Well, the hole itself was repaired, but I was just able to excavate as seen below. Surrounding area is ice pick proof. What are the best "fixes" to be done while keeping the car together? It does not extend into the interior either and the side runners are very solid (had been replaced too).

Using a wirewheel or grinder, or whatever you weapon of choice is, take the areas down to bare metal and see what you have left to work with. Then fab replacement bits, weld 'em in and be done with it.


Additionally, how was the hell hole repiared? (post a pic or two) I would think that if someone went to the trouble of repairing the hell hole correctly, they would have repaired the spots in your photos as well.

Use your ice pick to see what else may be lurking around there too. Hopefully, thats it.

If you can't get to it with a wire wheel, use Metal Ready or some other rust dissolver and soak the blind side as best you can to clear the rot.

Zach

I would check those fuel lines as well. You might consider finding a better filter.

Good point.

I told you so just doesn't cut it ...
That hell hole "fix" on the top just looked too suspicious.

Time to drop the engine and do it right!

The good news is, all of the sheet-metal needed is available. How are your welding skills?
Andy

Either leave it for the time being or drop the motor and do it right. I would bet there is more rust in there you can't access with the motor in. Also, I would investigate the PO's engine shelf repair you had in the other thread. I agree with Andy, its suspicious. I would be too scared to weld that close to an active fuel supply anyway.

In the 914 rustoration I'm working on, I've learned 1 thing.... Where there's smoke, there's fire.

The hell hole was patched...not with correct sheet metal but simply cut and welded pieces (like no hole for the drain funnel, etc.) twenty years ago. It's stri=ong buut has some surface rust that I'll take care of
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Redoing fuel lines, pump (relocating to front), filter and doing SS line through tunnel. Should I do the welding when all the fuel lines are out for safety purposes or cana decent welder work around the fuel lines?

I do not know how to weld. I guess I'll either take it somewhere or get one of those "welders on wheels" to come over.

Guess what I mainly need is the right triangle that AA shows in their catalog for like $85. and a small patch on the forward hole?

No. That small triangle is not structural.


You have a huge gaping hole in your longitudinal. That is the backbone of your car!

Judging from your images, i bet if you move your passenger seat forward and look under the carpet behind the seat, you will find more rust where the floorpan meets the rear firewall and the side of the long.
Andy

And use the proper FI clamps on the fuel hose, not those things in the picture.

That would be #2 in my picture, right? Seems that #1 is normally a hole that got larger, right? When I remove my passenger seat there is no rust where the floor meets the firewall and the side of the long is solid. The PO replaced the longitudinals.


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Ken, time to start digging in more man..........


I have a MIG setup, that can do gas.


This is why i am thinking of drilling holes in the longs/caverns and using waxoyl on my car once it is complete, if the longs and etc were really replaced.

Just to be clear, i'm trying to help you here, not trying to bring you down.

I have seen this exact same cancer many, many times. I highly doubt we (you) have seen all of the rust there is.

At this point, i would not trust any of the PO's repairs.

Take off the rocker panels and carefully inspect the outer longs.
Poke the floor behind the seats. Don't just look at the painted tar paper. The rust will be underneath the tar.

Take off the PO's top hell hole cover to get a good look at the mess from above.

This is your chance to fix this right. Heck, you could even buy a welder and fix this yourself!
Andy

Matey.............has that car been down in Davey Jones locker? arrrrgg

I know it's too late,but...you should'nt have picked it
the rust was holding hands, man!!

Don't lose it Ken, follow the advice

Andy is probably right.

BUT

If you pull the rockers, be ready to find pristine outer longs. There are clamshell covers that have been for sale that could be put over bad rusty longs. Ideally, the rust is fixed before the clamshell is used. but that is not often the case.

I looked at a parts car in York that I could put my fist through the rust holes (in fact I did just that trying to talk the dealer down to proper parts car prices). But the longs looked pristine due to the new clamshells. On this car, you could actually see the rust going under the clamshell, but you had to lay down and know what to be looking for. dealer wanted solid driver money, so I walked.

Whatever you find is fixable. We are here to help. Some of us will even come over and help you fix it in person.

If you promise good beer, not cheep stuff. :-)

Yes. Good beer.

914bonfires bring many tears...

(-good man, real good advice from everyone-) Cancer digs deep, only bare metal is real. The skin will lie about what is underneath.
Our rust is very predictable; it follows a decay path building momentum or it is isolated and is easily proven.
Bad seals make many floors rot. That is an isolated cancer. But a PO that ignores one, ignores others...
The R hellhole is the traditional start- the collapse of the R console and shelf progress with the decay of the R long.
We know you have the first and the last signs; the middle is highly likely. Poor repair by PO that was incomplete makes this likely.
Your prize was incomplete yesterday but today you now know. Just fix it.
The work is not growing- that damage is done- stop further and get it back up to speed with simple repairs. Don't dispare a bit. No-one's rushing for cover- we can help you along. No problem- you just need metal. Got to do it right. -Jordan

Who did the PPI on the car?
Too bad you didn't come see us in CT before you took it home.
We could have found and fixed every problem you have encountered so far.

