I had every intention of making an introduction video, but I found that I had ruined my wide angle lens trying to film some cool shots of grinding. So while I'm waiting for the new lens to be delivered, I will go with this novel:
I bought the car about a year ago with the shortsighted intention of throwing it back together and having a driver until its turn came for rustoration. I bought the car and a carload of parts from a guy in Dallas who did some really shady work and an incredible job hiding other rust; magician style he distracted with his obvious poor work. The drivetrain was out of the car and registration said it had been sitting for 12 years, so I don’t know what made me think I could get it driving in a month… Soon after buying the car, my daily driver VW went down and needed a bunch of work and Uncle Sam gave me orders to move 800 miles. I fiddled with the 914 now and then, mostly just probing for rust, but focused my attention on prepping my other projects and VW for sale, knowing I could only bring one car with me and it had to be rolling so I couldn’t really tear into it. I’ve been here in the new, much smaller shop since June and have been slowly tearing into the 914 between honey-do new house projects, new job training, and getting the new shop in order.
As we sit now, the car is on jackstands with the rotisserie acting as additional bracing, the engine and trans are under a workbench, the bigger pieces of the car are using the extra bedroom (the one my wife says needs to be vacated when we get pregnant) and others in boxes in my closet. Tearing the car down, I’ve found almost everything worse than I expected. The gas tank is pretty nasty with rust, all 4 calipers are locked up and the wheel bearing grease congealed. Removing the bumpers I found some evidence of prior damage and filler. Further probes into the longs found some rust on the driver side, and the passenger side nearly shot. The hellhole was a known problem, and turned into a chasm. I haven’t really dove to much into the floor, but found rust around the firewall and under a seat mount. The good news seems to be in a relatively dry trunk and pedal area.
My project’s Big 5 jobs are: 1) Rust repair. 2) Body work and a complete repaint. 3) Complete overhaul of the brake system, bearings, CVs, getting the window to work and stuff like that. 4) Engine rebuild. 5) Customization: wart removal, interior work, and an attempt at making custom made bumper tops.
In this build off challenge I face multiple fronts of challenges: 1) I grew up helping my Dad fix VWs, redid a Triumph Spitfire in my early 20s with his help, and have done numerous small projects over the years, but this is my first full rustoration on my own. 2) I have a severely limited budget. I am active duty Army, and everybody knows that NCO paychecks leave much to be desired. 3) I’m often short on time. My current assignment is as an instructor requiring me to work 10-12 hour days and 50-60 hour weeks. 4) I have a bum knee that makes it almost impossible to crouch and am fighting a shoulder issue that makes working overhead painful (praying for no surgery). 5) Nothing but the windshield and fine machine work like the heads and crank will be farmed out, I’m doing this on my own.
Well this is where we are starting, and honestly, who knows where we’ll end up. I haven’t really decided on color, engine, or upgrades, though I’m leaning towards keeping the 1.7 Liter Fuel Injection unless a good deal on another engine arises. I’m also thinking of keeping the car black but going minimal chrome, but who knows what the good idea fairy will deliver. I hope you enjoy the journey as much as I do.

Some more pics to show where we are starting. Yeah, I have a month's head start on the challenge, but I don't think it'll help. I will also say that if anyone has any requests for photos, stories, explanations, or what not, just let me know and I will do my best to oblige.

First, thank you for your service, it is greatly appreciated!

Hang in there. My car was in similar state when she got dropped off in my driveway. I have put a ton of time into the project so far and I feel like I am far from getting her back on the road. BUT, just gotta take it one step at a time. Looks like you are doing a lot more invasive body/rust repair work than I am - I'm just too impatient and want to get the car back on the road Keep up the good work

Thanks! It's a lot more invasive than I ever intended...

its unfortunate but true that MANY car's are in similar state as yours
the owners dont yet know or arent brave enought to poke around under OE tar and below that "surface rust"
Looks like a good start.
It can all be fixed.

This guy filled, undercoated and PORed the shit out of places that were heavily rusted. Not so bad that your quick screwdriver probe poked through, but bad enough to need cut out.

Call me optimistic.... but the rust does not look that bad . It also looks like you have a good start on it.

I like the list you came up with and your priorities seem right. I think you are going to be fine. Keep posting the pictures - we love seeing them come together.

I agree, the rust isn't too bad at all. Every time I think the rust is bad, a new thread pops up that makes my car look mint. There are definitely competitors in this build off with way more work ahead of them than I have.

