There are so many used parts available for 914's it dawned on me the cars rot around the parts.

The one we have in currently has been taken care of by the original owner and it still has hell hole issues. Always garaged in central California the guy washed and waxed on a regular basis.

With rain tray in place, the sides (opposite ends of rain tray) are open, the water pours in over the battery. That aspect is a poor design at best.

Don't get me wrong, I'm hooked the 914 but the poor things are like open windows in a house during a rain storm, the wood floors will suffer.

At times I read rust free 914 for sale. Is it possible to have an "original rust free 914"?

Steve's original red '73 is the closest I've ever seen. And it's on the east coast. I'm sure there are others, but they seem to stay hidden away.

With many cars now getting rotissary restorations, you’ll probably be seeing more rust-free cars out there, but not original anymore. Ben (mb911) has an excellent thread describing the restoration and amount of new metal being welded onto a 914 he’s converting. It’s really nearing the point where Restoration Design or Dansk should start producing bodies in white (for the 911 and 914) like the Mustang and Camaro crowd are doing. Then all those parts could have a great, rust free home to be attached to.

I thought mine was rust free, but it does have a little rust in the bottom of the headlight buckets.

My old chevelles were really bad at rusting in the bottoms of the fenders. All the gunk would get stuffed in there from the road or trees and eventually rot out.

unless rotisserie restoration and all cavities opened up: NO

I don't think we will ever see 914's made. Too much work to build a unibody for a car that still doesn't bring big money. Then there's the issue of becoming a manufacturer of cars. The muscle car bodies are still just bodies on a frame, they aren't the whole car. I'm not sure you can build a car and then not have it meet current safety standards. You could call it a kit car but then it's not really a 914. You can't (yea, I know people do) just pull the vin tags from a 914 and put it on the new body.

Dansk is in the process of making all the metal for early and mid year 911's so in theory you could build one from scratch but the replacement parts vary from good to poor. Its not to bad when you repair a 911 to add a part that needs to be reworked but if you are starting from scratch, you would need a jig for almost every part to make sure it doesn't just go in the right place but also to insure the part itself is the right size and shape. Building in mid air is not an easy task.

I know there is a company that builds every piece for early VW busses. I remember reading that they build a new bus from scratch but I don't know how they got around the VIN issue. I know when the rich people do it, they call it a "re-body" instead of a vin swap and that seems to make everything work

Disagree. You can do a full restoration and address all rust without a rotisserie. It's just harder. Unless a car was garaged from day 1 and not driven in snow and rain, then the rust might be minimal. but they still can rust from the inside out, especially due to battery acid and so forth. Every car needs a full inspection looking for signs of rusting from the inside out. Internal inspection of the longitudinals is probably the best check for the jack post and hell hole problem areas.

I remember somebody on another thread a few months ago describe picking up a six (I think) brand new in Germany back in the day, and the car already had rust.

you missed my point, I didn't mean the rotissierie was the only way to restore a car, my point was unless you open stuff up and clean it out and treat it , 99.99% of the time its not going to be a rust free 914, especially in the areas of the sail panel etc that have foam in them. every one I have had or looked into has had rust in those locations-

Owned since day one. Always garaged and covered. I can only recall 3-4 times I've ever driven it in the rain using the wipers. Engine and battery covered when I wash it. If there's rust, it's hidden deep in the unibody caverns and I'm not cutting into it to find out!
Dave
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I would be suspicious of any 914 that doesn't have rust.

Almost any time you remove a welded metal part or panel, there is rust between the seam. That's why a blasted or dipped car will still rust. If you dip it, it has to be neutralized and then e-coated.

that is a beautiful car! I sure would not worry about if or how much is in it with the care you have given it , it surely is one of the 1%ers, a true survivor. you can tell by the condition of the rubber bumper covers that it has seen very little UV light.

I believe they started to rust immediately after rolling off the assembly line. The boat ride over and being parked in open parking lots didn't help much either.

Yes, I agree, but you can use boroscope so as to not "open up" what you don't have to. multiple layers of steel show signs when there is rust between the layers.

I think the metal was rusty even before they stamped the parts !

Have to agree with neutralizing the acid and epoxy primer, or galvanizing, and any and all methods of sealing the steel so that moisture never gets to it. The foam the factory used seems to have been a bad idea. Seam sealer worked well in some places, but in others trapped water and caused rust. Use of seam sealer needs to be in a way of sealing seams, but not when it traps water into a pocket and dodry quickly.

My roomate in college had a 124 Fiat spider and I swear you could hear it rusting sitting in the college parking lot. Always said Fiat used salt water based paint...

Don't think the 914's are as bad but you definitely have to look after them! I've been doing that to my '71 from its first trip from the Porsche+Audi dealership. It was my only car for 4 years so I drove it sparingly in the winter and took off the rockers every spring for a good cleaning. Luckily I was in medical school at the time and didn't have much time for driving anyway!!


