I love this thread!

Go speed racer, go speed racer, go speed racer Goooooo!

Nice progress man.

All that Glitters is not Gold

Imagine my excitement to unpack boxes from the plater today. For the most part, the parts look fantastic. There a few (less than six) parts that had some spots of encrusted rust I thought would dissolve off with pickling that didn't so I'll have to clean and re-plate those. The brake calipers didn't turn out as nice as I had hoped considering the prep work I did on them. They are okay, but concave recesses are dull or burnt and didn't take the yellow chromate. Makes me feel a little better about the trouble I had plating them. I'll keep an eye on them and will send down to Utah for real cadmium plating if they start to rust.

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but Houston, we have a problem. A BIG problem.

How many brake calipers can you count?

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I count 3 and a half. Not good! Not good at all!!!

And that's not all. Here are the parts I've fished out so far that were bagged separately and clearly marked to be finished in black zinc and baked. I'm pretty sure I can strip the yellow chromate off and turn them black without too much trouble, but more concerning is that I don't think they were baked because they were mixed in with the main batch of yellow zinc parts whereas the smaller batch of hardened parts I had bagged and labeled for baking were shipped back in a separate bag. If I'm right, the unbaked hardware includes those irreplaceable brake caliper bolts.

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Why didn't I just do those myself? I'm waiting to hear back from the plater. I'm hoping that missing caliper half is large enough it will be found and returned to me.

I hate plating!!!

It’s all a trade off. If you send it to Shawn at true 6, you get almost perfect results but you pay top dollar. I have an extra set of calipers on my parts car. It’s early so my calipers won’t help but I’m 99% sure the bolts are the same. 914 calipers are a dime a dozen so I wouldn’t sweat it. Keep moving forward.

Thanks Mark. I'm hopeful the missing caliper half will still turn up. I know finding a replacement isn't a problem, but then I have to clean it and have it replated which not only racks up cost, but will hold up getting the car off the rotisserie. It is what it is though.

My car is one of those oddball "in-between" 73s and has late calipers up front but one early and one late caliper on the rear. I'm missing one nose half from a rear caliper and the noses are the same between early and late. The differences are all in the back piece so either an early or late rear caliper will work for me. The bolts are quite a bit different from early and late though. Early calipers use the Ribe head through bolts with nuts, where the later calipers have hex head bolts (still 7mm) that screw into the threaded back piece with no nuts.

It will work out one way or the other.

In the spirit of moving forward, I've already started putting the shiny parts back together. First up was rebuilding the wiper assembly.

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P.S. Got sidetracked over the weekend and didn't get that second carb torn down and cleaned. Will get to it this week though.

If you purchased your car used, there’s a good chance that one of your rear calipers was a replacement. When I purchased my first 914, I couldn’t get it to pass inspection in NJ because the parking brake wasn’t working. My local garage ordered a set of rear caliper for $120 and installation I think came to $200. A lot of money for a 17 year old in 1983. They told me you couldn’t rebuild rear calipers which was pretty much the prevailing wisdom until PMB started restoring them commercially. I think they might still be sitting in a box in my Mom’s garage.

It's a possibility. The OO sold the car in '76 to the PO that I bought the car from. The 2nd owner seems to have kept every receipt she ever spent on the car. The receipts tell an interesting story as she was all over the eastern 2/3 of the continent. Someday I'll generate a map from the receipts but I digress. I didn't find any receipts for calipers but that doesn't rule it out completely. However, this car has a funky blend of early and late parts so mixed calipers isn't entirely inconsistent with the "use up the old parts" assembly that occurred for early-mid 73 cars. Just another thing that makes this car special

So the brake caliper fiasco continues. It turns out that the Postal Service is responsible for the missing caliper half. The plater returned all my hardware in the same boxes I sent them. At first I was annoyed because they were beat to hell and not fit for shipping heavy contents. It turned out to be a lucky thing though as on the side of the crushed boxes, almost hidden under gobs of tape were two stickers apologizing for the damage that occurred at the Milwaukee sorting facility. I had insured the boxes and have filed a claim so we'll see what happens.

In the mean time, I pulled out my like new caliper pistons and rebuilt the first front caliper. It really looked nice with new seals and piston retainers. It was also pretty easy to correct the color on the bolts. A hot soak in TSP degreaser strips yellow chromate right off without harming the zinc. Then a very quick (about 2 seconds) dip in dilute hydrochloric acid to reactivate the zinc to accept chromate and a 20 second dip in black chromate followed by drying overnight. Not too bad.