And my list of challenges proved accurate this weekend. On Saturday I drilled out 30-50 spotwelds, and on Sunday my right arm was almost nonfunctional... I just need to start using my left hand more and save the right for precision work.

Subcribe

I double up a pair of cheap cotton gloves and a pair of leather gloves over that to help deaden the vibration and keep my hands from going numb. Helps a little. I'll be commiserating with you on this build!

No need to worry about a head start. Just keep leaning forward in your foxhole and you will be fine.

It wasn't the most productive long weekend, though I still have another day... Friday I spent the whole day waiting for UPS, Saturday I taught my wife some of my family's secret recipes and worked on my own kvass recipe. Then today I worked to cut out the rusty parts of the inner long. Getting it detached without destroying the stuff up at the front was way trickier than I thought it would be. I'm trying something tricky up towards the front and hope it works. I'm trying to just move some stuff out of the way so I can slide the segment of the new piece into place and put it all back...

I just noticed in the pictures (then ran out to verify), but it's pretty rusty inside that cross member... what to do...

Tomorrow is wire wheel, some sandblasting, primer and begin to fab the pieces.

Felt extremely productive this weekend fabbing and welding in some pieces. I've ordered the internal rocker panel from Restoration Design, but the inner long piece is $300 and would be a huge blow to my budget, not to mention that I really only needed 20% of the panel... So here I am bending, cutting, grinding, and welding some 18 gauge sheet metal. The front piece has more curvature to it than you can see in the pic, but the weekend's biggest trick was the twisty piece that handles the spot where the floorpan has a little slope. I'm a bit concerned about the fabbed area not having the slopes and textures of the stock piece, but I guess even the factory slathered and covered the whole area with sealer...

Random extra info: My old, cheapo digital camera seems to have bought the farm, so I have to use the biggun. Some of these welds had to be done with my left (non-dominant) hand, I'll let you guess which...because I can see no increase/decrease in quality with either hand. I hope to go back and do some stitching this week. And note to others and future self: welding on the inside under the tube makes it impossible to grind... Raw video is currently being uploaded and I hope to make a video of the long's progress soon...

And on the front piece I drilled/ground out the oddly patterned rust that was part of the inner fender and used the subsequent holes to plug weld the new piece. I figured this killed 2 birds with one stone.

I thought I was to the point of putting pieces back on the car, but instead I removed and cut out more stuff! Pulled the cross member and seat mount to clean up some flaky stuff. It made me realize that I will need to buy a floor section from Restoration Design, but I'm going to try and finish up the long first so I can utilize the rotisserie for the floor. You can't see it in the pic, but the floor section where the triangle would be is gone, there are holes under the far right seat mount, and the other passenger seat mount was cut out...so another RD order is forthcoming.

And since I was in the spirit of cutting, grinding, wire-wheeling, and sand-blasting, I worked to prep the wheelhouse area for its replacement next month.

It was one of those tedious weekends of prep work that make you feel like nothing was done. But after looking at the last post I realize that the last 2 weekends were productive, even though my "2nd weekend" (2 days off midweek for Veterans' Day) was spent car shopping (we bought a 2009 Honda Fit with 55k miles for our 2nd, gas-saver, car).

Last weekend was spent getting the last piece of that inner-long made and welded in and some grinding. This whole week had the old seatbelt mount soaking in rust dissolver since I couldn't find the right sized nut. This Saturday was more grinding, some more little welds, trimming and welding in the seatbelt mount, and more grinding before a lot of cleaning. Today involved the panic moment that the cross-member and heater tube thing needed welding in before I could I could seam seal. So the tube got wire brushed and naval jellied before a painting and a hole patched with JB Weld.The cross-member got prepped and tack-welded in (I kept the floor part mostly loose for a future part of the project). I used wait times to seam seal stuff way inside the front part and stuff.

The inside of the long isn't pretty, but I figure it doesn't really need to be...The part in the passenger side could have and should have turned out better, but it's not too bad and won't need more than a skim of filler to make smooth. Carpet covers it anyways...right?!? haha

It's weird how parts of the heater tube look like overspray, but it's solid black except in the weldy areas which will need painted later. I also found that it's mounts were kinda weak and thin, so I took some JB Weld to assist the real welds in their job.

Also, word of advice to future me: Weld the long from inside the car and not inside the long under the front heater tube. You can't grind behind that pipe. Actually, just get a better paying job and just buy that whole piece from RD instead of making your fancy little patch panels.

