Intro from Montana: '73 2.0L rustoration thread Options

[bbrock]

Headunit install looks great, like it belongs there.

Looks like I will be in your neighborhood April 25 this year.

Great news! Looking forward to it.

Buckle Up

A nice stepping stone accomplished yesterday getting seat belts installed. Shocking that the belts were nasty and chewed up considering how pristine this car was when the project started (IMG:style_emoticons/default/laugh.gif)



After replating the lower anchors and getting a pair of reproduction labels from a member here, I sent the belts off to Safety Restore for re-webbing. Turn around was quite fast. I sent the belts on a Monday and received them the following Monday. They did a nice job at a very reasonable price. The only thing I didn't like was that they only sewed the labels on one side but I'll take the blame on that for not providing more specific instructions on how to attach them.



My wife was kind enough to remedy the label problem. I don't think the edges were rolled before sewing on the originals but I think that contributes to them fraying and disappearing so I think this is better.



And here's one installed in place. Recievers are just waiting for new stickers before they go in.



I'm missing a couple bits though. I need to source one each of these (upper cover and buckle stay). I'll be placing a WTB for these.

[Superhawk996]

Good call. I don't like the idea of riding around with 50 year old UV degraded webbing either.

Thank you for forging the road for so many of us on this and finding sources to get this done and then reporting back on lead times and results. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/beerchug.gif)

[euro911]

Nice job, Brent.

Did you cut the old belts to re-plate the hardware prior to shipping everything off to Safety Restore?

[bbrock]

Nice job, Brent.

Did you cut the old belts to re-plate the hardware prior to shipping everything off to Safety Restore?

Yes I did. I also cut out the chrome guides but decided they were in good enough shape that it wasn't worth the expense to have the plated. I taped everything together with Gorilla tape before sending them i so they could easily see how everything went together.

[bbrock]

The only update I have from the weekend is that we took advantage of the 3-day weekend for a very quick trip out to Puyallup to pick up this critical Porsche accessory.



In person he has a larger, blockier head and looser skin on the face than Niaquq did, but in photos, he looks so much like him that I'm not sure I could tell them apart. Spooky. I'll have to make sure to carefully label all the pics of him.

Still working on a name for this guy.

[BPic]

Nice!! Congrats to him for landing an excellent caretaker!! Enjoy Brent.

[Dion]

He’s beautiful! Good on ya! Nice companion for the road trips or the hikes & trails (IMG:style_emoticons/default/piratenanner.gif)

[raynekat]

Looking forward to an update on the 914 from Brent and we get a pic of the new pooch?
Ha
Fantastic and enjoy your new friend.

[Superhawk996]

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/piratenanner.gif)

Glad to see you have a new garage buddy. Each is never a replacement for the last, but, a new friend indeed.

Maybe with a little luck, I'll get to meet this one this new pup this summer on the journey out west.

[BeatNavy]

The only update I have from the weekend is that we took advantage of the 3-day weekend for a very quick trip out to Puyallup to pick up this critical Porsche accessory.

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[mepstein]

When our Sheppard passed away, we tried not having a dog. It only lasted about 3 months and then we knew we needed another. Congrats on the new family member.

[tygaboy]

Carma and Dogma! A lot of love in that pic...

[bbrock]

A quick task here. Once again I appear to have failed at getting a before pic of the corroded, mouse-chewed and pee encrusted original antenna. Could have sworn I snapped a shot. Anyway, here it is after a good scrubbing and applying liquid electrical tape to the chewed sections.



While the liquid tape was still wet, I pulled gray shrink tubing over the damaged areas to tidy things up with a waterproof seal.



Then 2 minutes after completing that task, I hit the "pay" button on this.



Rather than stringing the unswitched power lead all the way back to a source, I modified my radio harness to add a pigtail for power takeoff. I'll need to do something similar for the control wire to split it so I can plug both the antenna and amp in. Exact config is TBD.



The fit is a bit tight, especially with the fuel vapor lines that run down that fender but I got it in. I've always fantasized about having one of these so it's hard to resist turning the radio on and off to watch the antenna go up and down.





