I saw a listing on Craigslist the other day (Friday), "1969 Porsche 914 - Good Condition $price" I figured I would call and go look at it. I called the guy, asked him the VIN 4702901140...ohh early 70.

"When could I see the car?"
"Not until Monday, I have things going over Valentine's"

Ok....I gotta wait two days, no biggie. Monday rolls around...go over to the guy's house after work. He opens the garage and I am immediately impressed that through the dust is a nice looking car! Build date 01/70..... Vegas car...zero rust...needs some definite attention. I do the exam before trying to start it. Not too shabby. I go to fire it up... "Oh, this hasn't started since Oct 2008...it hasn't been driven at all since 2006." Ok, time to mechanic a little and get her fired up...45 minutes later she is "kind of" running.

Let the owner know that I would think about it. I then sent my dad some pics of it once I got home. He sends me an email shortly after saying "lets go get it". He fell instantly in love with it.

Today was my birthday, so Dad and I got together to go pick it up. Once I got her running again, I had to 4x4 it out of his dirt (not gravel) driveway and over a snowbank....this required pushing...quite entertaining from the driver's seat! Once backed up a bit, I made a comment that this was going to take a while to get out of this driveway... "just go forward across my lawn" ok....hehe drove across the wet lawn auto xing around his sprinkler heads.

So here she is, my dad standing proudly by his new toy!

Happy B-day! What a nice find. Congrads.

way to go ....nice score looks pretty decent ...P.S HAPPY BIRTHDAY

wow, that thing looks like new!

Sweet score.

She looks a little better in pictures! When coming off of the trailer in 2006 (after coming from Vegas), the owner took it for a little spin and the rear DS wheel fell off and dented up the quarter...yup, lug nuts need to be tightened...

The car was originally a L96D color, the current paint appears to be an 80's laquer job with some cracking going on. She will need paint. I am pretty excited for Dad, he has wanted a sports car for years...perfect one to start with!

Hows the gear box

The gearbox is horrible! Second gear synchro appears to be totally gone. I have (I think) everything I need to convert it to a sideshift. I may have to dig through a few piles to find all the linkage. This trans may be a candidate for a rebuild!

Nice find!

WooooHoo!

Nice find!

Looks good in the pictures. Hows the rust issues? Is it really rust free?

Looks good from here! Happy birthday. Tell Dad:

Very nice; looks like you scored a nice car. Good luck and enjoy.

Thanks everyone! Dad is pretty excited!

I crawled underneath looking for rust spots and have yet to have found any at all. I did find that the sheet metal below the battery and above the long has been patched, but after looking underneath it is evident that they did indeed cut out all offending iron oxide.

She does need some body work and paint....yellow cars always look better in pictures...I think that is why they have to drive so fast, so no one can get a close look to see that they really are 20 footers! This car is a 20 footer by all means.

I will be working to return it to driver status this weekend (including a new sideshift) and hopefully talking dad into visiting a body shop. I did drive it the 5 miles to my house, but it will need some TLC before being a true driver again. He is adamant about the yellow, so it will not be returning to silver anytime soon.

After having just two injected cars, I really forgot how good the dual carbs really sound, especially without a sound pad in the engine bay.

This will need some attention....the lower part of this quarter is folded back from the lost tire incident the last owner had.

Bring is over to Zipper. I bet he can work the metal out for you.

I am heading over there in short order. Remember that purple 914 over there? That is going to be the shifter and linkage donor.

I need to hook up with Zipper anyways, it has been since RRC that I have seen him.

Tell him Hi from us!

We will do! You and Sandy sure made an impression on him!


I was looking at the VIN database. The next older car than Dad's is 4702901121 owned by GreatPumpkin. That car has a build date of 12/69, and is only 19 cars away from this car. That leads me to believe that this was one of the first cars built in 1970 (it is the earliest one in the member registry)!

Thanks Greg, now that picture sure reminds me of a Travelocity commercial!

Well, we found the second hurdle after the tail shifter....

seems when the tire came off on the PO, it tweaked the DS rear suspension. I noticed today that there is positive camber in that wheel. Looking closely at the hub/trailing arm assembly it looks as if the hub is bent.

Question #1.... If the wheel comes off in a turn, which tweaks first, the hub or the body?

Question #2.... If I replace the while trailing arm and hub, what are the chances that it will actually fix the problem (after alignment of course)? Because I have a set of freshly rebuilt trailing arms sitting here with all new bushings and bearings.

I thought I heard a rubbing noise in a hard corner...sure enough! The top side of the tire! 165's are not supposed to rub!

Sounds like the tire may have been slid into a curb rolling the tire and trailing arm under slightly. I would check the trailing arm ear carefully. If it looks good, (no kinks or stress related paint fractures) Then Find a couple places that are consistant like the pucks and take a couple cross measurement from the attaching bolts at the suspension ear. If there is too much interference use a weighted string line off the bolt to get the measurement you need to be confident the mounting point is good. Most likely the trailing arm is twisted.

If you can manually change the camber with that side lifted, I would start small and look at the bushings in the trailing arm to body area. These tend to go and can cause what you described. I doubt the hub is warped, but that is an easy fix (luckily).