I spent the whole weekend measuring and thinking. The next step is welding in the wheelhouse, so I figure there is no such thing as too much welding or thinking. I did trim little bits of the new RD wheelhouse (little bits at a time, kinda like digging a trench with a spoon) so as to compare how the pieces are going to go together.

I've found where the new pieces go... but I'm finding some of my confusion is on where exactly the passenger compartment's long piece ends and where exactly the long starts with its turn towards the inside.

Does the passenger compartment long ever angle? Or does it stay straight and then that turn is all on the engine compartment long piece?

Your going to support the doors prior to starting your welding right????

That chassis is going to be aeverely twisted if you dont...

Doors are braced, but I'm still concerned with some twist and droop. This weekend I developed a system of adjusting jacks, braces, rotisserie, etc to get the thing square on all 10 measurements I've taken. I'm still super nervous about welding time though. I'll prolly measure and adjust 1000 times.

After a weekend or two of measuring, fitting, and bracing, I finally welded a major piece in: the wheelhouse. It fit up pretty well and welded in well, though I definitely affirmed that I am more of a grinder than a welder. I really slacked on taking pictures...but on the other side of this picture is the outer suspension console welded back on. The other picture is the motor mount console being soaked with naval jelly or whatever it's called; I figure it's time to start prepping some parts...

Next weekend my mother-in-law comes to town, so I figure minimal progress will be made the next 2 weekends, but who knows.

I'm pretty nervous about welding in this upper long, this wheelhouse had plenty of surface areas for a solid installation, but for the upper long I'm really trying to find extra bracing ideas. I have so overlap things made for the bottom, but worry my welds could fail at the top. In some way I guess the suspension console will strengthen/stiffen the joint since the seam will be under it, but I'm thinking about adding some what will be ugly overlappers... I'm also trying to figure out if it will be necessary to add the cover to the RD piece like the factory...

I am disappointed in myself that I worked half days all last week and had a 4-day weekend but only managed to work on the 914 one day... My excuses are that I got an injection in my knee one day, spent 2 doing Christmas stuff with the wife (Die Hard marathon included), was sick 1 and straight up lazy another. So today was spent welding the scariest part back into the car after 8,000 measurements to ensure squareness and one of those half days at work spent talking to a coworker who was a licensed welder before he enlisted. So here it is, the engine compartment long welded in after welding in the wheelhouse without cutting the fender! The welds were ugly, but had perfect penetration, and welding in my little brace/strengthener/stiffener thing was mostly blind and done as a contortionist exercise (I missed a few of the holes). I also decided to use some pop-rivets on the underside one (it kinda weaves over and under) to hold the piece down where I couldn't get a good clamp on.

On another note, you can see where I made my zig-zag cut. I did this to keep as much original metal as possible and also because I theorized that the added edge area allowed for greater seam strength.

Next week is another week of 3 day workweek of half days (another knee injection Wednesday though) and then another 4-day weekend that I hope is productive...

Bravo! I've been sitting in my engine compartment trying to decide if this was possible. What I'm hung up on is whether I'll be able to weld on the outer suspension console. Either way, any advice for posterity?

The outer suspension console would take some serious contortionist skills; I just had the bottom half pulled off and the topmost part of that was a little rough.

The biggest piece of advice I'd give (and wish I'd done) is that you want the inner long (passenger compartment side) to be perfect and solid where it will meet the engine compartment long. I also wish I had waited to put the metal heater tube in, that work room would have been invaluable.

So today's short work was spent making a little patch piece from 16 ga steel and then welding it into the long area where it meets at the firewall. I got a little overconfident with heat (some warpage), especially where I ran the little bead. I got great if not perfect penetration in my ugly welds with only a few burn throughs (exactly where I expected them) by the firewall's remains. At the top edge you can see my aborted "big idea" of welding along that edge...I realized it'll be really hard to grind there...
I feel pretty confident in the strength of these welds and the long in general, I guess the first real test will be when I hoist the girl up onto the rotisserie in the coming weeks.


I also finished up prepping the engine mount console and suspension console for their installations later this week. That will be followed by closing up the long/inner rocker; and then ??? probably a day playing with the rotisserie as a 914 merry-go-round.

This project feels like it is rolling now! I even priced my paint and primer today ($460), but know I still have a long way to go before that.

Question for the gurus:

When installing the motor mount console shelf thing onto the RD corrugated long, what did you do about the dead space divots?

