The Family Car, Making progress for reveal at the family Christmas!! Options

[Larmo63]

Now that Mr. Nobody has a 914, we might have to refer to him as "Mr. Somebody."

[r_towle]

Great story and cherish the car forever.

Many of us will be happy to help however we can to make sure you do just that.

rich

[francar]

great car (IMG:style_emoticons/default/welcome.png)

[Michael N]

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/welcome.png) Be careful these cars multiply quickly. You'll soon find yourself on Craigslist looking for the next one.

[bcheney]

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Love the story your grandad has great taste and passing the torch to you is so cool...all he best!

[rpg5553]

Congrats, Nothing like passing the torch on to the next generation.
Im 70 now and will be giving my Healey to my daughter soon so that she and the grand kids will continue to enjoy it.

She still talks about the times id turn the lights off on the spooky windy road in Ohio at nite and we would go flying down it. Met another idiot one nite coming the other way probably doing the same thing with his daughter!

Enjoy the ride
Ronnie G

[tumamilhem]

Another thing I noticed when I was tinkering. My family remembers the car as always having a Porsche crest. They has no idea it wasn't a “factory” item.

Looks legit from the dealer to me. Any one else have any input?

Sorry for the gigantic pics. Unsure how to resize in photobucket.

Hey Andy! I shared your fb post of this story the other day. Great story and welcome to the club! BTW that's an orange bar badge. Worth $$$$. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[olsib914]

wonderful story and by the smile on your face grandpa made the wise choice. I own almost the same. early 72, bahia red with riviera rims. Bought mine from original lady school teacher. It too had spent some time hiding in a garage. Towed to a friends shop and replaced ALL fuel lines, brake lines, flushed all fluids tuned it and started to enjoy the ride. still needs cosmetics. has about 130,000 miles and yea the 1.7 is not a speed demon, but a hoot to drive. So my point being that since I am closer to gramps age than yours, get it running, make it safe, and DRIVE it (IMG:style_emoticons/default/driving.gif)
Palmer

[Mr.Nobody]

Thanks for all the kind words. My wife just gave me the go ahead to order the first round of parts so time to place some orders!!

I thought the badge was one of the older ones. It seemed to meet all the criteria from what I could tell. I definitely will not be selling it though, my grandfather wanted it on the car, it'll be staying on the car. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/driving.gif)

[EdwardBlume]

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You're Grampa must be a good guy.

Get the car safe first, mainly fuel, brakes, rust, and tires.
Do a thorough inspection so you have a full list of to dos.
Have a realistic budget plus a contingent amount.
Be patient.
Enjoy the process.
Lastly, it's your car, don't build it for the purists or for someone else's idea of what it should be. Take your time, drive a few with mods and then move forward. A full race ready 914 is too harsh on the street for some.

[Mr.Nobody]

I've already got a good list going. Safety is the main goal right now. I'd love to go cruise the car around, but that's not a good idea until I know that it's safe to drive mechanically and that doing so won't cause harm to the car.

Rust is looking pretty good so far. The car has been in a garage it's entire life. None are "rust free" but I'm looking pretty good. Obviously I'll find plenty when the day comes to prep for paint.

I just placed the first order for parts. Mostly standard tune up stuff. Fuel, air, spark, etc. I still need to order all the vacuum hoses in all the correct sizes. Plus I noticed my intake boot that connects to the air filter is split where it connects so I'll have to get one of those.

I'm curious, do people replace the oil filled air filter setup with a modern paper element? I can't find anything like that but it seems practical.

Also, I'm planning to do the front and rear brake lines and rebuild the calipers early on. I see there are a number of other hard brake lines that can be replaced. Do there rest of these commonly go bad? Is it worth replacing them now or maybe wait until I upgrade the brakes later on?

Thanks again for all the kind words and help.

[tumamilhem]

My hand brake just went bad. Likely just needs a new cable.

[KELTY360]

My hand brake just went bad. Likely just needs a new cable.

It's much more likely that the rotor and pads are worn resulting in too much clearance.

[somd914]

Certainly a story worth sharing, thanks.

Though my kids are college students, and hopefully I'm still several years from being a grandfather, I hope to spoil my grandkids with fun drives in our cars, but as for passing the cars along to them, my sons regularly remind me of their expected inheritance - their sister can have the house and money, they get the cars and tools!

