I just bought the furniture dolly and with the help of PP's article, I'm going to go pull the engine out of the 914 in my avatar. Never done this before, should be interesting. Gonna give the engine a breeze through to look for anything questionable, maybe swap it with a 1.8l that I was going to put into my beetle, install a working alternator that I just won on the bay, and go from there. I'm finally done with school, don't have a job yet but once I obtain one (hopefully, anyone want an EE/ME?) I am going to try to start as late as I can. With any luck I'll be able to get this 914 in solid shape in the time that I have free. Just a fair warning that questions may be pouring in from here on out.

Ahhh, a summer filled with no responsibilities and working on my 914, can it get any better?

-Chris

yes!

"while you're at it" you will find many more "little" things you want to do to the car, "improvements" and such, and pretty soon, this one "summer of love" will turn into 2 or 3 or 4 summer of "she's still sitting on jackstands, but i swear i will have her ready for next spring!" ...

BTDT Andy

Oh I've already discovered more than a summer's worth of problems just today. I got the engine out, but also did some poking around in questionable areas and found that they were a lot worse than I though. Once the engine was out I also found some more areas of rot that I didn't know about. Plus I knew the drivers side rear fender needed to be replaced, but it seems like the passenger side could be a hack job too. Oh well, I wanted to learn how to weld, looks like I'll get the opportunity.

As you can see from the pic, the engine made it out successfully. I actually think it was easier to take out than the engine in my Beetle. This next picture shows that both of the inner CV boots were hanging off, dunno how long they were like that but looks like I'll have to take them apart and check them out. Odd thing is that the flanges that the CV boots clamp to are not circular, the PO somehow banged them out of shape. Also, that glossyness around where the tubes exit the bulkhead I think is painted over seam sealer, should be interesting to see what is underneath there. The PO obviously did some repairs on this car, but it seems he used an arc welder from the quality of his welds. And he didn't grind them smooth.

Here is the area under the battery tray. More seam sealer in this area too. The console looks great though. Out of curiousity, what all is considered the hell hole?

Another picture of what I believe to be the hell hole area. Looks okay, but it obvioulsy has been recently repainted, and seems to be a bunch of seam sealer. My concern is that if the PO didn't grind and rustproof his arc welds, the oxidation contained within them from the welding process could be rearing its ugly head underneath all that white (well painted black) goop.

oops, here is the pic

Here is a pic of the passenger side rear fender well, red circle is the backside of a repair that wasn't finished off very well, and the white circle is a rust out that I found out goes clear through the long below it. The long had a gold ball sized glob of epoxy filling the hole, dunno what the PO thought that would do.

Here is another pic of the pass side rear fender well. Circled in white looks like a whole bunch of rivets/ holes with plastic body filler poking through. Yikes! Gotta strip the area where the sail meets the fender and see what is really going on. Below that is what looks to be a tube that should empty into the engine compartment, but it is cut off before it does and the engine compartment doesn't have a place for this tube to connect. And the door doesn't have a vent tube running through it either. My guess is that this fender has been replaced with one from a later car? This is a 71.

dammit, here is the pic

Here is the sexy hole in the long. Gross, huh. Its amazing how bad things look once you start poking around. As you can see, the PO replaced the pass side floor and used an arc welder again. Also obvious in the pic is the rotted jack point. Well at least the lower part. A bunch of drit and crap came out of there when I opened up that hole.

Here is the drivers side of the engine compartment, all in all looks pretty good. Doesn't seem to be any overzealous seam sealer usage.

As you can see, more bullshit rivets/body filler poking through. But this fender is f-ed anyway so I was planning on replacing it.

Here is the driver's side long and floorpan. The drivers side pan is obviously beginning to go, but I think I can just weld in a bit of a patch panel instead of doing the whole thin. Jack point is rotted also. The long itself seems to be in great shape. Actually most of the passenger long is in good shape except for at the rear.

you might want to open up the longs and see how they look from the INSIDE ...

there's a old thread here on the board where brad shows how to cut and where to drill the spotwelds out.

Andy

So those are my finding for the day. A good deal more work than I anticipated, probably not worth the money I paid for it, but I will definitely know how to weld by the time I am done with the car. I'm certainly not upset that I got it, I am looking forward to the challenge. Not sure what to do tommorow, start looking over the engine or look more into the rust issues.

On the good side of things, before I started taking everything apart, the car ran and stopped well, all of the accesories worked, didn't shift so hot, but the structural components of the car all seemed to be in good shape. I guess that last one could change. I'll keep you all updated.

