Hey guys,

I have been assessing the situation with the front trunk of the car recently and I have managed to grind through all the old bondo, bedliner and crap that was covering the majority of the damage to the front pan. Clearly it was brazed in after an accident along with new replacement panels from porsche in their typical red primer. The pan is pretty banged up but the car is surprisingly straight and the hood gaps, bumper gaps and headlight buckets all seem to be where they should be. My question is though - what should my course of action be to repair this in the future? Would the replacement RD front pan suffice or should I dig deeper into the body? Understand that as a student I am by no means looking for a concourse front trunk just something more original and as it should be - this bothers my OCD

Side note - this was damage from the first owner shortly after he bought the car new in the 70's so if it's lasted this long, its solid at least.

Needs a re-placement panel, but coving it up will only increase the OCD pain. Looks like a fairly confined fix.

Yes, RD makes excellent replacement parts/panels (and they're in your backyard!). This wouldn't be a terrible fix.

However, I do think to myself what is the end game for your car? (Repairs add up very quickly once you start...especially if you bought your vehicle to be a "driver".)

If this is a lifelong Ontario car, I'd be looking in other places (for major structural issues) before trying to address "cosmetic" damage.

Forgive me...I'm not trying to be cynical...only you can answer if you want to build a "show" car or a solid driver...the current repair has lasted 45-50 years.

I'm no expert on this but I've seen a lot of damaged 914's and I have a tough time believing the front suspension mounting points weren't involved in the damage and "repair". What does it look like under the car and have you checked to make sure everything is straight and true? Including the struts, crossmember and A arms?

My uneducated opinion, (because I'm not in front of your car), is you have a much bigger project on your hands than just a front pan.

http://www.914world.com/bbs2/index.php?sho...=346446&hl=

If the 914 in the above link is the patient , Its worthy of a new pan..I think

To Mark’s point does it drive straight without needing any funky alignment set up?

I agree with Mark (half way anyway). The crinkling in the pan has to have affected the geometry. However, it looks like the damage is only in the front which means the crinkles would be pulling the front torsion mounts closer together than they should be. I just peeked under mine and it looks like that would pull the ball joints forward. That would be addressed with a proper full pan replacement which would put those mounts back where they should be. As has been said, it is not that difficult of a job... assuming the suspension frame wasn't bent. I tend to doubt it is bent. Seems like the rear A-arm bushings are probably taking the pressure and saved the cross member. I'd plan on changing those bushings while you are at it and, of course, verify none of the suspension bits are bent.

Maybe a little bigger project than a pan replacement, but not that much bigger.

Thanks for the input guys. This likely will be a car I will keep. I've done a little more investigating and certainly more work would be required than just the pan. It appears that the fender wells are also pretty beat up but are original (lots of bondo). I would say the original owner probably rear-ended someone and hit decently hard. The repair seems to have been done "somewhat" well given the fact that it does indeed drive very straight and no weird alignment is needed. To bring it back to factory I'd say a front clip would probably make more sense. The rest of the car is extremely solid and in pretty good shape as seen in my other post so for the time being I'll strip the front trunk down and re-paint as it is. If it's lasted 40 years I'd say at least for a few more years it'll be fine. I am hearing a squeak from the front left I believe so I'll make sure to check out all the bushings as suggested.

whoops. Double post

Very true. You make a good point - drive the car as it is, worry about the cosmetics later.

I see 3 "sensible" options:

1. Work on straightening the floor pan and other panels, and live with the results (at least for now).

2. Surgically remove the floor pan and use a new replacement as a guide to straightening the inner fenders and other pieces that attach.

3. Replace the front clip.

I would not recommend detaching all the various pieces (outer fenders, inner braces, inner fenders, front panel, floor pan) unless you want to enjoy many extra hours in the garage.

I appreciate the suggestion. I think option 1 will do for now and option 2 will be a job in the future.

Well, if it drives straight and is usable why not just leave it then? If the inner fenders are wavy not sure what replacing the trunk floor alone really gets you...

Most likely the a-arm mounts have moved.
Frame bench to pull them back. Then new RD P337 pan.

After a little more investigation clearly the A-arm mount is not perfectly aligned but for the next little while I believe this should be fine and safe to drive? (see pic) Driver side is fine. The fender well is not terrible - a little crinkly though. Sorry I forgot to take some pics before I quickly sprayed some primer. Most of the wrinkles are from bondo that I haven't cleaned out yet. The plan will be to strip the full front trunk down and at least respray in body colour for the next little while. It appears that to fix the majority of the damage a new front pan will suffice with new A-arm mounts and new reinforcements on the inside corners of then pan (can't think of the name).

I like this option. Once you get all the bondo off the wheel wells and they are detached from the trunk pan, they should hammer and dolly out nicely.

