New Guy, Where did this club come from? Options

[Yellowbeard]

Man, the last decent 914 site I knew of was the Renegage 914 club and it seems to have died years ago. I have a 1973 1.8 that (AFAIK) has been rebuilt to a 1.9 (though I haven't verified this in any way). I built the car (actually it is my second, the forst being a '72 with a blown head and a bad tranny that was more rust than car - first car I ever bought - man did I get the shaft) when I was 17 and am now revisiting it at 30. I used it is a daily driver on an off through college. Now I am thinking about making it faster/better. I just looked at the car and it has my imagination running. Doesn't seem to have too much rust on it (although one of the legs of the driver's seat has punched through the floor - does anyone know if this means I necessarily need a new pan or can that be patched?). Thinking about buying a hotter engine from some of the places I have found on the interweb that offer suped up type IVs.

Any advice would be well appreciated. Glad to have found a bunch of 914 heads to talk to!

[Yellowbeard]

Jeesh - 5 minutes and I get 8 replies.

I can already see I have found heaven. I sure wish the interweb would have existed 13 years ago when I got into this mess.

I will answer everyone at once:

Thanks for the advice on the floor (to all). I sorta knew the answer before I posted. The floor pan looks fantastic from the bottom (other than that seat tie-down poking through) but this car has always had a small leak through the driver's side front window targa seal (an aftermarket part I bought from AA which I have regretted since the moment I got it). My big worry is that I will pull up the tar and find a mess on the top side - that would suck.

I also need to look seriously at the wheel well under the battery tray (did I see someone call that the "hell hole"?) AFAIK, it's not terrible, but I know there is at least /some/ rust down there.

None of my numbers match and the car is really hodge-podged together. I have oft thought that I should sell it and start with something closer to where I want to be but i have so much blood, sweat and tears in this car (literally, as I am sure you all know) that I am loathe to part with it. Plus it was a Texas car and really does seem to be in pretty decent shape.

I hope no one minds lots of questions, and if you have any advice, as I said, I would love to hear it.

First thing I need to do is finish putting some FI on (I want to say it's D-Jet, and am pretty sure that's right but it's been a while). Anyone have any advice about where I should start? It's been 10 months since I have driven the thing, but I seem to remember that it tends to die when it's idling....

I'll be looking into it over the next few months and checking back and forth.

Thanks all! You have made me feel very welcome.

YB