Well with the holidays & some purchases I made(Mainly my enclosed car trailer). I needed to come up with some extra cash. I decided to part with my 16x8 fuchs. I knew they would sell quick & until I add flares they are to much wheel really for my narrow bodied car. So I started my day by swapping some wheels around. I put my 16" phone dials & pulled my fuchs. They have powder coated grey centers with polished lips. I do like the look of them but I must admit not as much as my fuchs . It's all good though as I can pick up another set of Fuchs down the road.
So after getting them on I took the v8 for a spin. Weather sucked but it was nice to get it out & put it through it's paces. I still have no brake lights though. My brake light is stuck on in the car. I'll deal with it once I finish the LE though. So it is back under my carport with a cover on it.

Then I spent the rest of the day working on the LE. I finally painted the interior floor pans. I also am repainting both the front & rear trunks. The guy who painted my car just didn't do much work prepping the trunks. I had some rust bubbles. So I have been cleaning that all up & treating the rust that was there. After treating it I sanded down everything. Put down a primer coat & sanded some more. Another primer coat & things are looking good. The front trunk I also put a coat of the L80E on. When I got it painted I went in after & had them make me a few cans of the white in rattle cans. That is sure paying off now. So I put one coat on the front trunk. I did get some runs unfortunately . I'll have some more sand work to do. It is a little tough getting a nice even coat out of a can. Still hopefully I can get it looking good with some more sanding & another coat or 2. I just need to go a little lighter on the coats. I think I tried to put it on a little heavy. It was a good 914 day overall

Any tips on the paint work are appreciated

Brake lights stuck on usually means the washer on the brake pushrod is on the wrong side of the little arm on the brake light switch.

--DD

I just fixed that while diagnosing a few electrical gremlins on my LE.
Now I think I have to adjust the plunger arm
sort of OT but is there a spec on how much play there should be in the brake pedal?

I have no brake lights. The light on my dash is stuck on. The little arm should sit on the outside of the washer right. So when you push on the brake pedal the arm keeps constant contact right? If the arm was on the other side the arm wouldn't have any pressure & would not stay against the washer at all. Is that right?

Oh yeah I did replace my brake switch at the pedal with a known working one

there is an adjustment on the switch itself. p129, section 30, shown on fig 9.52 of your haynes. if you swapped out the switch this might be the issue.

I believe that is correct, but I don't remember exactly. I do know that I put it in the way that "seemed right" at first, and the brake lights were on all the time when I did. I believe the spring-loading of the switch is in the "lights on" direction, so without any pedal pushrod the lights would be on.

The light on the dash is a separate issue from the lights in the back of the car. They may have a common cause, but they are more likely to be separate problems.

Check your wiring diagram to see where the brake pedal switch gets its power. I believe that power goes through the switch to the lights, but I haven't looked at the diagram in a while.

--DD

Spraying color out of a can? You need to build up the basecoat. You should have used white primer. White over anything is a hard cover and causes you to put down thicker coats than you should.

You need at least 2 more coats to cover that front trunk. How hot are you spraying in? You need to get wherever your spraying at least 60 deg.

If you havent started the rear trunk, get a can of white primer to lay down first.

The brake light switch can be thought of in terms of a switch that turns the brake lights off. When you step on the pedal, it releases the switch, letting the lights go on.

Also, check for power at the switch. One of the two wires should be hot when the key is on. The other wire should flow to ground (although it'll have some resistance from flowing through the bulbs, so don't look for zero, just look for not-infinity).

Thanks for the tips Andrew. The temp is an issue. I am doing it out in my barn & it just doesn't get warm out there. So I am probably lucky to get to 50. I could load it in my enclosed trailer. I am sure I could get that warmer without to much trouble.

I will get some white primer as you suggested. That makes alot of sense. This paint stuff is all new to me.

Okay I am sure I have the arm in the right spot. I do need to check on the power to it. If I had the wires switched would it matter?

Regarding the bright lights (or bright light indicator):
I had the same issue with my 75 914 this summer when i bought it. Turns out Porsche went from a 4 prong head light relay to a 5 prong. Check the relay. If it is a 5 prong, there is a jumper wire you'll need to add if it isn't there from the 5th prong. This fix is listed in the AA Tech Tips (took me a week of checking wires and a sore back) but finally figured it out. My brights wouldn't change to regular lights because of it, and since the brights were on my fogs didn't work (which they aren't supposed to work with the brights on). Once I added the jumper, the regular and high beams and fogs worked as they should.

Hope that saves you some time!

Sorry but you misread my issue. Not a surprise as half the time I confuse myself . It is my brake light being stuck on(on my dash) & my brake lights not working that has me stumped. Although I did just remember I haven't hooked up my ebrake at the calipers yet. Would that cause one or both of my issues?

Nope.

Triple-check the wires up under the dash.

--DD

The wires heading to the gage with the light stuck on?

Yup. And the wires supplying the brake switch with power. Perhaps they got swapped around?

--DD