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Now just a matter of slipping those bolts in and torquing the halves together. First round of torque is a light 7 lbs. just as the bolts started to snug, they popped loose If you read my other thread on this, you already know that all my calipers are now FUBAR. Apparently too much time in the acid bath prior to plating eroded the threaded holes. Well ! That sucks. But if you read that thread, you also know that several saviors rushed to my rescue. @sixnotfour , @mepstein , @mb911 , and @Eric_Shea , I can't thank you enough. Thanks to them, I'll have a good set of cores to have plated and get back in business here. This time I'll do what I should have done in the first place... let PMB handle the plating.

Okay, moving on. I have a lot of bling to put back where it belongs.

Ignore the engine mounting bar, that still needs a refresh but I did manage to finally get the bolt that was rusted in out with a lot of MAPP gas and a BFH. Surprisingly, only quiet swearing under my breath was required which for me, is pretty much like a kitten purring.

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These nest pics are @defiantly 's fault. I was perfectly happy to hide tarnished clips and valves under rust encapsulator until he showed off his handiwork. After that, I had no choice but to do it right.

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Then I kind of ignored @914_7T3 'advice and went ahead and installed the air diverters. I may regret this when I install the air box after the exterior is painted, but it looks like they won't interfere and I think have the cables already routed before the box goes in will help. It looks nice now anyway.

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There's been something bugging me. It might be my imagination, but I have a feeling that a whisper campaign has been brewing about my shoddy workmanship. I'm speaking of coarse about this ugly elephant in the room.

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Yeah, this is much better. We can all relax now.

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Last thing is a little product promotion. I don't know how many people are familiar with this product, but I recommend you keep a bottle in your tool chest.

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This stuff is the bomb for minor repairs on cut or torn wire insulation and cable sheathing. I bitch a lot about the cramped quarters of my shop and this morning was a good example of why. In order to park the wife's DD in the garage, I have to turn the Porsche on its side and store the blasting cabinet, welder, tool chest, and other shit underneath. It's a PITA that wastes a lot of time before and after working on the car. This morning I rolled the blasting cabinet out to do some work and a sharp edge on the door caught the sheathing of my brand new genuine Porsche e-brake cable and sliced the sheathing open to expose the metal spiral. Yes, expletives did fill the air but luckily, I had my trusty bottle of liquid tape handy. It still needs one or two more coats, but the cable is once again protected and probably nobody but me will notice.

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I wound up using the liquid tape again later to repair where mice had chewed the sheathing on the Bowden cables for the air controls. Good stuff to have around and way better than electrical tape. Should be able to find it in the electrical section of any hardware or home improvement store.

Please. You know you're going to have to replace that ruined e-brake cable.

And as we all know, the lefts and rights mate for life so you'll need a pair. You won't want them hanging around your shop, reminding you of this horror story so just PM me for my shipping address...

[End of attempted humor]

Brent - your car really is an inspiration. Wonderful and complete documentation and so many tidbits of info that will help others bring their 914 back to (better than!) their former glory. Thanks for taking the time to do all that.

Yeah, you are right. Really, the only honorable thing to do is burn the whole car along with the cable.

I'm just glad this is the only blemish on this car. I honestly feel like a bit of a fraud sometimes. I was frustrated by feeling like photos of my welds and rust repairs made them look worse than they really were, but I have the opposite problem with the painted and restored parts. There is a LOT of shallow rust pitting as a testament to the car's rusty past that doesn't show in many of the pics. I don't mind. Scars tell stories.

I like the idea of restoring parts vs bolting on new ones, even if they have some scars.

Amen on that.
Shawn always spreads all your parts out when he receives them and takes plenty of pics of the parts.
With me he took before and after pics.
Used him a lot and never lost a single part (knock on wood).
And yes, he's very expensive.

Make sure you "test drive" this before you install.
I have mine put together slightly wrong and had to remove it to make the necessary adjustments.
You only want to put this (and the airbox) in one time.

Be very careful with the motor and arms if you bench test it.
That is a very powerful motor and I almost cut off the end of my finger as I had it in the wrong place when I tested it.
Lucky to not get hurt seriously. The tip of my finger hurt for over 6 months.

The yellow tag says, "Test Motor Before Installing" so I don't forget. Good to know about the potential guillotine effect. I'll do my best to keep my fingers free and wear pants!

In retrospect, you may have dodged a bullet there if you saw what @cuddy_k went through to clip the Bowden cables to the diverters after the air box was installed.

Just been catching up with your progress Brent. Lovely work and attention to detail. Keep it up!