Welcome to the "World"!

[EdwardBlume]

I don't know anything about the 1.7 air filter (I've only had 2.0's or /6s) but there's a search feature on this site that's helpful. It can be frustrating at first, but after you figure out the right words to search and process, you can usually get the results you want.

On the brake lines, I would expect your hard lines to be just fine being an indoor car. Flush out the fluid and look for rust and chunks of metal. Likely while they look weathered externally, they will be fine. Dad's car spent its first 20 outside on a ranch, sat outside for a long long time, and the hard lines are still fine today.

The flexible lines are more prone to failure over time. I'm not a fan of stainless but I've run them in prior cars. A stock system with regular fluid changes will stop the car.

If you are rebuilding the calipers, its a good time to get in there and inspect replace the wheel bearings, bushings, CV joints, cleaning painting, and powder coating as you go. I've found that this is a very fun and rewarding exercise but the dollar trail doesn't really end (shocks, torsion bars, turbo tie rods, sway bars) until you want it to end.

Depending on wheels the 914 tends to show off the calipers. I believe Eric nickel plates his, but you can do whatever you want in terms of paint or plating.

Good luck, and again, enjoy the process!

[hcdmueller]

Your car looks great. I am hoping my kid will want my collection when all is said and done.

My car had the side bumper thingies. They were not riveted on, although the paint down the sides has a line where they used to be. Take a look inside your fenders for the rivets. You might get lucky.

[Mr.Nobody]

Hcd, you give me hope for the sides.

I plan to clean up the calipers and freshen them up with a red caliper paint kit I have lying around. Probably picked it up for an older project I had. Before this I come from watercooled VW's.

My old GLI (my pride and joy), my R32, my rabbit, a carb setup I had for the rabbit, and my old GTI VR6 at the track.

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So yeah, while the 914 is a new adventure, thankfully this ain't my first rodeo. Hopefully I can apply some of the many mistakes I've learned from over the years to this new project.

[Mr.Nobody]

Well, almost a year later, a little update. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/piratenanner.gif)

The car has been stored in hibernation over the last year. Getting to work on the car is tough. It’s stored 45 minutes from my home, and I work a lot. I've done a few things, but not much. Mainly got it running. Vacuum lines, plugs, wires, coil, oil change, timed it and got it to run. Oh, and save money.

My time and energy has been spent combing the resources like this forum, Pelicans forum, 914club, and every vendor, blog, book, or tech article I could find. Researching one thing led to another, which led to another, and so on. I also spoke with anyone who would share their knowledge. Once I’d decided a course I began purchasing parts. Tom @ TC’s Garage has been extremely helpful with parts knowledge. If you haven’t checked him out, you should.

One day I hope to do a full restoration of the car, but for now it's mainly a refresh with the potential for a motor build in the near future.

The car has thankfully little rust, and from what I’ve found, it can wait a bit longer for the restoration. Poking in all the usual places has revealed very little.

The plan is to bring the car to the family Christmas this year. Everyone should get a kick out of that.

Over the last few days I have installed…

Brake job – including rotors, pads, SS lines, 19mm master cylinder.

BMW 320i calipers
Turbo tie rod kit
Rotary14’ SS fuel lines

I started Sunday, I'm slow. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/beer3.gif)

One plus right off the bat, when on 4 jack stands, both doors line up and open and close very easy. I did not try to take the top off and test it. And no it hasn't been on jack stands for the last year.
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Fuel lines were first, out came the tank. The tank itself looks great. Inside is bright silver and clean. Outside is really nice to.
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Unfortunately there was a small pin hole. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/chair.gif)
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A quick trip over to a buddies in town and he had it all welded up. He does some pretty stellar work and has worked on many high end restorations. If you need metal work, have a look at Mettelka Craft Metal Shaping, you won't be disappointed. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/welder.gif)

Just need to fill it with water still and make sure it’s water tight before paint and reinstall.

Next up was the fuel line from Rotary’14. As many of you know already, really nice product, super easy guy too deal with. I definitely recommend.
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The fuel lines themselves slid right in no problem. The motor was in place and I did the install alone, it’s that easy. Took maybe 20 minutes to fish them both through. Definitely takes more time to replace all the other rubber hoses than it does to do the stainless.