Now I just gotta get my girlfriend's dad's mig setup. Mmm, free welder.

Yup, you've got the standard rust repair ahead of you. Good luck! And have fun with that welder.

You answered your own question about the "hell hole". It's the passenger side engine shelf at the front corner of the engine bay.

Well Summer turned to fall, and fall is quickly turning into winter. Haven't gotten a whole lot done on the 914, got a job though and got a t4 engine into my Beetle instead so all is not lost. With the Beetle squared away, now I am devoting my free time to repairing my 914. It is a bit of a mess, but I wanted a project to learn how to weld on, I will certainly have that opportunity here. I plan on keeping track of what I do here, and probably posting questions too. First, here is the part of the scab plate and the huge chunks of epoxy a PO used to fix a rotted out hell hole. And I thought the hell hole was fine . . .

Here is the scab plate removed and the rusted metal underneath cut away.

Here is a shot down the long. Hello hello hello

Here tis the inner bulkhead, the pass. side floor pan has been replaced poorly by stick welding, a scab plate was used to connect the inner bulkhead to the new pan, I've removed it here. Maybe I should buy stock in resotration design?

Does anyone know if their rear floor pan piece has the tunnel integrated into it?

more BS scabbin

outer bulkhead

Finally, the door brace I made. So far I suck at welding but it certainly is fun.

I mean, here it is.

Shows the nice respray, didn't even pull the aluminum plates to do it. Can't wait to get the whole car back to that tangerine, I really dig that color.

Thats all for now.

looks more like "Signal Orange" to me ...

is your original paint code "L 20 E" ???

Andy

hmmm, it almost looks like your car was hit at one point ...

that whole fender has a different color (on the inside) than the original body.
looks like the whole thing was replaced once, which usually indicates a accident repair ...

make damm sure the tub is straight before you dive in too much!
Andy

Both drivers and passengers side fenders from the bottom of the sail panel down were riveted in along the base of the sail (can see that in the pics), and brazed in along the seal channel. Both from the same dark green car too. No other signs of metal replacement, most anywhere else the original orange is still present. Except part of the front quarter, but that looks like it was repired well. Can I check the chassis straightness just by using the measurements on this site? What is a good measuring device? Doesn't seem like a tape measure would be accurate enough.

I'll have to check on the paint code, where can I find it? Unless the car was completely stripped at one point and resprayed, that orange is the original color.

-Chris

tape measure works just fine if you have 2 people ...
it helps to have one that shows MM as the units are more granular.

the paint code should be stamped on a little black plate riveted on the front drivers side door-jamb ...

Andy

LMAO !

Man i feel with you. This is an realy terrible rusted car.
And i thougt mine was in bad condition!!
I hope you know that it will cost you much time, money and nervs to solve it.
Maybe you find a better one?

I wish you success for your project.

Michael

ehh, its not so bad. Not too many good teeners here on the east coast for cheap, I'll get this one to work out.

Got some stuff done. Fender off, did some cleaning.

here tis.

gettin clean

wow. you're a glutton for punishment.

kevin

hell hole up towards the console, a lot of surface rust but the metal is solid, do you think I can just clean up and POR it? I stuck my finger in the hole in the console and there is a lot of dirt in there (not rust), any way to get that out without cutting stuff?

more surface rust and some a little more than surface.

some funk but looks like good metal behind. Gotta do some cuttin.

tools for today

Guess I didn't make myself clear, got the fender off about a week ago, did some cleaning today. It took me a damn long time to get the fender off, a PO decided to braze a replacement fender on along the door jamb and along the weatherstripping channel in the trunk. Oh yeah, it was also pop riveted on along the sail. Below is the pic of the carnage resulting from having to get all that braze out, I'm thinking about cutting that whole strip off and replacing it with metal from a junk trunk lid that I have (should have close to the right contour). So if you ever think about brazing something on, think about the people down the road that may have to deal with that repair. Will you please think about the children???!?

Anyay, I have to give some respect for the wound wire wheel in the picture above, that thing absolutely dominates. The paint, seam sealer, and surface rust stripped off in the after picture was done tonight in abotu one half hour . . . not too shabby. My arms are feeling it though, better than going to the gym. Once that thing gets spinning it is tough to turn it from side to side, just like the old spinning bike wheel experiment. Tis a lot of rotating inertia.

-Chris

oh, and if you are wondering why I am not working directly on the hell hole, it is because I am keeping my fingers crossed for some sheet metal from R-D for christmas.