Here's one from the "don't be a dumbass" file. I find the Factory Manual sometimes mysterious when it comes to finding torque specs. Weeks ago, I looked up the spec for the ball joint to strut bottom bolt and the manual lists 47 ft. lbs. I thought that seemed like an insane amount of torque for an 8mm bolt but thought maybe Porsche made that special little wedge bolt out of something magically strong. Just to be safe, I sourced the lock nuts and washer directly from Porsche since they weren't very spendy and I wanted to make sure they were up to the task. This afternoon I decided to finally torque down those bolts. The whole time I'm thinking 47 ft. lbs is insane. I even stopped to check the manual once again. Yep, "suspension strut bottom to ball joint" 47 ft. lbs. Alright then. I snuck up on it slowly and just when I thought I was there...

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Ha! I was right. 47 ft. lbs. IS insane. Why didn't I listen to my gut? Only then do I notice the spec is for a hardened M10x30 bolt. Might as well have just pulled a twenty dollar bill out of my wallet and set it on fire. I don't know what that torque spec is for, but it ain't this bolt. I never found a torque spec for that bolt so I torqued the other side to 18 ft. lbs. That seems like plenty.

Not much else to report for the weekend but need to end on a high note. Got the transmission mounts cleaned up and decorated with bling.

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Brent - "Tighten til it breaks". Just one more thing we have in common. I did the exact same thing installing my strut. You'd think after years of wrenching, a torque spec like that would trigger more/earlier investigation on our parts. But no.
Hey, at least I'm in good company!

Your build is looking awesome and it's looking like you're getting close! Any target ETA for when you think you'll take it on it's maiden (rebirth) voyage?

I always figured they worked just like a cotter pin on bicycle crank arm. You tap the pin and tighten the nut until it’s snug. The nut is holding it secure but not taking any real load. A little lock tight on the threads for piece of mind. It is a better design than the early pinch bolt struts that rely on the nut and bolt to keep the strut tight on the ball joint shaft.

Ha! Great minds screw up alike Progress on the car is deceptive. Remember that the exterior is still in primer so once I get the car off the rotisserie, I have a lot of work blocking and prepping for final paint. Deck lids and doors have yet to be touched. I think the most optimistic ETA is end of the summer but that seems pretty optimistic.

@mepstein carbs are boxed and in my car ready to drop off. I'll paypal you return shipping tonight or tomorrow. I have to work in the field today so don't know how much I'll get done today. Boohoo, I have to spend a day hiking around a ski resort for my job.

Anytime is good.
I’ll be hiking around a ski resort in VT next week but paying for the privilege.
WCR was great but driving and eating won’t get me back my girlish figure.

The 914 technical book calls for 22 nm = 16.23 ftb for the wedge bolt nut.

Son-of-a-B! I have a copy of the tech book on my desk. Never even thought to check it for torque specs. Who'da thought a booklet titled "Technical Specification" might actually include specs? Yes sir, I'm a dumbass.

I had to turn down the pressure a bit to save the plating. So not 100% but I’ll say 95+ and I’m pleased.

@bbrock

YES! You are the man! Thank you!!!

I didn't take a pic of the calipers, but you may like this one better anyways, caught him going up the post trying to get some bird eggs,,5 min. later there was another,...

That's cool! Nice gopher snake! Whose eggs was it after? Barn swallow?

I wish we had more snakes around our house. Lot's of western terrestrial garter snakes and an occasional common garter, but that's about it.

A 914World member stopped by on Saturday and we had a great visit. This time, I remembered to snap a pic so here is what @Superhawk996 looks like in the flesh! Really great meeting you in person Phil and I hope you stop by on your way home.

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My carbs came home yesterday. @mepstein did a fantastic job. I spent the evening putting them back together with all new seals, gaskets, accelerator diaphragm, and replated hardware.

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Hosed

I also received a piece of vent hose from URO yesterday. The hoses from the air mixing controls to the side vents are now NLA but thanks to help from the World, I discovered URO makes a variety of reproduction foil/paper hoses. I ordered this one for the side vents and it was plenty to do both sides.

911 211 274 00: 50 x 720mm (Tan)

It's a very nice reproduction of the original. Here is one piece after cutting and pre-bending.

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And the other side installed.

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Quite a change handling these hoses without them popping and cracking from becoming brittle as eggshells. Let's not kid ourselves though. This style of hose is way more fragile than the aircraft hoses that 914Rubber sells but they do preserve the original look so I'm going to stick with them.

Brent, those tan paper/foil tubes look great.
Most of the time folks put in all manner of heating tubes that just don't look right to me.
Yours are spot on.

Another tip. If you can't find long enough tubes, I've used the long black VW paper/foil versions and spray painted them tan with a rattle can.
Looks just like factory as well.

It's always the details that make for a great car. Thanks for sharing and we all benefit from seeing things like this. Keep'em coming

Wow a visit from @Superhawk996 I would have loved to join in on that visit with both of you '73 2.0 restoration guys!!!

