Even though I have never met any of you, I found the posts on here helpful as I have spent the past year wishing for a 914 and the past months looking for one. So to all my new mates, thank you for all the shared information, highs and lows of 914 ownership and inside info you have provided.

Today I went way, way out on a limb and took the plunge. I drove about an hour out and picked up a car that I knew had some issues, but considering my budget and the time spent looking I felt it was the car for me.

Living in the upper midwest brings its own drama to the car search process. Rust free cars of this vintage are few and far between or clearly out of my price range. So I thought "stick with a low mileage rust free body and anything else can be fixed". Recently, on a trip back from Chicago we found a 1970 1.7 with a claimed 57k miles without the documentation to prove the mileage. The guy inherited it from his father and had all intentions of keeping it but having 3 children in the past few years meant it had to go. It had been in storage for years - and he neither had the time or the budget to return it to its former glory. I was glad to help him out.

A non original color and aftermarket parts indicated some sort of episode - sure enough, bondo in a couple of locations. Considering the car used to be owned by a PCA member, was sitting on Yoko A008R rubber and had a harness replacing the seatbelt leads me to believe it was a track/fun can and the bondo is a result of a racing incident and not rust.

The good? Its pretty much rust free and solid, original engine with fuel injection runs good, and I drove it home almost 100 miles with little drama. The bad? once warm it doesn't like to idle and smokes a bit on decel. I also am assuming the transmission is non original as the speedo claimed 90 while the GF said hers said 75. We will get it up on a lift this week and start the process of going through it.

Thanks again to all who post here. I will try to research before posting, and keep dumb questions to a minimum.Click to view attachment

Welcome to the adventure!!

That's no fun, dumb questions are meat to feed the inmates around here. Without dumb questions all you'll get is erudite, well constructed, boring answers. 914World is constantly in need of straight men.

Impressive that you drove it home at speed. The inaccurate speedo may just be a matter of non-stock size tires. Nice looking car; congrats on finding it in the upper midwest. Lots of guys have tried and failed.

, welcome to the therapeutic madness , Bill D.

Welcome to the world... Litteraly

... The french guy...

And smart thinking. The rust repair can be a daunting task and many have walked away from their projects because of that. The drop to low idle after warm is the opposite of what most DJET owners experience, which is high idle. You'll want to do the standard tune up items as you don't know when or who did it last. If it's a '70 I doubt it has the idle control knob on the ECU but if it does rotate it CC (IIRC) one click at a time whilst adjusting the air mixture screw on the TB to raise your idle.
WARNING: There is no known cure for this sickness called 914 ownership. In fact it quite often manifests into ownership of multiple 914's. You've been warned.

I know a bit about this sickness. Cars are not a hobby, they are my disease. In addition to this there is the 1978 Ford Fiesta ITC SCCA racer, 2004 Mini Copper currently being converted to H Production SCCA racer, 1990 Mazda Miata 62k original miles, 1986 Mercedes 560SL way too many miles and a 2013 Subaru BRZ as a daily driver. Not a usable back seat in the bunch.