27,000 mile original '74 on BaT, This will be interesting Options

[Big Len]

I'm going for it, $71K.

https://bringatrailer.com/listing/1974-porsche-914-59/

[Superhawk996]

Not buying the miles at all.

Too much road grime, rust, and corrosion on the fasteners for this to have been driven as little and garaged as much as claimed.

I've also spent a good chunk of my time looking at fasteners both in real world vehicle corrosion inspections (in Rochester NY) as well as lab based salt spray testing.

I'll do my best to justify with a few pictures.

Let's start with the front ARB lever arm. Looks pretty good but let's compare it with an arm the arms that came off my project car that likely had 160K miles.



Now let's look at the underbody - plenty of red rust corrosion on the undisturbed tin fasteners as well as the tin itself. This is not an area of the car that would get a ton of road spray from water, salt, gravel or whatever.



So the problem is -- was it stored heavily leading to low miles, or was it driven?

Before we get too far, yes, I agree corrosion continues even when stored or lightly used.

Allow me to make a relative comparison to my mother-in-laws's 1997 Toyota Camry. Classic old lady car. 67K miles. She's owned it since new. Driven lightly during Michigan winters. Largely, when roads are clear and dry but most certainly still salted. Has driven in worse slop but only when doctors appointments or something else made it mandatory for her to go out. Garaged most of it's life. Has been stored outdoors since late 2019.

Let me also state that corrosion protection of fasteners has been a serious challenge for OEM's with the mandated move away from Cad, Zinc, and any hexavalent chromium type products that began in the 1990's. Early 70's yellow chromated zinc will have better protection than many modern fastener coatings when applied at equivalent plating thickness. If anything the fasteners on this 914 should have aged better than the pictures below.



Notice how clean the CV joint boots are. Notice the yellow plated CV band clamp. Then look at the condition of the suspension fasteners. As good as or better than the "shows 28K" 914 fasteners.

Let's look at the Camry rear suspension.



Notice the factory paint dot on the toe link rod? And the condition of the toe link itself? Very little corrosion and/or road grime.

Now let's look at one more - common fasteners that were on the front cross member. These fasteners would be typical of black oxide and/or a very light Geomet / Dacromet type coating that has minimal salt spray corrosion resistance. Again, as good or better than what I see on the 914.



So here we have a car that is 25 years old, that has been continuously exposed to Michigan salt (even if only lightly) and has seen a combination of garage and outdoor storage. Michigan is a rust belt / salt belt state. West Virginia is not.

The "shows 28K" 914 would have only been 11 years years old when it supposedly went into storage in 1985. Although corrosion could continue unabated during the 37 years, it is highly doubtful that what we are looking at on the 914 is storage corrosion.

If the mileage on the 914 is so low because it was only used a few month a year, in good weather, that makes it even less likely that the 1st 11 years of its life would have been used on salted roads to give corrosion a foothold on so many fasteners to eat up the zinc and yellow chromate plated parts like it has.

Although some corrosion could have continued unabated during the 37 years between 1985 and 2022, that doesn't account for the other anomalies like the rust ring on the passenger side 1/2 shaft or the mix of new and old undercoating in various places on the car. The replacement of the front dampers (with KYB's none the less (IMG:style_emoticons/default/confused24.gif))? The replacement of the heat exchangers and associated pipes, and flapper valves? Then there are the freshly painted valve covers?

I realize I'm not going to convince everyone that this "shows 28K" 914 isn't low mileage. I just hope to provide a sanity check to those that might not have the experience looking at corrosion to see that it is possible for a car (the Camry) to have been in continuous use, in the salt belt of Michigan, to have 60K miles on it and to actually look BETTER than what this supposedly low mileage 914 looks like.