I've been putting this off, but I guess I should document the restoration build for my latest 914. I finally got the car on my property and even though there no garage (YET) I can go ahead and get some things started. This will be my 3rd 914 and it'll be a bit of a second chance for this car, as it has a front end section that's been grafted on (by PO) because of a previous accident - not to mention the rusted away hell-hole and holes in the floor. The graft actually looks pretty well done and solid, and the other items will be addressed. The car came with it's original engine - a 1.7 that's freshly rebuilt with zero miles on the rebuild (uninstalled). I've also got a 2056cc 'GA' motor that'll probably end up in this car.

The car was originally L21E Tangerine and someone's gone over it with a real crappy red paint. Since my last 914(/6) was L21E Tangerine.. I'm going to paint this one something else, and will be doing all bodywork and paint myself.

This "restoration" will be considered a driver quality effort.. but I don't plan on cutting too many corners either. I plan to do a quality job but it won't be going across the block at Christies either. Lots of parts have already been sourced, but there's always more, right! Here's the BEFORE shots:

UGLY FLOORS:


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HELL HOLE:


RUSTY FENDER TIPS:

You've got your hands full with that one. Always good to see another saved though.

I've not been doing much of anything to my 914 project lately, what with all the rain, weather and me doing over 200ft of cedar fencing (single handedly at that), etc. Anyway, I took some time yesterday and was able to get out there and cut away all the rusted metal from the Hell Hole. So, that's a little piece of progress I can report on . Here's a shot of it:

Here's my replacement metal test fit:
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When can I come by and see it? I can bring a 914 for some motivation.....

Nice work on making/forming that patch!

Wow, would love to have you out this way.. just gotta let me get a driveway poured first, it's in the planning stage.. but it's just a big strip of mud and gravel most days. Your 914 would NOT care for it.

This 914 'build' will probably take forever with all the home improvement going on (thats what we get for buying a fixer upper ). Still, I'd like to have it painted before summer. Here's part of the fence I've been building, and that's been taking up my spare time:

I was able to mess with the 914 a couple days since my last update. I've cut the rusted thru parts of the floors out:


I've got the panels already and picked up some Mig gas for welding, the other day.

Also, I've removed all of the suspension.. for bushing, bearing, seal replacement - but also for under car clean up and painting. This car will not be on a rotisserie, I plan to wire wheel the entire underside, treat with phosphoric acid, epoxy and paint, or bed liner stuff, or both.

Looks like you used galvanized- bravo.

I busted most of the front suspension apart today. Gotta figure out how to get those bushings off the A-arms and the joints out of them too. Couldn't budge the dang set screws in the REAR discs rotors, so I just called it a day

Put a torch on the bushy gs until they smoke and then turn them off with a screwdriver stuck in the hole on the mounting tab.
Heat will loosen the set screw.
It’s worth it to go to your local home store and buy a map torch. Heat makes everything loosen up.

Nice patch! Don't forget the drain hole.

Will do, thanks. What about the ball joint thingy that attaches to the strut - does it take a special tool to remove?




Yea, planning on adding one before welding it in.

Nice work. Every hour and step is progress.

OK - made some small progress lately.

So the general plan is this (since I'm working on this car with NO garage). Phase 1 is as follows:

1) pull and restore all the suspension.
2) weld in new floor areas & interior firewall sections.
3) remove dash
4) prime interior
5) address the entire underside of the car, wire wheel, prime, paint, etc.
6) repair: hell hole, damage to shifter hole & clutch cable hole - in engine compartment.
7) prime engine compartment.
8) address the front trunk including to cut out area for A/C condenser.


What I've been working at lately is.. getting the area under the rear trunk scrubbed down with a nylon 'wire wheel'. I really like the nylon wheel for this because it lasts forever, stays cool, is cheap and leaves an 80 grit texture which is good for the epoxy primer that'll be coming next (I will not be taking this all the way down to bare metal - not necessary). Here's the nylon wheel:

..AND one of the major hurdles has been removing the muffler heat shield (so I could get above it for rust treatment and paint. They'll tell you it's only spot welded in, but mine also had small strips of edge welding - I'll be bolting it back in:

..Here's a shot showing under the trunk floor after nylon wheeling it. I'll be scuffing all the nooks and crannies with maroon scotch-brite pads and phosporic acid solution before epoxy primer.
BEFORE:
AFTER:

Also I've gotten up inside the fenders/wheel wells and removed all of the foam that's known to eventually cause rust. Mine look pretty good at this point. The job sucks but glad I did it, and got it out of the way:
DURING
REMOVED:

I know, I'm honestly terrible with documenting my project.. in my defense I did accidently crush my old android phone, that had a ton of pictures documenting the work so far on my project#1 914. So, I'm going to try to catch uo with what little I do have. Here's a shot showing the body stripped down to bare metal, with as little filler (kitty hair in this case) as possible, before epoxy primer.



