So I finally got the first of the two Texas Twins down from Colorado down here to Texas and cant wait to get started on the build. I first obtained this 914 as a parts car back in 2010. After getting it home, I realized it was actually in better shape than the one I already owned. The first one is a 1973, 2.0. This one was a 1974 1.8 in Ravenna Green. Unfortunately I never was able to make allot of time to play with the car, so it sat in my overcrowded garage in Colorado.

Since I retired and moved to Texas, the wife said I had better find something to do and stay out from under her feet, so last week I made the treck to Colorado and brought the first of 3 914s back. (the 3rd really is a parts chassis).

The car was on a rolling frame so was easy to get onto the trailer, problem is it had to be lowered enough to fit inside a four foot cover to be added onto the trailer, so first we had to raise it high enough to get it off the rolling frame.

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Then it had to be carefully lowered to where the car was sitting on 4 X 4 blocks so it would be lower than 4 feet high and secured to the trailer. It came in at around 3'8" when done.

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Then the shipping crate was built over and around the car. The trip was long and went well till I got about 10 miles from home and disaster struck.

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A catastrphic loss of one tire on the trailer. Thanks to a good samaritan who flagged me down, because I never heard or felt a thing. Also a testament to Top Hat Trailer Company, the trailer was slightly damaged but did not roll, in fact it rode so smooth that I never new the tire had gone away. Of course...no spare for the trailer, so I limped the last 10 miles at 15 miles per hour.

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So 16 hours of driving and now one of my babies is here in Texas and the work shall begin.

Happy to hear you're about to start your projects!

Good luck! Looks like a great starting point!

From the appearance of the other tire wear, looks like you need to invest in new trailer tires all around! :confused:Isn't that a spare mounted on the other side of the trailer in an above photo?

Awesome, gonna be more 914s in the DFW area! I’m in Dallas with a couple projects working also. What are your plans with the front wheel arches, your plans in general with it? I’m somewhat local to you and would love to see the cars at some point as the projects progress. If I can be of some help, don’t hesitate to reach out. Good luck and keep posting your progress


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isn't that a spare in the fist pic?

There is a large contingent of 914 people here in the north Texas area. I am very close to DFW airport. So if you need anything, just holler. I have been working on these little cars for over 34 years. And I have lots of spares.

Mineola is not that far from here.


Clay

Glad you made it safe. Welcome

Yes Jamie, it is on there, however it had suffered a puncture to the sidewall on the trip up, so was flat....It was just not a profitable trip as far as the trailer went...lol.

Wow,

I did not know there were as many 914ers in this area, that is great to know. Would enjoy meeting some of my 914 neighbors in the near future.

So as far as plans for the car....As you can see the front wheel arch has already been cut out for the fender flare. While in Colorado I had started those and the two on the other side are partially installed. I had also reconstructed the infamous hell hole. So now I will complete the other two flares and then it will be on to other minor body repairs. The good thing about this car is the longs were rock solid. So most of the work is going to be minor sheetmetal repair.

I so want to convert it to a six cylinder, however on my retirement salary that doesnt seem very likely, so will probably just upsize the four to a 2056 and be happy with it.

But for now at least the adventure begins....

Glad you made it OK, but come on brother, put a full set of new tires on that trailer, including a new spare. I know you know better. Congratulations on getting that car home though.

They really didnt look so bad when I left. But believe me, they are all getting replaced with radials. No more bias tires. I am taking the whole trailer in to be serviced since the factory is close by. I did almost feel ashamed to post my failure because I knew I would take a ribbing, but It was definately my bad....lol

I know this must have been a lot of trauma for you but it makes a great start to your car story.

So now that I made it to Texas, It was time to unload the 914, This view showes how the shipping container was built around the car. It was a tight fit, but she was well protected.


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It took about 5 hours to uncrate the car, raise it back onto jack stands and get it loaded onto the rolling cart and moved into the garage, but she is in her new home.


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Great story and a great new location. Is that American Flag touching the ground in that last pic?

Great story and adventure, can't wait to see this projects progress!

No Sir, The flag is actually folded on a chair. It is awaiting a boyscout retirement ceremony. I know when I looked at my picture I was appauled, then went back out to the garage to look too. It was on the chair, just a piece of scrap paper on the floor.

So spent the day unpacking a truckload of parts as well as unpacking all of the loose parts that were stored in the car during shipping. Didn't know you could fit so many parts into such a small car. The wife was kinda ticked when she found out we pushed the car into the garage with all of that extra weight in it....lol

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Then I had to find a place to put everything away, since the hot rod cant sit outside. Quickly running low on space for now. In march they hopefully will start on my new shop.

