The restoration begins! Options

[993inNC]

Man everyone is bailing out on me!

Yeah she would kill me! He wasn't out there long, but I didn't want to squelch his enthusiasm for "his Porsche". As my second child and only boy, I need to foster any tendencies towards P-cars and guy stuff in general. Of course my 12 year old got
pissed thinking he was getting a Porsche and she wasn't (IMG:style_emoticons/default/headbang.gif) Suppose maybe I should foster her enthusiasm too?

I'm excited about the prospects of being able to start welding and getting the body ready for paint soon. I need to keep telling myself I can do this so I don't loose interest. Its not helping that everyone is moving away on me !

[SirAndy]

(IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/uploads/post-10676-1268274192_thumb.jpg)

Where are your door braces??? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/unsure.gif)


Before you start welding anything back together, you need to add (adjustable) braces and make sure everything is within factory specs.

http://www.914world.com/specs/bodydims.php

http://www.914world.com/specs/underdims.php

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/smash.gif)

[993inNC]

There aren't any Andy. I know what you are going to say, and I will before I start welding big stuff like pans etc back in. I just verified the "f" measurement (rollbar to windshield) and its dead nuts on. The longs are truly in such good shape that car hasn't flexed a bit in the year + its been on that rotisserie. I'll go through and verify everything when I get into it heavy, promise (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Thanks for those dimension pages BTW, just what I was wondering about where to find.

[993inNC]

So with as busy I've been lately with work, I got tired of looking at my unfinished car (blasting was never finished by the first guy). I started to chemical strip the remainer of the car but was getting frustrated with the time it was taking and the fact that the rest of the car was flash rusting as time went on. My Ospho wash worked well but there was a fair amount of prep time in being able to do that.

I met a guy a while back who runs a powder coating shop but had not had a blasting capability.............until recently!

I brought the car (still on the first blasters rotisserie!) to the second guy. Last week he blasted the entire car again for me with aluminum oxide and then powder coated the car. Enclosed are the pics. Can not express how my somewhat OCD self is excited. Now I can work on little bits at a time without having to worry about rusting somewhere else and paint remnants here and there (that was driving me crazy, I couldn't see the forest through the trees!). I can grind the coating back down to do welding etc and just have to prime back small parts instead of an entire car!

[CrashDown]

good luck man, that powdercoat is gonna be a bitch to sand all the way off....

[jaxdream]

First completely powdercoated 914 ???? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/piratenanner.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/piratenanner.gif) Exterme rustproofing!!!

I like it !!!

Jack

[Ductech]

Have any of you guys ever scraped powdercoat out of threads of bolt holes!!! That was the one thing I hated when a customer would bring in a powder coated swing arm with bolt holes chock full of powdercoat. And not to be a shit but I worry more about the areas that you can't easily powdercoat. like the intersections of multiple panels coming together to be spot welded that you see all of the place. and the longs internally. Did you cut a bit of the longs somewhere and seal the inside?

[993inNC]

Have any of you guys ever scraped powdercoat out of threads of bolt holes!!! That was the one thing I hated when a customer would bring in a powder coated swing arm with bolt holes chock full of powdercoat. And not to be a shit but I worry more about the areas that you can't easily powdercoat. like the intersections of multiple panels coming together to be spot welded that you see all of the place. and the longs internally. Did you cut a bit of the longs somewhere and seal the inside?

So far, I think I can say with a reasonable degree of certainty, that these guys did an outstanding job. I have only found one easily seen spot where they missed with both the media blast and coating (a suspension point), but it was a clean rust free area still covered with a hint of paint so I'm not concerned. They took the time to cover bolts and holes, the vin tag and the vin stamped into the fender, etc...
The longs I can't comment on other than to say that there is a little coating that can be seen inside and plan to run an Ospho wash down them before all is done which will carbonize any rust in there.

Someone commented about how difficult it will be to sand off. First, I have no intentions of sanding off the coating other than for welding and body work. I did sand some off today with a pneumatic drill sanding disk (forget the grit) and it came off like a champ, not easily mind you (it was on there good), but I got to bare metal with no issues.

The coating made it into those multi point locations you mentioned.....its everywhere!

Secondly, show me a primer job that covers as good as a good powder coating, and as uniformly thick....

I'm pleased and for $1000 to blast and coat, can't go wrong IMO (IMG:style_emoticons/default/beerchug.gif)

I'd powder coat the car's final color if I knew there would be no body filler, but I doubt that will be the case.

[trojanhorsepower]

Woo Hooo (IMG:style_emoticons/default/piratenanner.gif)

Progress!

I can't believe $1000! That seems pretty good to me. I wish I could bring them mine. I am trying to get my shop built so I can't spare the $$.

Can you paint over the powder coating?

[993inNC]

Woo Hooo (IMG:style_emoticons/default/piratenanner.gif)

Progress!

I can't believe $1000! That seems pretty good to me. I wish I could bring them mine. I am trying to get my shop built so I can't spare the $$.

Can you paint over the powder coating?

Yeah I thought it was a great deal, since the first idiot wanted $1200 just to blast! I ended up having $300 in the first guy and I'll have $1050 in this guy once the two decklids and healight buckets come back, so $1350 in all. Now if I could just find someone to do the body work that cheap and well done, I'd be in business!!

The second guy is a 914 fan, has one in the back of the shop tucked away awaiting resto and two more parts cars, so I think I got a combo good deal.....he's a fan of the cars and hadn't done one before so it was an experience for both of us.

And yes, paint over powder coating. It gets prep'd like any other primer coat from what he tells me.