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Next up were the brakes.
The rear rotors are still within spec, so I’ll re-use them. Every dollar saved is another dollar towards the motor.

The rear calipers appear to have been rebuilt not too long ago. While they aren’t the prettiest, the rubber around the pistons is soft, pliable, and in good shape with no tears. Maybe I’ll pick up a caliper paint kit or hit it with a clear lacquer.
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I went to install the 72+up SS lines I had ordered and sure enough, the threads appeared to be different when trying to bolt to the hard line coming from the proportioning valve. It took me a while to figure out (due to tight visibility in there), but some prior mechanic had installed a metric to SAE adapter to hook up to the random old stainless steel line he had installed. Very strange. Once I got the stupid adapter off everything fit right up.

While in the front brakes I noticed both tie rod ends were torn. So, a quick call over to Tom and a Turbo tie rod kit sooner than expected. Looking forward to those. The passenger tie rod end came out no problem. The driver side, 45 minutes of banging on a pickle fork. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smash.gif)

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The front rotors were out of spec and were replaced. Along with the 320i calipers, pads, SS lines and new front hard lines.

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New 19mm master cylinder with old two pole switch. Didn’t get any pics of it installed.

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I ran out of time to work on the car and had to come home to work on a project for work. I should be back up there for a few days in early April.
Next up on the list (have all parts already)

Fill up, bleed, and check the brakes for leaks.

Install new motor mounts.

New ball joints

New shift bushings.

Optima 34r battery.

Pertronix pointless ignition.

Finish the remaining soft fuel lines and reinstall the gas tank.

While I can’t work on the car for another 2 weeks, I can finish up polishing and painting the Empi 8’s I got and put some rubber on them.

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One final thing, the car is located in Fallbrook, CA. Which is also home to a certain specialty Porsche restorer called CPR, the place is 10x more insane then your wildest dreams. I stopped by for some questions and took just a couple quick pictures.

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Soon enough I'll be doing this (IMG:style_emoticons/default/driving.gif) and saving for the motor. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/aktion035.gif)

Thanks for looking and reading!!

[LowBridge]

What a super great story and one that just sums up with owning a teener is all about.

[Mr.Nobody]

Little update.

The brakes on the car are finished, but need to still be bedded and used. The car has yet to have miles put on it.

I have been bugging Mike Mulligan at Mulligan Racing Development in Vista, CA with questions since the beginning of the project. He's been gracious enough to answer everything honestly and has been invaluable up to this point.

About two months ago I dropped the car at his shop to do the carb setup. Yes, I probably could have fumbled my way through it, but at this point I'm glad I left it to Mike.

They quickly sorted the remaining fueling issues and had the carb setup mounted and the car running. Unfortunately, immediately there was a problem. The car had a knock.

Upon disassembly MRD found this...

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This piston looked bad, the cylinder was alright. The ring had failed...

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Nothing major was found inside the motor, so at this time we would not be splitting the case.

Mike set out to find a donor piston and cylinder and in doing so stumbled across a set of NOS 96mm flat top P&C's. Apparently they were just collecting dust somewhere. So, a couple bucks later I was going to end up with a 1911.

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To make the P&C's work on the 1.7 heads requires a bit of minor machining. So the last few weeks have been waiting for the heads to return. Two days ago I gave a call to check up and got a "yeah, come on up and check out what we're up to!"

I arrived to find this...

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Now before someone freaks out, yes, Mike opened the motor without contacting me. Honestly, imo he made the right call. They had the motor running again with the new P&C's and unfortunately there was another knock. Upon disassembly they discovered that one of the pistons on the down stroke was contacting the case. So some clearancing was required. A couple other small issues arose and the case was split to address them all now. Good thing to as now hopefully the motor will last a good long time. Since the case is opened we went ahead and ordered a Web 86 Cam and gear, new lifters, and other odds and ends. Should all be here next week.

Hopefully if all goes well the car will be running and driving next week. Then it's off to get an alignment and start the shakedown/break-in process.


Oh, and I ended up powdercoating the wheels a while back and had some rubber mounted on them. They are already on the car now, no pictures though.

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Stay tuned, hopefully it'll be on the road real soon!! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/aktion035.gif)