This thread will be dedicated to my father's 914 build. Some of you may remember DBCooper and his car, and that he passed away in 2017. His first name was Paul, but he went by his middle name Steve.

I am his younger son and I've inherited the car. For the past couple of years it's been tucked away in my garage. I haven't felt that I've "owned" the car because it's almost like I've been waiting for Steve to come and continue his project. Just recently I've decided that I can't let it sit anymore and that it needs to get to a condition where Steve would be proud to take it out for a spin.

A little background on who I am because in all of his posts he rarely mentioned me, and mostly included my older brother. That's simply because he was around for the build and I was thousands of miles away in Texas.

For the past several years I've been committed to participating in local SCCA autocross and time trial. Initially I built a fox mustang from the ground up to CAM class rules, which is basically unlimited modifications while using a 200tw tire and maintaining street legality. By the time I was finished with it the only thing that was original was the sheet metal.

A few photos of the Mustang:







After 6 years of building the mustang I found something I couldn't live without, a 1997 Dodge Viper GTS road race car. I initially saw the car on Bring A Trailer where it had sold a year prior. I ended up tracking the car down to a dealer here in Texas. The car was bought by 60's NASCAR driver Dick Turner and turned into a race car from new back in 1997. I scored the car for a great deal and drove it the four hours home on Hoosier slicks and open side pipes! I've been sorting, modifying, and racing the car for the past year.

A few photos of the Viper:







So now, that brings us to the 914. Near the time that my Dad passed away, his health was steadily declining so the car got pushed to the wayside. Because of that it hasn't changed much at all from when it was first built. In resurrecting the car luckily most of the mechanical bits still function well. I've had to replace the clutch, fix a leaky oil supply line to the turbo, and track down some bad connections in the wiring. At this point I'm ready to start tuning the car to perform better at the autox, because that's where I want it to shine. It will definitely get a full interior, that's something my Dad never had a chance to finish. He always wanted AC in the car too, so I will sort that out as well.

Here are some recent photos of the 914













I know Steve really enjoyed his time on this forum, so I want to thank you guys for bringing him some joy. Hopefully you guys find some peace knowing the car is in good hands. I'll be posting photos of the car and it's adventures here in the future.

It's good to have met you at the local Modesto Euro Sundays. Through the couple of conversations we had it was obvious you got that car bug from your father and really enjoyed the different communities you are in.

I think the car is in the perfect home,many of us were very sorry to hear about the passing of your father a while back.


Keep us up to date on how your doing regularly! The car has always been a really cool and well done build. That GTS is something else!!

I see by your bumper tops you need to get hold of Matt and Mark from 914rubber.com and do a little sprucing up.

Sorry about your Dad. He was a cool dude...

Welcome- I am sure your dad is tickled you are taking on his car as he is looking down and waiting to see it running and driving again. Those are some very cool cars you built. I love the 914 already and it will only get better. Keep us all posted with the progress. What kind of power is that Subie putting out?

Great that you're here! You Dad always had interesting things to say...and I love that he called himself DBCooper. Maybe the best screen name ever. Sometimes the way he answered things I wondered if he might actually be DB Cooper.

Love the foxbody and the viper.

Keep us posted and let us know how we can help!

with all of the above. It sounds like your Dad's car is in good hands. Welcome!

Welcome and thanks for the post.

Sorry to hear about your father. I am confident that he would be proud you are caring for his car

Thank you for sharing!

I blatantly copied the shift setup on that car and told your Dad so. He said great, your welcome. Later, I made the adapter plate used on that 914 to mount the clutch MC to the existing pedal cluster. Hope it's still working for you. I take it you've seen his Youtube video of the 914 eating a Saleen Mustang. That wasn't a poke at you was it? I knew him as Paul so I'll say as others here have, I miss Paul. His passing was a shock to me. His contributions are sorely missed here. One of the Suby/914 Pioneers. His build was an inspiration to others & me although I went the 6 route. Welcome to the insanity. Kent

I actually had never heard of DB Cooper (being from another continent and all that) until some of Paul's comments many years ago.

This is a proper tribute to your Father-well done, Sir.

What a great connection to your dad. Keep us posted on your progress.

Paul was an awesome guy (as you know ). We really miss him. It's nice to see the car again and it sounds like you're the perfect person to own it.

Here's the 914/Mustang race...car looks familiar...


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6JxpYwqUMs

Glad to see you’re getting it back going

It is awesome your here & bringing his car back to life. It is famous among us Subaru conversion guys. Good to have you here with us crazy people. Sounds like you'll fit right in

Welcome to 914World.