[DRPHIL914]

Woo Hooo (IMG:style_emoticons/default/piratenanner.gif)

Progress!

I can't believe $1000! That seems pretty good to me. I wish I could bring them mine. I am trying to get my shop built so I can't spare the $$.

Can you paint over the powder coating?

Yeah I thought it was a great deal, since the first idiot wanted $1200 just to blast! I ended up having $300 in the first guy and I'll have $1050 in this guy once the two decklids and healight buckets come back, so $1350 in all. Now if I could just find someone to do the body work that cheap and well done, I'd be in business!!

The second guy is a 914 fan, has one in the back of the shop tucked away awaiting resto and two more parts cars, so I think I got a combo good deal.....he's a fan of the cars and hadn't done one before so it was an experience for both of us.

And yes, paint over powder coating. It gets prep'd like any other primer coat from what he tells me.

that's pretty cool- i could see if you wanted black, to do that in a gloss black.

Where is the shop in N.C. ? i'm down in S.C. , and eventually need to do the same with mine. (except i have some extensive rear long and jack point work to do.)
I have not found an experienced 914 body person here is southern SC., might be willing to transport, SC to NC not too far to do that.

enjoying the thread, please keep updating as work is done.


Phil

[993inNC]

Woo Hooo (IMG:style_emoticons/default/piratenanner.gif)

Progress!

I can't believe $1000! That seems pretty good to me. I wish I could bring them mine. I am trying to get my shop built so I can't spare the $$.

Can you paint over the powder coating?

Yeah I thought it was a great deal, since the first idiot wanted $1200 just to blast! I ended up having $300 in the first guy and I'll have $1050 in this guy once the two decklids and healight buckets come back, so $1350 in all. Now if I could just find someone to do the body work that cheap and well done, I'd be in business!!

The second guy is a 914 fan, has one in the back of the shop tucked away awaiting resto and two more parts cars, so I think I got a combo good deal.....he's a fan of the cars and hadn't done one before so it was an experience for both of us.

And yes, paint over powder coating. It gets prep'd like any other primer coat from what he tells me.

that's pretty cool- i could see if you wanted black, to do that in a gloss black.

Where is the shop in N.C. ? i'm down in S.C. , and eventually need to do the same with mine. (except i have some extensive rear long and jack point work to do.)
I have not found an experienced 914 body person here is southern SC., might be willing to transport, SC to NC not too far to do that.

enjoying the thread, please keep updating as work is done.


Phil

The guy's shop is in Leland NC. On the web at capefearpowdercoating.com (no affiliation, just seems like a good guy).
There's a Porsche resto guy up this way, but his reputation is spotty. Knows his stuff but has been a rob Peter to pay Paul kinda guy in the past and I'm just not sure of him. I have so much going on right now and the car is in such good shape, I'd love to find someone to hand it off to to restore properly for me (at least body and paint). We'll see. So far I've owned the car two years and am now just getting to a workable state and now I have no time for it like I did when I bought it!

I'll keep the thread alive, don't worry. I'm inspired and educated by those here and some of the amazing work I've seen, will do my part to carry the torch (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[mepstein]

I'm curious about the powder coating. Your guy powder coated over the seam sealer, covered up the paper and foil tags and then placed it in the oven? Then he's doing bodywork and paint over the powder coat? Never heard it done like that.

[sixnotfour]

Once you smell powder burning while welding, you will rethink.
My local powder coater does everything , but the exterior panels . They simply blow it off before baking. Tags and such are masked and then unmasked before baking.

[993inNC]

I'm curious about the powder coating. Your guy powder coated over the seam sealer, covered up the paper and foil tags and then placed it in the oven? Then he's doing bodywork and paint over the powder coat? Never heard it done like that.

He told me the coating would not stick to the sealer and it seems that it hasn't (so far as I can tell). All tags have been removed and will be replaced as well as the ds jamb tag (with color code - new rivets await it's reattachment). The rear production date sticker has been removed (a new one has already been purchased and date stamp mimicked- can't tell original from new). The only tag left was the windshield vin (masked for blasting) and the ps fender vin stamp (masked before coating).
The oven temp was low enough not to melt the heat tubes in the longs but hot enough to properly bake the coating.
Its a really nice job! Will need a sand and prep for paint but not to much. As for bodywork, coating is removed before the work. The coating was for the sake of saving the remainder 75% of the car while the rest is worked on. Flash rust from the first guy's blasting was covering the car and I wanted that to stop while I worked on the problem spots. Should be no issues with painting over it. If I can keep filler out of the body, I'll coat the car the factory paint color too!

[dlee6204]

So I'm going to revive this thread for everybody...

Chris, 993inNC, brought me the car to do all the repairs and get it ready for paint! He dropped it off yesterday and I started to tear into it a little bit today.

The powder coating on the car is pretty awesome. It even makes swiss cheese look good and swiss cheese it has! Overall it is a pretty solid car with a lot of little rust in lots of places.

[dlee6204]

The longs have a little bit of rust which is going to be my first concern. I started off by removing what was left of the inner lower firewall.

[dlee6204]

I need to pick up some sheet metal for the long work so I started to work on the firewall in the meantime.

[dlee6204]

And I made up a panel to replace the area. That's all I got done today. Tomorrow I'll do some clean up, weld this piece in, and get some door braces in before I start the longs.

[rick 918-S]

And I made up a panel to replace the area. That's all I got done today. Tomorrow I'll do some clean up, weld this piece in, and get some door braces in before I start the longs.

Please get some mild steel 18/20 gauge sheet metal for your patches. that thin galvinized metel (likely 28 ga.) will not weld very good and will posion you.