It took a while to get it measured out and then held in place (I used little pop-rivets to hold it in place), but I put the motor mount console thing on. Super ugly welds (par for the course) but I was really surprised at the ones on the firewall side, which were done half blind with my left hand...

I spent the day off fitting and prepping the inner rocker panel for welding and fabbing/prepping a piece of the firewall. I was planning to weld them in, but elected to knock off early and watch some college football playoffs. Which means I will kick-off the new year with some welding and finally hoisting the 914 up onto the merry-go-round. I'm excited and can't wait! Next year will see a lot of the tedious work, but this is where the build really kicks in. I meet my surgeon about my shoulder on Monday and hope it doesn't take me out of the garage too long... It'll really suck having something around a month off work and not be able to spend it in the garage...hopefully I can pull some light duty. Serious pics to come tomorrow, a major corner will have been turned!

Looks like you decided not to make a layer to go over the inner wheelhouse. How did you decide?

Hope the shoulder mends up well. Doesn't look like it's slowing you down much.

I debated it for a while and wondered how sturdy I could get it regarding the mounting of the motor mount console and suspension console, but the decider was that I saw Cary didn't so figured I was good to save some time, worry, and sheet metal.

Today was a big day in that I closed up the passenger side long! I tried a different weld-thru primer and had some splatter issues, and some burn through problems... I think I was a little excited.
But the really exciting news is that I got the dude up on the rotisserie and it didn't break in half! I then had to enlist the wife's help and we spent 4 hours trying to get the whole thing balanced. It's almost there so I haven't got to go full loop yet, only about 60 degrees each way, but after one or two more adjustments tomorrow it will be on like Donkey Kong. I can already tell that the rotisserie is going to make this job waaaay easier than my previous experiences.

Funniest part of the day was that I almost forgot to put the heater tube back in!

Non-car update:

No shoulder surgery to keep me out of the garage on the calendar yet! I Saw the specialist about my shoulder today. He doesn't think the chronic instability, weakness, lack of mobility, and dislocations are due to the labral detachments, but rather that the detachments are due to the instability and dislocations. He thinks I have some weird form of dhakjsdhlfkajhdg (some big word I didn't catch) nerve palsy that causes certain muscles and muscle parts to not work and therefore let my shoulder (mainly shoulderblade) go haywire. It could be worsening and partially intermittent, which is why sometimes my arm doesn't swing when I walk etc. (After physical therapy or heavy work it won't swing) I have a bunch of crazy tests coming up, and from the talk I'm extra glad I have full health coverage.

Get a second opinion so you don't waste a lot of time and money going down the wrong road for your shoulder.

Rich

I'm active duty Army so it won't cost me a thing except my actual arm! hahahaha

But seriously, I'm really glad I'm at a small post and get referred to civilian doctors; everybody's heard the stories about Army doctors.

Nice to see your working through the process in spite of the arm.

This was the month of health chaos. First I missed a weekend of work because I was sick, then a weekend because the wife was sick, and then I missed a Sunday and another weekend with the eye injury. I think I only actually had about 3 days working in the garage. In those days I got the inner rocker panel welded in (as seen above), got the 914 fully up on the rotisserie and stripped some more stuff off of her, cleaned off some surface rust, roughly trimmed the excess on the rocker/floor/long seam (pictured below), and rehabbed and welded the whatever that thing is called back into place (pictured below) using some scraps of trimmings where needed--this is whose grinding tried to take my eye. Here's hoping for a better February.

It was a long weekend but more in-laws were in town... but I still found some time to hit the workshop. It still wasn't the most productive time because I realized after it was too late to buy more that I was extremely low on welding gas. So I used my little bit of gas to weld the little piece on the long to flush it up, and the little piece on the front engine shelf. Then I got the floor cut out and all sized up to receive the new panel from RD, cleaned up the pictured rust and did some other random cleaning up around the car. This made days 2, 3, and 4 that I actually got to work on the car in 2016 since illness and an eye injury sidelined me... But the best 914 news of the year was finding that the inside of the tunnel was clean and 99% clear of rust!

Funniest moment was that the only thing I screwed up when cutting were both of the old fuel lines, which were rotted and needed replaced anyways.

