed by the dealer who sold it new originally. its not hard to change out an interior. not hard at all. dr.914 has that very original, very low miles green 6. he states that car had its original brown interior pulled out and replaced by a black interior when the car was sold new. it had sat around on the lot for a long time and the dealer changed out the interior for the customer to achieve a sale. the original brown interior came with the car separately when he bought it. he reinstalled it.
so.........its entirely possible the same thing happened with your car. certainly not out of the question. remember the 914/6 did not exactly jump off the shelves when it was new. dealers would have been up for anything to move a car and make a sale.

it also could have been changed along the way? previous owner? you would know the history of the car during your time but has it always been in your hands?

as to interior pieces. normally the centre cushion would match the interior.
but not necessarily always. i know my 74 came with a black centre cushion from new.
the original owner told me that when i asked the question 35+ years ago buying the car. however i suspect the original owner requested the centre cushion as a late fitment when the car was sold and the dealer only had black ones to fit. pretty sure if ordered from factory you got the cushion to match the rest of the interior. but i have seen the odd photo with a mismatched cushion. either a later fitment by the owner years after original sale or as the case with me, fitted at the dealer when new but not fitted at the factory when built.

as to carpet. needle loom (whats called perlon sometimes) was fitted standard.
the cheapest grade of carpet. the option upgrade was woollen loop pile. all in three colors. black, brown and beige. so - they did not necessarily have had to come with needle loom. none of the 914s came with velour carpet. not even the 6s. was strictly a 911 thing - and i am not positive about this, but i don't think velour was available at that time. came a couple of years later for 911s. not a 100% on that.
velour was top of the range carpet. basically loop pile carpet that has been mowed,
a bit like mowing the grass. strictly reserved for 911s.
perlon is that stuff that was used for the greyish (what factory called black) carpet in the trunks through all the years. it was also the base grade interior carpet in all the cars whether 4s or 6s throughout the years except in the USA when it was deleted from 74 on for USA market cars. they went upspec to woollen pile in all cars as the new base grade (and did not have anything else). you still got perlon in europe/ROW.

i think one way you might be able to date the interior is the vinyl finish on the door cards. it was smooth in 1970, 1971. basket weave after that.

another give-away on the carpets themselves will be the slots cut in the drivers side floor piece for clutch and brake pedal. those slots are neatly cut into the carpet with no moulded surround trim. this distinguishes the early carpets from later carpets.
applies to at least 70 and 71 to best of my knowledge.

looking at your photos it looks to me like you probably have a correctly dated interior for the car. if so and if you like the beige (i think its pretty good combo myself) i'd leave it alone. it may well have been built brown but it could very very easily have gotten into the hands of a first owner with that interior replaced from new. only way to know would be original sales invoices etc which might have made note of a change.

a big big plus is a biege interior is really very rare (as is brown).
most of the cars for most of the years got black interiors.
back in the late 80s and into the 90s people laughed at my car (phoenix red/orange? with a brown (chocolate) interior. respray it they said, and change that bad taste inteior. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) i loved it. now people go weak at the knees and all wobbly when they see it and if they look at it long enough their eyes glaze over and they start dribbling. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) times change.
come to think of it, down here on the bottom of the world i do not think i have seen another 914 that has a colored interior. all of them have been black. except mine.
mind you there are not that many 914s down here anyway!

[914werke]

So in a generalist sense there are two "Beige" interiors & one Brown.
The early beige was a solid light brown vinyl while the late, what many coin beige, often called "saddle" has a mottled or nonsolid color.
The Brown is much darker & as you say Id call a chocolate brown color, in person id would not call red at all. Ive found it installed in yellow or green exterior cars particularly MY's 73-74
I can take some pictures of the brown as Im putting it back in 73 2.0L Sunflower yellow car. Oh BTW I am still on the search to find some uncut dr panels as the Brown basket weave appears to impossible to find new.

[wonkipop]

here is what i can spot in your posted carpet photo.

this piece of carpet is from a later car than 70-71.
its got the wider moulded trim pieces around the pedal slots in drivers side floor piece.

its from 73 on at least. never been sure about 72. but they could have changed it to that in 72. but definitely not 70-71 carpet.

[mepstein]

This was the brown interior from my 71. I’d call it a chestnut brown. Definitely not beige or tan. I had a 70 with tan interior. It was not even close to brown. I still have most of the interior.

[DennisV]

i can answer some of your questions.

Thank you for the thoughtful and detailed replies.

If I follow the salient points, I think the takeaways are:
* Given corroboration between CoA and Pateman, brown would have been factory color; but maybe not original (i.e. dealer delivered color)
* The dark brown, kinda crappy felt-like material, without molding around slots, pieces I have are likely original.

Did any of the early carpets have trim? Like this brown piece I have?


I will give the door cards a closer look next time I am able to visit the car.

This was the brown interior from my 71. I’d call it a chestnut brown. Definitely not beige or tan. I had a 70 with tan interior. It was not even close to brown. I still have most of the interior.

I notice your carpet appears quite a bit lighter than the seats (i.e. the carpet appears beige, but the seats brown?). Do you think that is original?

Given that I have what appears to be a nearly complete set of beige, I guess I'll roll with that for the time being. At some future date I will probably do a full restoration on the car, and will get more serious about sourcing brown materials. I don't know if I'm better to start looking for brown used now, or just recover what I have when the time comes. For the immediate future, I am just anxious to get it back on the road and drive it! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/driving.gif)

[mepstein]

i can answer some of your questions.

Thank you for the thoughtful and detailed replies.

If I follow the salient points, I think the takeaways are:
* Given corroboration between CoA and Pateman, brown would have been factory color; but maybe not original (i.e. dealer delivered color)
* The dark brown, kinda crappy felt-like material, without molding around slots, pieces I have are likely original.

Did any of the early carpets have trim? Like this brown piece I have?


I will give the door cards a closer look next time I am able to visit the car.

This was the brown interior from my 71. I’d call it a chestnut brown. Definitely not beige or tan. I had a 70 with tan interior. It was not even close to brown. I still have most of the interior.

I notice your carpet appears quite a bit lighter than the seats (i.e. the carpet appears beige, but the seats brown?). Do you think that is original?

Given that I have what appears to be a nearly complete set of beige, I guess I'll roll with that for the time being. At some future date I will probably do a full restoration on the car, and will get more serious about sourcing brown materials. I don't know if I'm better to start looking for brown used now, or just recover what I have when the time comes. For the immediate future, I am just anxious to get it back on the road and drive it! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/driving.gif)

Not including the cocoa mats, the carpet was more of a rust reddish medium brown than dark brown. Door sills and center tunnel were a bit sun bleached.

It takes an hour or two to change out seats, carpet, door cards and back pad. In 50 years, it is easy to imagine an interior could have been switched out because the old one was damaged or just not as desirable. I didn’t like the brown interior in my car when I bought it, ended up becoming one of my favorites.

[JeffBowlsby]

Dennis, have you seen this ad of an Adriatic Blue /6 from 1971? Looks like Beige to me.

@DennisV

[beltwerks]

Thought i should add my New old stock pictures to this thread for future reference.

[914werke]

Interesting. Thats NOS? For a particular MY? I thought the factory parts had vulcanized robber edging on the pedal slots & carpet posts?

[beltwerks]

70-71 cars didn't have the edging around the pedal slots. Also has the unbound post holes unique to the early 70-71 floor pan

All this information is from this site. Here's the colour code 402 as printed on the Porsche part number label on the bag.