Nice find ,
How much room does your Dad have around his place ? , How many jackstands does he own ?,
my dad and his yellow 914, 32yrs ago. Maybe my mom will drive hers out to RRC

Thanks for the tips! I hope it is simple. I feel like an idiot for not noticing it earlier. Next time.

I will probably get it up on jackstands tomorrow to drop the engine, and will really be able to inspect everything better.

Awesome Jeff! That plate looks familiar!

Congrats on the new ride... it goes to show you.... you're never too old to enjoy a 914...

Thanks Rob! I got a text from Val today... "I opened your garage door and there is your dad working on his car already!"

I had the exact problem on my 6 when I bought it! I replaced the trailing arm. You will need to check the ear that the trailing arm bolts to! Mine had ovaled the hole so I had to fill the hole in by welding and redrilling!

Similar to these photos!

Nice work Jeff! I had thought about that too. I looked from the outside last night and didn't see any obvious cracks. Keeping the fingers crossed!

I got Dad's car in the garage and in the pre-engine drop position...


Does this seem a tad off to you?


Engine bay is pretty clean, it is going to look good after a cleaning:


There has been some hellhole work...and an aluminum battery tray :


I will call this the "before" picture:

Called it. Curbed tire. bent trailing arm mounting ear may be ok.

I hope so Rick!

Most likely the arm is bent; happened to me when I hit a curb after slipping on some gravel. The trick is to get the 3 bolts out without breaking them. There is supposed to be a plastic cap over the threaded hole, so putting penetrating fluid in there a few days in advance can help. Best penetrating fluid is supposed to be 50% acetone & 50% ATF.

It is strange that you report the DOT date as 01/70 as I have 12/69 up into the 2000 range. It would be great to get the chassis number from the Karmann badge.

Heya Jeff, I fixed that pic for you:

Tonight's progress: Engine out, trans split off, a whole lot of cleaning done...and to do! Tomorrow we are going to go load up the new trans and try to scavenge the shift linkage and shifter. If we get that done in time, we will tackle the trailing arm.

Seems the Buttercup crew is so busy, I will post pics to entertain you for now!

It does look like the arm is bent. After inspecting the ear tonight, I found no cracks or abnormalities.

Here are those #'s:

Son why is there only four cylinders ?, hahaha

Replace the arm and align at home . I used this method at the Lemans Classic on a greenwood corvette the frenchy's all laughed and we kicked there ass.
Later he said I thought you were crazy with string.
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=...0n0l0bx4b-MztDQ

Man you guys tore right into this one! You will be ready in no time! Hey thanks for posting the pics. Those guys working on Buttercup have their hands full. No time for click click!

I stole the alignment link and posted it in the build off thread. I'm sure Ed has done it a million times but I thought it my prove usefull.

Thanks very much for the documentation. I'll have to study this to see what I can learn from it. Most interesting!

Plenty of progress today. We went over to scavenge off of my parts car at my brothers house. We nabbed up a 2.0 and sideshift trans. We also found all of the linkage and a shifter! I was worried that I would'nt have all of it.
We got the new trans cleaned and drained and installed the pilot bearing. Also got the old tailshifter engine bar and brackets off. Pretty much all we have left is to get the sideshifter engine bar mounts off of the 2.0 and swap the shifter out.

Where is the best place to buy Weber gaskets (I just need the top / air filter side gaskets)?

Also, does anyone have a spare 1.7L cooling fan in good shape? Dad's was missing four fins. Nothing like a good 12% loss in cooling!

Can anyone verify that the 1.7 and 2.0 fans are the same and are marked the same?

Looked on The Bird, seems they are both timed the same...I have a 2.0 sitting here with a real nice fan on it.

Nice find Eric!

I'm sure dad will be thrilled when she gets all cleaned up. Very very early 914

The fans are all the same, just marked differently. But since the 1.7 and 2.0 use the same timing, they are totally interchangeable.

Make sure you get the motor mount bar and associated stuff from the later car as well as the side-shift linkage. All of the linkage, even the gear shift lever.

--DD

Thanks Dave! That is pretty much what I figured about the fans. I will be posting a very informative post up here shortly about fans. I found out quite a bit.

We have everything needed, just waiting on the bushings and motor mount bolts to ship.

Today I brought back the bellows thermostat and flaps that had been removed from this engine. I also installed two underbody flaps, seems this car was too early to have them. We drained and refilled the "new" trans and got it on the engine. We also pulled the fan and the motor mount brackets off of the donor engine.

I am sure a bunch of other stuff that I am forgetting.

They didn't want me at the Buttercup build because I make a mess!

Nice work Eric!

Thanks Rick! This has been a blast for both dad and I!

Nice find, enjoy the build. These are the only cars I know that go up on jack stands as soon as we buy them. I gues it is part of the fun owing a 914. New springs & shocks, front struts, new bushings, new seals, rebuild brakes. weather stripping, interior, and the list goes on......

Thanks Geezer!

We got the motor mount rubbers in last night, so I mounted the engine bar and the fan housing. It looks like the next step will be a valve adjustment and to get the tins and carbs on! She should (*should) be up this weekend!

Valve adjustment done, tin back on, wiring coming together!