I knew of your dad from Turbobricks and here, glad to see the car was kept in the family.

Looking forward to seeing it completed.

Welcome. Sorry to hear of your Fathers passing. I love your other cars! I am building a Subie conversion (6). Hopefully our paths will cross.

Yeah I wonder what happened to the orange 1975 242 Paul was planning to put an LS in? He posted some pics when he bought it.

Looking forward to updates!

Oh boy, I'm glad you asked. My brother Thomas ended up finishing the swap and still has the car. It's become quite the legendary sleeper. Almost two years ago Thomas convinced me to participate in one of Driving While Awesome's Rallys. So my wife and I cannonballed out in the Mustang to do three amazing days of beautiful California canyon carving. We ended up doing about 5000 miles in 7 days.

It was a great chance for us both to get photos of our cars together, but being my brother he had plans to setup a drag race between us both. The race was pretty legendary I must say hahah, at least it got a lot of comments on Instagram for sure.

Check it out here: https://youtu.be/fD_oVmY-Fn8

Here are photos of the 242 and the notchback during the Rally.

Thank you to everyone whos replied, it really means a lot to my brother and I.

Today I got the car inspected, so it'll be losing it's California plate soon. I also weighed the car at a truck stop. It weighs 2100lbs with about a 1/4 tank! 920 front and 1180 rear, so that's about 46%/54% weight balance.

Here are some photos of the 914 from this weekend. It's such a fun car to drive.

Here for another update on the car. Thanks again to everyone who's posted, I know my Dad would love to see it.

The motor in the Viper let go two weeks before the Houston region was to host it's very first SCCA Champ Tour event. That's a big deal since typically these national events were hosted at the Mineral Wells site up in Fort Worth. Mineral Wells was just closed in 2020, so hopefully Grandsport Speedway in Houston becomes the new central south region national venue.

So, naturally I saw a perfect opportunity to get the 914 track ready.

The clutch had failed on it so it got a new Excedy clutch and lightweight flywheel. And yes, that trans cradle setup is super sketchy, I was in a full on scramble to get the car ready to race.








The car also got a set of new stainless fuel lines, and a set of the new Falken RT660 autox tires. I went ahead and did a quick alignment on it too. And finally finished up with a late night run to In-n-Out, just like they used to do when this car was getting built. And yes, surprisingly, the first In-n-Out in Houston was built right down the street from the house.





With the new alignment, lightweight flywheel, and those amazing new Falkens the car was handling absolutely incredible. It has a crazy amount of turn in and trail braking grip and can take a ton of power on corner exit thanks to the Quaife diff. I knew the car was going to be a blast to drive on track, I just didn't know how competitive it would be.

Because of that I decided to help a buddy with Mazda contingency money by padding the field in XP. I should have stayed in the XSB class though, and you'll see why in the next post!

Now onto race day!

I spoke with some buddies who are mid engine MR2 gurus, and got an idea about how to drive this platform. The strategy was to trail brake hard, and anticipate push on throttle. The few practice runs I was able to do confirmed as much, but I didn't anticipate just how much speed this little car could carry into and out of corners. Pretty shocking to say the least!

Before I get into the runs and video, here's a few pics of my Dad's pride and joy sitting pretty on grid. She got so much attention and was definitely a crowd favorite. I know my Dad would have been absolutely beaming to see his 914 doing its thing that day and looking fantastic doing it too.









Champ tours are broken into two day events. You get three runs one day and three runs on a different course the next day. Times from both days are added together for your final time. The two cars in XSB were both penalized for being overweight, so if I would have stayed I would have won the class on day one! In a 50 year old 914! Absolutely incredible, my Dad would have been over the moon. On the second day, in XSB, I would have placed second and with final times would have won second overall. Not a bad finish at all! But, because I stayed in XP I missed out. However, I still managed to place 7th out of 11 entries in XP, which is stupid good since I was the only car on street tires in the class.

Here's what the 914 would have been up against in XSB. It would have placed ahead of the two codrivers in the Orange Exige, one of whom is a good buddy of mine and also a legitimate NASA engineer! The guy in the Miata is Guy Ankeny, a popular driver and shock tuner that came all the way from California.





But get this, I was told the car was lifting a front wheel in the slaloms!

Here's a video of the 914 in action. No power steering is a workout!

https://youtu.be/k2rsXU2Chh8

Those would have been the fastest lap, but I made a mistake on the last corner of both laps. So it goes. Overall I had a blast in the 914 and it's now a welcomed staple in the Houston region autox scene. It's actually really difficult on which car to drive, Viper or 914!

Nice!!!! Great writeup too.

Enjoyed-thanks for sharing!