That's a great tip. @UROpartsman posted a list of the foil/paper hoses they make on the other thread I started trying to source these. I found it super helpful so I'm posting the link to that here:

URO Heater Hose Parts List

It lists diameter, length, and color to make it easy to pick what you need. I'm going to order the other tubes soon to complete the set.

You should have been here! We swapped stories about how much you've helped both of us on our projects.

@914_7T3
Would be awesome to work up a trip out west when we all get these relics back on the road.

Brent's progress and workmanship is nothing short of amazing. Thanks for the sourcing info on these URO hoses. I see I'll have to get an order placed! What a gracious host! Thanks Brent!

Both of you are helping to keep me motivated!

@mepstein
Amazing job cleaning up those carbs!

Well... we went one week and five days without snow. Gotta admit, as much as I love snow and winter, this is getting old. Tired of hauling plants in and out.

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Back indoors - My Pelican order arrived today. Included was this nice, new coil. Anyone have a problem with this?

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Why does your coil read in Fraunch?

Black top ? Tip too tall ? Both ? can't adjust timing ? Have to slide into bracket (cover decal) to use ?

You guys are homing in on it. This coil is a fraud. Twist it 180 and we see this.

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I thought the black top was the best give away along with not being able to buy these old Bosch coils from Pelican. All the genuine Bosch coils I have or have seen have brown tops. Rory is right that the tip is longer than the originals but the apparent interference is just the camera angle. The dizzy rotates fine as it sits.

I was curious about the French too. All of the repro stickers on ebay have that and all the photos of vintage Bosch coils have it too. Were they made in France?

It should provide a nice hot spark for my Pertronix anyway. I need to transfer the spade connectors from one of the coils in my stock pile. Trying to resist the urge to paint that black top.

My Pelican order also contained a replacement wedge bolt to correct my F-up torquing the ball joint nut. 16.2 ft. lbs. thus time!

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A couple weeks ago I took my ridiculously overpriced genuine key blanks to my local locksmith to have them cut.

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In the process, I discovered I had put two valet wafers in the rear trunk lock and none in the front. That was easy to swap. More important, it had me revisit the front trunk cable. I love 914Rubber but the wire they are using for these cables is too soft. Even with plenty of teflon lube in the tube, that cable felt sticky and springy and wanted to kink when feeding it through. It had a terrible feel and I was afraid would fail prematurely. I bit the bullet and sprang for an expensive OEM cable.

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Expensive, yes, but if I were sitting at a gas station with an empty fuel tank and a trunk latch that wouldn't open, $55 would seem a small price to pay to avoid the problem. This cable is noticeably stiffer with a slight spring to it and operates silky smooth. Money well spent I think.

I discovered that the front trunk lock was binding when the handle was bolted in place. If you recall, I had to rebuild that section of the bulkhead thanks to its previous use as a rat latrine. I had to do two things to fix the problem. The first was to gently bend the steel tube the cable runs through to better align it with the mounted handle. The second was to oval out the mounting holes with a round file to allow the handle to mount slightly farther out to give the swaged fitting on the cable room to slide all the way in without hitting the tube. 1/16" is all it took and you can't tell by looking.

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Spacing and alignment are more critical than I thought on that mechanism. With those adjustments, the handle looks fine and the cable and lock operate smoothly. Now I can securely store my dead bodies without worrying about snooping people finding them.

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Huh. Thanks for that pick. Might have to see if I can track down a different sticker for my forgery BTW @sixnotfour , the front calipers arrived yesterday. They look great. Thank you!

Brent,

Not overlooking any detail on your car. You my friend should be very proud of what you have done on your car from bringing it back to as new conduction. Some elements are even better.

Best,

Bob B

Brent,
I’m loving every minute of this thread.
Sorry bout the snow, we’ve had a month of rain. “Waiting for the sun” cue the Doors.....
That coil set-up. Very slick!
Keep at it.

Doors – Waiting For The Sun Lyrics
At first flash of Eden, we race down to the sea.
Standing there on Freedom's Shore.
Waiting for the Sun (3x)
Can you feel it now that spring has come.
And it's time to live in the scattered sun.
Waiting for the Sun (3x, pause, again slower)
Waiting.... Waiting.... Waiting.... Waiting.... (2x)
Waiting for you to - come along
Waiting for you to - hear my song
Waiting for you to - come along
Waiting for you to - tell me what went wrong
This is the strangest life I've ever known.
Yeah! (Riff 8x)
Can you feel it now that spring has come.
And it's time to live in the scattered sun.
Waiting for the Sun (3x)
Waiting... For... The suuuuun. (Riff 2x)

Aren't those two fasteners supposed to be Allen-head screws?

--DD