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We're obviously in Epoxy primer and.. Got my rotisserie built and the car mounted:

Oh yeah, before it got on the rotisserie I had to address the fender to cowling issues... both fender's "pointy tips" by the cowl, were rotting away. I cut them off and welded on replacements:
Before, during -

^ frustrating, when I use the forums 'attachment' buttons for pics, they get turned in all kinds of directions - is there something I can do to fix this?


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If your using your phone before uploading just go to edit your picture on the phone and just make some silly edit and that will be all that is needed to ensure they post correctly.

When in the world do you sleep? In addition to the fence (looking great!), it appears you've painted the house in the meantime too. And STILL got a bunch of stuff done on your car--OUTDOORS! Major kudos to you!

Thanks, however it’s been two years that this car’s been in that spot.. so I’m seeing it as I’ve been too lazy. The lack of a garage is a big deal though as it seems as though it’s done nothing but rain around here (when it’s not 95+ degrees out)! I’m trying to do better.. thanks for the encouragement!!

Ps- I do plan on addressing the hideous chimney this fall (I have a plan believe it or not)

My longs are generally in good condition on this car, but there was a small amount of perforated metal (outer skin) where the two rear firewalls meet the longs on each side, so I’ve been cutting and patching:
Passenger side, before, during and after-
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Welded up holes from spot welds and the crack under the belt mount:
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..after phospho acid and primer to the inner layer:
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Now to do the driver’s side:
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..in process:
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I actually finished up just before dark , will post a finished shot tomorrow.

Btw, I had a practically new bottle of welding gas empty on me after sitting a couple weeks and I had to run and get a replacement. The frustrating thing is that I had the valve closed tight. Supply house wouldn’t hear it.. my gauges must be leaking they said.. I checked them when I got back and they’re not leaking. The valve knob on the empty felt particularly loose but was normal according to them.

Driver’s side long repair, done:
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.. here’s a picture showing the reason I broke down and built a rotisserie...

The first pic is what my miserable welds were looking like while trying to weld a patch to the floor while laying on my back and the car a ft or so off the ground . Couldn’t really even manage to get anything clean enough for consistency. Had hot slag dripping on me and trying to dress the welds with a grinder between me and the car felt really dangerous.

The second pic is the very same area that I managed to clean up today and make look a little less embarrassing. So much easier with the rotisserie!
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AFTER clean up

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I can't imagine doing the underside work I did without a rotisserie--and certain not being able to enjoy any of it. Being able to turn the car on either side or upside-down made most of the cutting, welding, and grinding fun(ish).

Ok so today I removed the rear under side of the tunnel and cleaned up the lips on the tunnel where the floor will be welded to eventually, as well as cleaned up the inside of the tunnel forward - in prep for internal chassis paint there. Note, the tunnel had been left intact before I had a rotisserie and this was going to make installing the floor easier somehow . This way is much more thorough but also helpful because my clutch tube needed securing at the firewall as well as some repairs needed to the area around the throttle cable tube (see last pics):


Here’s the a shot showing the rear floor completely removed and tunnel flanges cleaned



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Very Loose clutch tube
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..both repaired
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Here you can see marks for the cuts I made at the bottom of the outside firewall..I will be fabricating the lower section of the firewall - buying a whole panel seemed wasteful since most of it is in good shape. Hopefully these repairs will last a long time, the car will be a driver, if not a daily driver.
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Here’s a before shot of the PS inner firewall panel that I bought..followed by a shot of how I cut it length wise. Only the bottom most part of my inner and outer firewalls were in need of replacing. I’m using the upper part of this panel to create the lower section of the outside firewall, pics of that to come.

PS inner repair in process
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GAWD !! Can’t make 1 single pics post as it should… as it is on my phone. The attachment feature here kinda sucks I guess! Twists photos at its whim and the host I use will not make the photo any larger than a thumbnail, so my apologies for the viewing angles. Maybe it’s the apple phone as I never had this issue with my android, just sayin’.

PS inner firewall repair, completed
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The outside passengers firewall panel I made up from the remainder of the PS inner firewall:


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Nice, nice work!

Received a couple more items from RD, time to finish the firewalls.

So next up.. the driver’s side inner. This time I popped holes around the perimeter for spot welds, with a convenient air tool I forgot I had (harbor freight). Before proceeding I needed to separate the ebrake tube from inner and outer firewalls:

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Drivers side inner wall with holes ready to be welded.. this is actually and over-lay or a second skin for most of this wall as only the bottom of the original was bad. I figured why not use the entire piece, since some people buy ‘reinforcement’ panels and over lay anyway.