The control wire is powered whenever the radio is switched on regardless of input. That is good and bad. Good that it makes it easy to use it as a power on control for the amp. Bad because it means the antenna is up even when streaming music from a phone or other device. I think I'll install a manual switch in the antenna leg of the control wire. Not sure where I'll put the switch. Might do a wireless remote control. Will have to think on that.

Lastly, the new inspector seems to take his job very seriously.

[FlacaProductions]

Love the power antenna. Always have. I had one on my 73 back in the 90's and I took it apart and cut down the plastic toothed insert inside the metal mast that pushes it up so that the antenna didn't (couldn't) go up to full height when automatically triggered.

BTW - did you find the seatbelt pivot covers in the specific style you were looking for? I read your post concerning those just after I bought two off of ebay in that exact style. If you still need, I can pass on the vendor info....

[914_7T3]

The only update I have from the weekend is that we took advantage of the 3-day weekend for a very quick trip out to Puyallup to pick up this critical Porsche accessory.



In person he has a larger, blockier head and looser skin on the face than Niaquq did, but in photos, he looks so much like him that I'm not sure I could tell them apart. Spooky. I'll have to make sure to carefully label all the pics of him.

Still working on a name for this guy.

That's a handsome fella!

[bbrock]

Love the power antenna. Always have. I had one on my 73 back in the 90's and I took it apart and cut down the plastic toothed insert inside the metal mast that pushes it up so that the antenna didn't (couldn't) go up to full height when automatically triggered.

BTW - did you find the seatbelt pivot covers in the specific style you were looking for? I read your post concerning those just after I bought two off of ebay in that exact style. If you still need, I can pass on the vendor info....

@FlacaProductions Haven't gotten around to posting a WTB yet so if you have that vendor info, I'd love to get it. I looked on ebay but couldn't find this style.

[bbrock]

Details Matter

I mentioned there was one more detail on the head unit install I was going to try, so here it is. First, a reminder of what it looked like.

(IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/uploads/post-20845-1581109370_thumb.jpg)

And here it is now.





It isn't perfect and I'm not confident it will be durable, but I like the look and it is a decent match to the air controls bezel. It wasn't easy, but I found a supplier for 1/8" wide flexible stick-on chrome molding. As a bonus, they send free samples and sell the stuff by the foot which makes it cheap to try. The corner radius is a little tight which puts strain around the bend so I'm not sure how well it will stay. I experimented with relief cuts in the corners but didn't like the result. There is also a bit of waggle across the top because I had to reposition the trim after my first failed attempt. The waggle is where the corner bends were on the first try.

The perfect solution would be to 3D print a bezel and send it off for plastic chroming but I don't have a 3D printer or know anyone nearby with one. I'll see how this works. I might order another piece to at least straighten out the wave.

[raynekat]

Brent....you are such a mad scientist. Good job man.

[bbrock]

Mystery Solved

I've been putting of tracing down the problem with only two fan speeds on the fresh air blower for obvious reasons. I finally broke down today and removed the hood and fresh air box. Tore it completely apart and yep, there it was. The coil resistors have what must be fail safe bypass switches. Just simple open contacts that I assume are designed to close if the resistor breaks to create a circuit direct to ground and run the fan at full speed. The switch on the medium speed resistor was bent and making contact. Just to be sure, I checked resistance and the low speed resistor read 2.5 ohms exactly the spec stamped on the assembly but the medium side read 0 ohms.

Here you can see the open contact of the low speed resistor in the background and the closed contact for medium in foreground.



A bit of a tweak with needle nose pliers to try to match the gap on the other side.



After adjustment the coil read 1.1 ohms which is a little higher than the 0.75 ohms stamped on the assembly but after testing the speeds, I think just fine.

Than I had the fun of reinstalling the fresh air box. That makes three times solo now. Following Ian's video tips, it just isn't that hard. Hardest part is connecting that Bowden cable. Glad to have this out of the way. Now I can work on the fuel tank.

[Superhawk996]

Nice work!

Maybe contacts are bi-metallic and close if resistors get too hot and then increase fan speed until it cools?