Hi - here are a few pics of my car which needs 'quite a lot' of work.

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The immediate problem I'm trying to solve is this - the drivers side door gap - at the forward edge.

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There is no adjustment that I can see (i.e. no shims on the hinge mount) which can only mean that the front wing (sorry, fender) is 'out'. As far as I can tell it is the original.

My questions are

1. Would it have left the factory like that ? I've read that tolerances were a bit slack by todays standards. The door gap on the drivers side is about 4mm more than on the passengers side. It hangs low by about 5mm when open but lines up perfectly when closed. There is no discernable play in the hinges. The door does shut with a liitle resistance but does not open and close as freely as the passenger side. Gaps on that side are a steady and even 2 to 3 mm front and back. Roll bar to windscreen frame dimensions are equal side to side within 1mm and do not change when the doors are open. The doors are the same size.

2. If it didn't leave the factory like that - what has caused it ? The car has had a light knock on the left front corner which I will show in my next post but the damage doesn't appear to extend any further back than where the inner wheel arch meets the bulkhead between the fuel tank and spare wheel well. The inner longs are completely shot both sides, the inner INNER longs are shot up to about 2" above the floor, the floors are fairly bad and the hell hole is good. I'll show all this with future pics.

3. Can I put it right and if so how ? Again - more pictures following will help you to decide.

Thanks in advance. The knowledge on this forum is priceless.

doesn't look so bad to me! Remember these were built in the volkswagen factory!!!

hard to say what is wrong, lot of things can cuase the door gap wrong.

i say get the car measured, on a rack if possible. need to see if car is crooked or not (colliiosn damage) or bent from rust (rockers gone) then see if it can be squared up. since you will be putting lots of time money and effort intot his restoration, i think it is highly important to determine how stright the car is now, before you spend more on it, then you will know what needs to be done.

if you were out in california, you would have a choice of better body shells, but since your car is probably pretty rare in teh UK, you may have to fix what you got, just make sure early on in the project you assure yourself the cars strightness with accurate measurements, then proceed to fix frm that knowledge.



best of luck!!!!

Generally that gap only gets bigger from some sort of accident damage. But from the pictures that looks pretty good.

This is the evidence of the damage at the front.

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As you can see there is no significant damage to the front valance ( although there has been a lot of subsequent corrosion outboard of the bumper mount) but the suspension mounting bolts on the right hand side of the picture (LHS of car) are almost vertical rather than angled. Quite an unusual impact would you say ? I bought the car in this condition so I don't know what caused it.

Next shot is inside the wheelarch - again note the suspension mounting bolts in the circle.



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There are very slight creases in between the pairs of black lines, a few even smaller ripples upward and forward of those but nothing at all aft of those areas. The four mountings for the steering rack bracket appear to be square, true and equal side to side, front to back and diagonally.

So the question is - is that impact related to this

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That does look like a wider than normal gap in the last pic. Go to the top of this page and go to 914 info where you'll find the body measurements.

Good luck and keep us posted as you save another one.

Also add your vin# to the database here if you havnt done so already. Thanks

Wow ! replies to my first post from McMark AND George. Thanks for the input.
Realred - you're right, there are probably less than 200 cars in the UK - it makes me weep to see what you throw away or sell for peanuts in Ca.
I've seen a few threads about crash damage having other than expected effects (Rick 918 sorted out a car which needed pulling downwards at the front and that squared it up in other areas) so I'm now thinking that is the first thing to tackle and see what happens. Has the frontal impact also pushed the front end sideways and therefore pulled the wing(fender) away from the door ? I'm off to do some more measuring and then to bolt a shackle to the garage floor.
As a back up plan I do have this

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but I'd like to solve the problem without using it.

One of the (many) next jobs is this

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This looks like evidence of replacement. Better picture please....

Yes, sorry that is a rubbish photo. That was this years sunshine in between the raindrops. What views do you need exactly ?

It sounds like you were eyeballing my thread. If not check it out in my sig. Be very careful before you start pulling the car around. I made some careful measurements and even a jig before I did my pulls. I also pulled at an angle opposite of the impact. You'll see I have 3 holes drilled in the bracket mounted on the suspesion point. I did that so I could adjust the angle of the mounting point as I pulled down. If yours is just bent you might just use a long bar with a plate welded to it that can pick up the suspension point. You could lift on the bar to correct the angle.

Yes John, thats the one. How do I pull at an angle opposite the impact if I don't know the original direction of it ? It appears to have been (mostly) upwards !

Also how do I print off the dimensions sheet from the info section ?

Just noticed the blue arrow - off out with the camera right now.

If it were me I wouldn't concern myself with that suspension point right now. I'd get those longs fixed to stabilize the chassis first.

I wouldn't put it on a Collette Bench or similar, until you get that rusty long fixed & any other structurally critical sheet metal areas which are likewise rusted out - or temporatily bracing it (in case the areas you need to rust repair are out too).

A local shop here in SoCal put a 914-6 on a bench to pull it straight before fixing the critical rust rot in the longs & floor pan (didn't think to do temp braces apparently either), & literally pulled the car apart when the tried to straighten the front end body damage!

Also, with that drivers side long in that shape, if your rear gap is similarly out-of-whack, then it could also be due to the sagging - in addition to or instead of the accident whack putting it out of line.

then again, you dont want to weld in new panels until ou know the car is stright, less they will be crooked when you straighten teh car latter.


cant put a new rocker in a bent car properly, it has to be straight first, just dont pull hard until you know what might break first.