I would recommend against having a "welder on wheels" take care of this.
Look carefully for a place that has the necessary skills to do a proper job. Too many weld shops will talk big and do sh!t for you.

BTW, we have the triangles,made in-house, at a much better price.

This also.


Ken I can tell you from experience that with my flux mig we would do better than most body shops in the area........


You'd be lucky to get a bodyshop in our area to even use metal, most are glass and go.

Really...it's more the flash of the camera...doesn't look fuzzy or brown in person.

I'll start digging and poking more tomorrow. I appreciate and hear everything ya'll said. This is really something I'd rather pay somebody to do if it needs major surgery as I have neither the equipment or experience to weld. I'll report back tomorrow after further inspection.

Any beer you want!

If you pay someone else, take it to a reputable person on here like scottyb or tangerine up in CT.

I can't think of anyone in MD I would want touching my 914 with a welder besides myself.

Already did the CT / MD drive once...why not.

I have seen a lot of work on many makes of cars from the local famous body shops and all of it leaves me shaking my head. There is always something half assed or crap, and I would not risk it with something this old and awesome.

THe stuff I see on here from tangerine and scottyb is in the same price range and MUCH better.


Plus im sure if we partially strip your car you can probably save a couple bucks, we can zip loc and organize everything for re-assembly.....

Have your folks of choice do the metal/paint work, and the simple stuff could be handled with a local 914 gathering or something?

Your car looks a lot like this one did.

Find out where all the H.H. rust is. Clear it. Post up looking for locals. Bribe with food and beer and promise you have the parts ready to go.

My schedule is a bitch, but I can come up one day (maybe take a vacation day after Freshman Registration is over next month) and weld in patches if you do the grunt work before I get there. All I would ask is that the rust be cleared and the metal that needs to go in was on hand before I showed up. My welds are not very pretty, but they are strong, and I am working on the pretty part.

I'm pretty sure that there are some others that would offer the same.
Zach

If you think yours was/is bad take a look at mine,

Very sweet offer...thanks.

Damn...and doesn't even look like you braced /supported the thing before cutting half the car away. How'd you ever get it back together (correctly)?

Err yes it was braced and supported....

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Guys...the car is as solid as can be (well...almost). The floor needs some POR15 but you can't drive an ice pick through the floors or longs with a freakin' hammer. It's obvious to me that the PPO, who has written to me, replaced the longs and the hell hole damge in the engine compartment, and never did the triangular corner of the Unibody below the hell hole. It "looked good" to me too until i started poking, so Im sure it was much better when he did the "restoration" in 1989. I'm convinced I just need some patch work on the actual horizontal area shown in my original shot. That being said...please (and I mean it) chime in.

Your long does look good. Why did you say that one spot was soft in the pics above? You said the floor was solid at the firewall, but I can't see how its soft underneath and solid inside.

EDIT: Nevermind, I can see how that would happen after looking at Chris's pic above.

Just as i thought ...

Pic 2 looks like there was a repair at the rear of the long, where the black spray-on undercoat is.
Pic 3 shows a questionable repair done to the floor/inner long.It may be strong but certainly isn't faithful to the way the floor and long were originally assembled.


The firewall has two layers at the bottom 6". They are roughly one or two inches apart. The floor often rots between the two, from water that gets inside and can't get out.

Sir Andy beat me to it.

Keep digging Ken!

Yeah, the long should fold the other direction. What I don't get is, I don't see the coincident repairs that usually occur with the repairs that were done. If that inner long was repaired, why does the outer long look OK? I would think if the inner long needed repair that bad, wouldn't the outside long be bad too?

I assume they were both done. Anyway...even though you guys wouldnt have done it the way it was done, I don't care about originality and it's way too strong and nice for me to go redoing it for my purposes. I'll keep poking underneath where I showed it was "soft". The car basically sat for 20 years in a garage after the longs and upper hell hole were repaired, so I'm also assuming that whatever wasn't taken care of simply rotted away even though the car was then out of the weather and wasn't getting any more water intrusion from above. I'm also assuming (please correct me) that the entire longs were replaced...inner and outer.

I don't know. The outter long looks original to me. Probably, it was repaired aft of the jack point. It seems to me with the extent of that inner repair you would see more evidence of an outter long repair. But, I'm beyond the edge of my expertise here.

FWIW I'm in the middle of hell hole/firewall repair myself.

Probably the "soft" area I showed in my first shot?

Nah...you thought I was gonna find nothing but cancer in there and need to get out my torch, gas, hatchet and wallet!

That was the other thought ...

Andy