Other pics

We picked up a new class of students this week so it was a short, 1 day weekend. So I spent it getting the floor piece ready to weld in, but then realized it would be easier to fix the lower firewall pieces with the big hole there, so I fabbed and welded in some pieces. Just a note and a question: My plan is to get the pieces welded in and a quick, rough grinds, I'll then go back for finishing/cleaning/prettying during paint prep--one area at a time. Is that a bad idea?

This weekend's goal was to tack the floor section in and finish making the firewall. I actually met my goal. Due to the curve at the bottom of the upper firewall, I found it easier to make it in sections rather than one big piece. I decided to make a photo sequence of my grinding technique: I first hit it with the grinder to get the tallest, toughest spots, then I switch to a rough grit flap disc and work my way to smoother discs. There are still some holes to be filled and grinding to be done, but that will come later when it's time for finishing/paint prep.

But the big event of the weekend was getting the floor section welded in. I had it fit and ready to go from last weekend, so it was just a matter of lining it all up, getting the edges even, etc. The big task was at the corner where the triangle will go; it stuck up a few mms and almost a cm at the corner. However, starting the plug welds at the other end I found I could hit the next hole's area a couple times with the hammer and it would go down flush all the way down the line. For some reason I threw a couple extra welds at the edge...and wish I didn't..they're extra ugly.

The story begins 2 weeks ago... I spent that Saturday grinding the welds that hold the new floor section in, and it went wonderfully. So I decided to weld the seat mounts in, which worked out well too. I then decided the next logical step was to weld in the little reinforcement plate underneath. It was now Sunday and I had been in the garage for about 20 minutes fitting the piece in place when I noticed a completely separate area could use some grinding... 2 seconds into grinding my bad shoulder gave out causing me to drop the grinder which caught my finger on the way down, taking an enormous chunk of it with it. Over an hour later I still couldn't get the bleeding to stop so we went to the ER where they had to cauterize the wound since there was no flesh to stitch.
The real horror was upon arriving home to find that our 11 year old dog had lost the use of her back legs (she spent a night at the vet's the week before and had been having all sorts of issues) it seemed that she had another stroke... She died peacefully a few hours later and only a few hours after that I was taking my students to their field training exercises.
Cutting to the chase, spending a week in the field with my wound was a bad idea and I developed a rather wild infection deep in the finger (but luckily not the bone). So here I sit with a well healing but oddly swollen finger and antibiotics that give me explosive diarrhea watching March Madness. I may not even be allowed in the garage next weekend, which would mean 3 weekends in a row. After the eye injury and now this, added to the fact that I'm taking the entire month of April as vacation to visit family; this build is waaay off schedule, but better late than never right? Bonus picture of the dog.

Really sorry to hear about your dog! Looks like a really loyal part of the family.

Hope your infection heals soon!

Best wishes! (Your metal progress thus far has been fantastic!)

Sorry about the loss of your dog. I have one that has been on her last leg for over a year now. Every time I wake her up in the morning, am surprised when she gets up!
Keep plugging away.

So it's been a long time... After the finger injury's infection caused a bout of pneumonia, and then the going on vacation for the entire month of April, it was really nice being home in the garage the last 2 weekends.

Last weekend, APR 30-MAY 1 was only a one day in the garage weekend. That Saturday was spent with the newest addition to our family: a little girl we found at the dog pound named Muttley. She's an interesting mix: German shepherd and greyhound... Then Sunday I finally got the little floor support piece welded in, a job I started in early March which almost claimed my finger. Then I welded in the little jackstand triangle thing. All of this was pretty straightforward work so I feel like I had to have done something else too...

This weekend was spent on one major job, a job I thought was going to be minor. I had about a 4" x 4" hole, but when I went to weld in the piece that was part of my RD replacement panel I found that its bends and shapes didn't really fit and the surrounding metal was unweldable and I had to cut a lot more out. I salvaged some of the piece, but the rest needed to be fabbed. I'm extremely proud of the work and the technique and wish the photos could better show the compound curves accomplished. Here's how I did it: I would weld one edge of a small piece, then bang another edge to meet its mate, weld it, then bang the next, etc, one piece and one edge at a time. I used no hammers, but only dollies for the banging since they were easier to wield in the small spaces.
It was kinda funny that on Saturday I ran out of welding wire, and then today (Sunday) I ran out of gas, so I did some work organizing the garage, removing the heat shield and targa pad, and other little jobs that would eventually need done anyways... It's just funny that what I thought would be an easy, 2 hour job turned out to be a crazy, 2 day job. It still needs some finishing, but that will come later when it's time for primer prep.