Replaced the firewall pad with a rubber backed one. I had installed the other one backwards and after the little fire on the first start last September, it was not looking as good as it could have.
Also got a catch can from Tangerine Racing and installed it on the firewall. Cary put nut zerts in so we can remove it if needed in the future.

Final connection checks and communication with the microsquirt before reinstalling the engine for the final time. Had a few issues with confusing info and the set up. We had to change the power routing to some of the relays but Mario walked us through it and remoted into my computer to help get the initial setup done and get things calibrated.

2 steps forward 1 step backwards. Got everything in place, but lost power in part of the relay box. Putting everything in the original ECU box sounded like a cool idea to start with. Now it is not so cool. Big PITA to get to it when needed and when we closed it back up, on of the power jumpers came loose.

Finished getting everything hooked up mechanically so that I could take the car up to Monroe Washington to see Mario in the morning at the Dub Shop. Left about 10 PM and got in to the hotel at about 3:30AM.

Got to Mario's shop at about 8AM and got to work. He started with getting the innovate controller calibrated and then we closed up the ECU box and hung it back on the battery tray.

Once everything was communicating properly and in place, we started pressure testing the fuel system. Pressure on the gauge was reading about 70 PSI and we had a little leak on one of the fuel rails. Got the pressure on the regulator turned down got pulled off the fuel rail to see what the issue was. The fuel injectors had a change on them where the groove that the retaining plate holds onto does not go all the way around them so is keeping them for him being able to seat all the way. We fixed that issue and they were still leaking.

To make a long story short we spent the next few hours sorting out fuel leaks and ended up replacing the fuel rail with one that Mario makes himself instead of the resold ones. His is way cooler and puts the fuel lines on the same side, making the engine bay tidy

Time for the 1st start.
This is how cool it was. The throttle cables was not even hooked up, but the car started and idled on the base tube that he had loaded!!!

We did a few road tests and tunes and got the car doing well enough to be road worthy for West Coast Rally

Made it back to the barn to get the flapper boxes hooked up as it looks like there may be rain in the forecast.
Jack made it out to the barn! It was good to see Super in-law starting to feel better.

Guess I haven't posted in a while on the progress. We did get the car running for West Coast Rally

Put about 1700 miles on it very quickly. Developed a fuel leak at the front.

We pulled the tank and had it opened and re lined.

Entered the car in the Forest Grove Concours de Elegance. Ended up taking a trophy home

Cary and I went to Seattle for the weekend to attend a vintage aircooled show

Wow. Lots of cool cars and congratulations on the trophy.

Thank you.
We also took it to something called WEKFEST while we we in Seattle that was supposed to be an all makes car show at Century Field. It wes actually and major show for tuners not teeters. Lots of cool JDM stuff but not as cool as the aircooled show the day before.

man that looks awesome!! which back pad is that that you installed?

Thank you!!
The one in the car is just perlon over the thermal formed back pads that we make:
https://shop.914rubber.com/Back-pad-NEW-PLA...m?categoryId=-1

The one in the engine bay is our firewall back pad:
https://shop.914rubber.com/Porsche-914-Fire...m?categoryId=-1
I have tons of photos if you need them for your install

Thank you sir

So today was the day. We got the car on the dyno for some fine tuning. So here are the results. Not bad for a 1.7. So much fun to drive

That is at the wheels! I don’t think you would see that much at the wheels for a stock 2.0.

Matt, what back pad material is in your car?

Mike that was at the wheels. It's a 1.7 with a crazy radical cam.

I haven't given any updates on this car it a very long time so I thought I'd report in on how its doing.
This is my favorite car to dive and the most reliable with the micro squirter system. The only issues that I have had was with about 1,700 mikes on the build, the engine started having issues requiring a few tows back to the shop. It was something to do with the micro squirter system and it was difficult to figure out exactly what was going on. We ended up pulling the motor and replacing components like the hall sensor. It turned out to be the #1 pin on the plug (power) into the ecu. We did not put any service loops in the wire and it was being pulled on by the heat shrink on the harness. It was just enough to loosen the female side of the connection. All it took was a nanosecond of power drop and the system would go back into the start up sequence and kept cooking the waisted spark.
With that fixed it has been nothing but fun.

About a month ago I took the car down to LA and loaned the car to Sung Kang. Sung played Han in the Fast and the Furious movies. He has decided that he wants to build 914's at a Singer level and has lots of very cool ideas. He is interested in learning all about the 914's and the ethos of this "under dog"

He picked up a 914 to start learning about the cars. However it was a V8 swapped 914. I suggested that he should probably start to learn about them from a well sorted out car and then expand from there. The next thing I wanted was to help understand the 914 community and 914world.com. There are so many cool builds that have been done and there are some great people in the community who can help. So we took the car down to him and introduced him to a few people like Marty and Matt at MSDS @Maltesefalcon.
We then left the car with him for about a month.

Last week I got a call from my friend JP in Vegas that was getting tired of the 116 days. He needed to head up to Washington to take care of some business and he was thinking about driving up the coast. Then I spoke with Sung and he had picked up another 914 and was done with my car. So I jumped on a plane and grabbed my car to drive back up with JP.
Before getting on the road, I stopped by to see Magnus Walker and we took the car out for a hot lap around downtown LA.

Awesome story. What did Magnus think?

He was impressed. We filmed it for a project that I am working on.

that is soooo cool!!!!! big fan of the F&F franchise, tell him he has fans here and stoked for his return and his character's "resurection" in #9!! hope he gets into the community here and so cool for you to help show him the ropes with his 914 adventure. I dont think he will be drifting the 914 much unless that v8 swap car is what he's driving.
so aka Han/Sung!!!

Anytime we can raise the profile of the 914 to bring it further into the pubic eye, the better for us. I am tired of people asking, "Is that a Fiat?"

Mike I followed your whole ride on IG. So epic.

Thanks for sharing that.

Sung did make it up to West Coast Rally with Glen Cordell and a few friends. He had a great time and enjoyed the community. It was a special event for him to bring his own 914 to an event and like many of us going to our 1st 914 rally, he was working on it right up until (past) time to leave for the event.
He was able to drive it up from LA to Santa Rosa (North of San Francisco) with no issues.
I took some drone shots, so I couldn't resist putting this together. (Just wish the hood was down)

Well Sung will definitely be raising the profile. He has some pretty big plans for the 914's He plans on building 10 or 11 Singer level 914's that will have his own signature touch. They are going to be pretty amazing cars and will get a lot of attention, so you may want to grab another 914 while you still can because I think that things are going to get interesting.

Thank you brother, that actually means a lot to me. I tried to share as much as I could from the road but I got some epic gopro shots as well that I will endeavor to make a cool watchable video out of.