If you have a good alignment on the car, I wouldn't worry about driving it. However, I still think the A-arm bushings are taking the brunt of whatever is tweaked. That could cause those bushings to wear faster which will make the suspension more sloppy and can lead to wear and pitting on the torsion bars. This is all speculation of course but given that replacing the pan isn't terribly difficult, I'd try to make it a winter project if it were mine. You can probably knock it out in a few weekends.

Thanks brent. I agree that definitely seems like the best option for either this winter or next winter. What's the procedure for installing a new pan? Any specific bracing that's required? or can someone direct me to a thread that outlines this? I'm assuming some kind of jig is necessary to keep everything in place and line up the A-arm mounts?

I would get the complete replacement pan, and then detach the existing pan along the seams with the inner fender panels, the front panel, and the front bulkhead. Then use the new pan as a guide to straighten everything.

As for the getting the suspension mounts properly placed, short of a chassis jig, I would install new bushings on the A-arms, and then "install" the arms using the cross brace, get them in place by measurement, and then tack weld the front mounts to the new pan.

BTW, this would be much easier--and almost fun--with a rotisserie.

A rotisserie makes everything fun! (Mostly)

Thanks for the tips guys! I think this is definitely on the list for a winter project. More pics will come as I dig deeper into the frunk. Thanks!

Yep, pretty much what bkrantz said but I wouldn't use a rotisserie for this job unless you had a fancy rotisserie that attaches at suspension pickups rather than nose and tail. You'll be removing a lot of the structure that makes the nose strong enough to hold the weight of the car on a rotisserie.

The nice thing about this job is that the replacement pan becomes your jig. As was said, cut out the old one along the pinch weld seams and plug weld in the new. Go slow to keep from overheating the panel but pretty straightforward. I think the process mostly differs only depending on the source of your replacement panel. I replaced mine with a donor trunk so the front a-arm mounts were already welded in. In that case, I bolted up the suspension assembly so the rear was bolted to my car's chassis, and the front to the donor panel. That kept everything where it needed to be. I believe with the RD panel, you weld the front A-arm pickups on after the pan is welded in. Just make sure the placement meets the specs for under body dimensions found in the '914 info' section.

I also had to do a long butt weld across the rear which was the only tricky part. Not sure how far back the RD panel goes. One other thing you'll have to deal with is cleaning all that brass out from the brazing. Your welder won't like that at all.

I think this is probably the easiest of the major panel repairs because there are few things that can go wrong compared to something like the longs.

Get yourself a shrink disc to help work out all those crinkles. I could actually hear the body pulling itself back into place when I shrunk some crinkled metal.

Thanks a lot Brent. Cleaning out the brazing will definitely be a frustrating job

Sorry I'm not familiar with a shrink disc? Can you elaborate? edit: Nevermind I found it - looks like that'll be useful as well, thank you!

The instructions that came with mine said it was NOT magic but I have my doubts. Pretty amazing what they can do. It isn't going to eliminate the need to replace the pan but will sure be handy for when you straighten out those wheel wells. I wound up with some oil canning when I did mine and the "magic" shrinking disc made short work of it. Made the wheel well tight as a drum.

I'd play with it on the pan though. Since you can get to both sides, it might do better than I think. Remember though that the shirinking disc is exactly that. It shrinks metal. Your crinkles aren't necessarily stretched so even if you managed to flatten the metal with the disc, you haven't removed the problem of the mount points being pulled together.

I'll definitely give it a try! At least if I can straighten the pan somewhat that might tide my OCD over until the pan can be properly replaced.

Lots of videos floating around the InterWeb on Shrink Disc. I would probably go for one of the small units for these areas.
If you cant get to the back side with the disc you use a hammer to bring that spot up.
Learn as much as you can before you start and you will be amazed.
Let the panel cool, be patient, move around. It can be fun.

Will do! Thanks for the input.

How do we feel about the brazing versus proper MIG welding that we are seeing here? Brazing can't be as strong...

I would either put it on a bench and repair it properly or leave it alone. My opinion, If you start shrinking back the sheet metal, even if just for cosmetic reasons, you are going to pull at suspension points and possibly throw the car out of alignment. Even just replacing the pan without a bench or proper jig is risky since the suspension is a three dimensional affair. It needs to be the proper height and distance from the other mounting points like the steering rack and struts. There is some leeway to the measurements but if you are going to go through the effort...

From what I've learned brazing is actually quite strong when done right. The heating of the surrounding metal is usually what leads to warping but the bond itself is apparently strong.

Keep in mind I have no experience with brazing and this is simply what I've been told by a few of the older mechanics working in the shop with me. *Brazing is still not ideal though*