Those stripes look pretty good...

Are you planning to put them back when you are done with the repairs?

You're not the first to say that. I do like them but I think I prefer the purity of nothing at all so - on balance - probably not.

One other reason not to have them is that it reminds me of a friend of mine who, many years ago, ran a repair shop. He always said that pin stripes were a good way to 'hide' less than perfect panels/paint/repairs. I'd forgotten that advice until I started taking paint off the right rear quarter and found half a ton of filler (is that the same as Bondo ?) - see the second picture at the top of this thread. Now I'm wondering how much more I will find as the paint and the stripes come off.

I am building a jig largely because of your thread. Similar to this one shown in Jeff Hails thread

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The problem I have is that I can only build it using the passenger side as a guide (assuming that is 'good') and then measuring that and reflecting it to create the drivers side. I think I need to create some sort of datum line down the middle to check that the passenger side is giving me good data. I'm starting to think that the whole front is pushed over to one side slightly.

Following advice from you and others I will do the longs first. That was my original plan but then I started looking at the door gap and was worried that the door would be harder to fix once I'd stiffened up the shell by doing the longs. Now I see how the door is mounted I realise that won't change and it has to be something to do with the front wing and/or the front end.

Thanks again for all the advice - that's the great thing about 'world' - there are so many people who have actually been there, done that so you know the advice is based on experience.

Another rusty one in the UK being brought back to life...

My 72 914 also have this uneven openings. And: the 914 was produced at Karmann in Osnabrueck for VW, like the bug and Golf konvertible, and the early 356.

You have a real challenge ahead of you. The door gap is the least of your worries. I would suggest you build as solid a platform as you can. Along with the suspension pickup point fixtures you should add something like this front to back. I built this for a Mercedes that was about as rusty as your car with a prior improper repair that I was battling. I would attach all thread to it so you can adjust out any sag.

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Which is by the way what I think is causing the gap issue on the driver side. I would take some tie wire and hang pieces about 12" long at both the right and left sides of the car in about 6-8-places. Longer in the front at the suspension pickup points and bumper mounting positions. Use known good places like the dounuts of they are still there, suspension bolts and bumper mounting positions.

Here's a quick and dirty example.

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Andrewb,
Quite the project you have undertaken. Certainly more than I would undertake! Best of luck to you sir!
By the way, I have never done anything of this level of difficulty, but I think it would be a good idea to make your jig fit a known good chassis and then bend yours to fit.? Maybe others will have more ideas.
Again, I wish you the best. Please keep us updated on your progress.
I also thought the stripes looked kind of nice.
Tom

Measure down the wire and set up a cross bar.

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The check all the locations with a level or better a pitch gauge. I have one I can show you if you need an example but they are used for doing roof estimates. The one I have is digital and only costs about $ 40.00 at Home Depot. You can get these on their web site too I would think.

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I think once you have the car set up on the fixture then check the pickup points you will see the drivers front corner is low. That's my guess.

Good luck!

I also think Rick is dead on. You can probably just put a jack on the driver front suspension point and just jack up a little and watch the door gap get better. Rick's idea with the wire seems real good and accurate though and you will need it to brace the tub before you start. I would like to know it is straight as possible and well braced before I start. I know it will move a lot but at least you will know what moved it after you start and be able to correct it. If it is straighter after you finish than it is now you have really done a good job, this will not be easy and I have done a lot of body sheetmetal replacements and would never try one this bad.

It depends on when the stripes were put on but what do they look like with a long straight edge laid under them compared to the good side? Does it show the door to fender misalignment? If it does that means it's happened since the stripes were put on. I really think it's the way it is supported on the blocks though.

That is something that's crossed my mind - the problem was finding somewhere strong enough to take the weight that wouldn't get in the way of the work I needed to do. I'm not totally happy with it which is why I'm working on a jig that will pick up on suspension points - the good ones !. My concern there is that by moving the supporting points outwards the car will sag in the middle so I'll have to build in some floor support as well. So I end up with the kind of arrangement Rick shows under that Merc. Thanks for that input Rick - much appreciated.

The plan now is -
1. More accurate and even support under the whole car
2. Sort the longs
3. Do I then do the front suspension or do I still need to do the floor first ?

Thanks again to you all.

Not had chance to take a better pic so here's another (bad) one from a few months ago of the area that you wanted to see.

All it shows is a big gap. I know I shouldn't have done it but enthusiam overcame ignorance and I drilled out the welds holding what was left of the outboard end of the valance to the wing and gravity did the rest.

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There is definitely no evidence of a previous repair. The odd thing is that the other side is in a similar condition but nowhere near as bad which is what makes me think that the front end - and specifically the valance - has been pushed sideways and the flexing of the welded areas between the valance and the front wings has then lead to the corrosion. I've noticed this before - a smallish impact leads to corrosion in surrounding araes and joins. I'm guessing that the deformation - even if only temporary - opens up microscopic 'cracks' in the surface of the metal and allows moisture to get in and get to work. Any metallurgists here who can confirm that theory ?

When I've built my underframe jig I will then construct something off that which will give me a car centreline - then I can check whether the car is permanently turning a right hand corner.

I would fix the floors and longs and fit the doors and targa top first then work my way out of the center box to the front and rear. Think of three boxes. The center being the most important as everything is squared off the vertical and both horizontal planes.

Message received Rick. Drivers side long is first up - after I've made a better frame/stand. I'll post again when I've made some progress,

It is done.