(BTW, nice to see another original owner cheek...)

...mines rust free except behind trunk latch , which has surface rust

Yes purchased new back in the 70’s

I thought the same also,starting to see rust now after around 2.5 years of ownership .

My 74 spent it's first year or so back east and then moved to Nevada. While it is about as rust free as they come, including the longs and battery area, if you dig deep enough. When I replaced the engine tin rubber I found some in the channels the rubber attaches to. Also in the channel that shifter / ebrake cables run through.

I remember reading that if there is no rust on your 914, you simply have not looked hard enough. Maybe if you tank dip and then e-coat the body you can be assured of 100% rust free.

Keep your 914 out of water as much as you can. --Keep your powder dry boys--

keep one's powder dry. Stay alert, be careful, as in Go ahead and take on the opposition, but keep your powder dry . This colloquial expression, which originally alluded to keeping gunpowder dry so that it would ignite, has been used figuratively since the 1800s but today is less common than take care



What Rust Is
In order to understand how rust works and spreads, you first have to understand what rust is. "Rust" is the common name for what is scientifically known as iron oxide, a form of corrosion that occurs when iron (or one of its alloys, such as steel) reacts with oxygen and there is water (or heavy air moisture) present.



Other metals have oxidation processes as well, but they do so differently and the result is not commonly considered rust. Copper corrosion is green (and accounts for the color of the Statue of Liberty) while aluminum corrosion spreads extremely slowly.

The Molecular Process of Spreading
The process of metal corrosion is an electrochemical process. It happens on a molecular level as electrons transfer from iron molecules to the surrounding oxygen molecules, changing the makeup of the iron and turning it into rust. This is happening to iron all the time. In fact, it is impossible to find a piece of iron without at least some oxide present within it. However, the rate of rusting is usually slight and slow but is accelerated by water, especially if the water has a high concentration of electrolytes (substances in the water that help electrons move).This is why the presence of salt causes rust to spread more quickly.

Spreading
Rust does not spread through contact like a biological infection. Instead, the process of iron oxidization occurs independently based on the conditions surrounding a particular piece of metal. This means that if one part of the piece is exposed to water, oxygen, and electrolytes but the rust of the piece is kept clean and dry, the protected metal will not rest at the rate of the wet metal.

Iron alloys will have different corrosion rates based on their makeup.

Bob B

Mines a Barn Find having sat inside in Ohio for over 23 years. Originally an Arizona car brought back to Ohio by Stoddard's and resold there. It became a parts car, shudder, so much of it is not original including the doors. She received a re-spray of original color Bahia Red. I've found very little rust anywhere. The battery tray is original and the hell hole has only seen dust, see the pic. She's back on the road again but only occasionally, ok 2-3 times a week in the summer. Glad to have her on the rod again.


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The "914R" car I have now is pretty darn close to 'rust free' for a car that's actually used. It's a SoCal car and has only been wet a handful of times in the past 20 years or so, and is in a relatively low humidity, no sea/road salt area. I believe the battery tray and hell-hole are original and unrepaired. I actually bought a new battery tray for it when the car was being painted in 2011...didn't use it. That said, it did need some small patching in the rear of the rear trunk, a common area where moisture pools and/or the carpet hangs-onto moisture and does the deed. It has zero carpet or floor tar anymore.

A totally rust free 914 probably would have to be a true museum queen with extraordinarily low mileage that's barely if ever been taken outside of a climate-controlled space.

it's relative - what do y'all mean by "rust free" ?

imho - rotisserie rust-removed & panels replaced is not oem PCA preservation classs "rust free' but ymmv - whatever ya can get away with , eh?

here is one that is probably your dream car
- if you can afford it (or can spend $20K on a rotisserie resto to attempt to duplicate)

Bob Schoenhoer's frequent PCA Concours winning preservation class car

at Livermore Porsche Zone 7 Concours in 2013

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here is a rust free '73 - i owned it long ago - a Ca Si Valley car - 473 290 3757 now on East Coast

really - ZERO rust ! - when i b'ot it in San Jose in 1993

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THAT ^^^^^^^ is a spectacular car !

The rust free cars one hopes to see or own, ARE out there but a scarcely seen or run across.
They are cars which have lived their entire life in a low humidity condition, not been in any corrosive road salt areas, and have lived a pampered or sheltered condition.

Dry weather only driven, or cars living in sheltered environments with a scarcely washed exterior are true rust free cars. Diligent owners are important within this mix.

A lot of European cars from that era have the same problem. My 1971 Saab 96's steel is in far better condition than the 76 I had many years ago.

Reason: around that time, car manufacturers were forced (by law) to use water-based paint. And that process wasn't very well-thought after, back then. Some manufacturers (Italian) suffered from B-grade steel. Alfa Romeos of that era are virtually non-exist, these days!

Menno