Hell Hole Update, Suggestions on the suspension ear? Options

[bandjoey]

Well, after a summer of spending all of my time and money remodeling the house, I'm finally working on the 914 again. Look at the P.O.'s work. 1/4" steel plate for the inside fender and top of the long, and little else in the way of rust control.

Help Guys!...Look at the suspension ear support. The bottom is rusted through. The P.O. did a wonderful job of making a support brace out of what looks like 20g steel and welded it over the long, connecting the inside and outside together. It probably gave added strength at the time but how to replace the support now?

If I cut on the Yellow Dashes, will the new piece from RD (or does anyone here have one for sale?) fit up to that line, or does it lap over the seam??? How much of the outside will I be needing to cut out if it goes over the seam? The outside support, with the 3 bolt holes, look solid as a rock. It looks good inside the long at that area.

The good news is it's centrally located and fixable. Just forward of this point everything look solid.

Also...look at the engine support on the long. Anyone got one of these laying around? Imagine that side of the engine falling off. The support hole is rusted through.

I've got all the sheet metal pieces up to these 2 from RD and Engman already, and a new set of pans. If there's anyone in the DFW area that's already done this and just can't keep their hands off of 914 restorations, feel free to call and stop by.

Bill (IMG:style_emoticons/default/welder.gif)

[r_towle]

That "patch" is stock.
Its a standard item that ties in inner and outers.

If you replace the inner, you need to make those again, they are no available, but as you see its pretty simple to fabricate.

For your car I would suggest you look at buying the inner fender from AA, the rest you can fabricate but the inner fender has some funky contours for the battery tray that are a bitch to get right.

Rich

[Richard Casto]

I would agree that you should look into getting an inner fender due to the shape and difficulty in makeing your own. However you should be able to fabricate the Hell Hole patch (like the PO did), but do a better job.

You say "suspension ear" in your post, but I think you are talking about the 4-cyl engine mount that is rusted through. I don't think anyone makes a replacement for that. Beware that there can be hidden rust behind that as well. The "ear" is the part on the left in your "20g patch" photo. And as mentioned above, those are stock. Those thicker metal plates "bridge" the inner and outer suspension consoles together.

This can be fixed, but just make sure you get all of the rust out and don't cover up anything that is just going to rust from the inside out later on.

[bandjoey]

Thanks...You're probably right that that whole section comes due to bottom rust. I did get the inside fender from RD. It's a work of art. Here's to a few happy hours of grinding! Anyone locally have a plasma cutter to loan out? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/beerchug.gif) Bill

[r_towle]

When you are all done, after you have tried every f-in tool made to get in there at the right angle to do the job....only then will you understand why it has been called the Hell Hole.

My vote, cut the firewall OUT and work from the passenger compartment.

Rich

[Richard Casto]

It can be done. You will find much worse examples here on the forum, but here is the state of my Hell Hole...

Before...



After removal of rusted engine mount and cracked and rusted inner suspension console...


As of this weekend. Re-skin of area behind engine mount and new metal directly below battery tray. I was able to keep the inner fender (some patches are needed) and am at the point that I need to fabricate the firewall patches and weld in the new batter tray. Rust you see is just flash rust on surface of patch due to high humidity...

[bandjoey]

Thanks Richard..These Pix's and your project threads really help to see what I'm doing before I do it. Bill (IMG:style_emoticons/default/beer.gif)