Spent the remainder of yesterday removing the layers of Colorado dust and dirt from everywhere in the car. then started re-assessing what has been started and what needs to be done, body wise. All in all it is a pretty solid car.

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The headlight buckets are in pretty good shape. The passenger side shows some signs of damage, but the fender does not appear to have been replaced, so maybe tire damage?
The weather seal channel needs attention all the way around.

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Front Trunk isnt to bad, some rust that isnt to deep, and the spair tire hold down bracket is missing????

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The original Body Tag is still attached to the right headlight bucket

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And of course the channel corners where the cowel meets the fenders are rusted out
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The firewall and gas tank area are in great shape

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The interior front half of the floor is in remarkably good condition as well

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The rear floor half has been replaced, but still has allot of cleaning up to do on the weld lines, etc. The underside where the two halves meet still needs to be welded, but that will have to wait until its on the rotisserie.

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The rear wall on the drivers side is solid, the passenger side may be a different story, bondo.....Hmmm

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The drivers door leaves a bit to be desired. The door itself is pretty solid, no rust, however the IPO tried to attach adjustable mirror to it and blasted out the mirror support underneath the skin and cut more holes. The door handle pocket is a bit rough as well. And of course the obligatory speaker hole cut to the inside of the door. But hey on a positive note the paint tag is still in the door frame....

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Passenger door is good except for the speaker hole and couple extra drille holes on the inside. Good and solid though, with no rust. You can see I already started repairing the speaker hole.

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The engine compartment was a mess when I first got the car. Of course the hell hole and engine shelf on the right side were toast, as was the inner right fender wall, All of that was cut out and replaced, but now needs to be finished. That damage of course worked its way into the right Long, but that was replaced as well. The drivers side wall has signs of crash damage but not too bad. It will definately need sand blasting though to get all the glue off of the fire wall. Most of the brown stuff is glue remnants, not rust though.

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Further inspection up under the drivers side fender shows that the fender has been replaced. As you can see in the picture the support structure underneath was never realligned nor was the wall damage properly straightened. However the fender replacement and alignment was done quite well.

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Inside the right rear fender well, you can see the repair panel installed for the engine compartment, also a ton of cleaning to do, but thinks look pretty solid at this point
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The rear trunk is good and solid, however the mounting points for the jack are missing and the new plug is where the PO tried to put an oil cooler in, so several extra holes to be welded up. The rear wall is in excellent shape, but as you can see in the picture, the trunk lid has damage to the rear left edge,

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The right side fender flares have already been placed but need to be finish welded. the right side front has been cut, but the left rear has not.

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So today is NASCAR race day so just killing some time before the race. Decided I would look at the Fuel Tank and work on dismantling it.The filler neck, fuel level sender and return line nipple came out very easily, however the feed line nipple and strainer screen took about 30 minute of penetrating oil and persuasion to remove.


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After getting the tank dismantled I found that the goo on the line nuts and such cleaned up nicely. The filter screen was trashed and I found the it was full of debris, on the inside of the screen, where it didnt belong. Surprised if this car ran at all before I got it.Click to view attachment Click to view attachment Click to view attachment

The inside of the tank is not pristine, but looks good for nearly 50 years of service. I now need to find someone in the area that can acid boil it and then I will have it powder coated and do the POR15 treatment inside. Do any of you Texas folks know of a place that can acid wash it for me?

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Do yourself a big favor and buy a new tank, now that they are available. I paid almost twice the cost of a new tank to have mine boiled out, and it removed all the attachment fixtures in the process. I also didn't replace that problematic internal sock filter, much better to add an extra external filter in line.

Any Advice on the best way to remove the windshield? I need to get it out so it doesnt suffer any damage.

Thanks Jamie, I may just go that route. Considering the cost to clean it out, then treat the inside with POR 15 and then paint the outside.....

So I tried using a thin copper wire and got about six inches around the windshield before that broke, tried a few strands wound together, al little further then the goop just clogged it up and no further. I wracked my brain and came up with some very thin welding wire......and 30 minutes later I had success.


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Then it took another hour to get all of the mastic off of the window and another hour to scrape the majority of it off of the window frame. Man that stuff is nasty.

Nice rescue ! have fun love the color !

Thanks Pete. I have been debating what color to paint the car in the end, but the current color is kinda growing on me.

So, with rain on and off today, I couldnt move the hot rod out of the garage, so no working on the body of the 914. (Its a deal I made with the wife since the hot rod is hers)

Instead I worked on parts, cleaning and boxing for reassembly later.

Dismantled the steering rack and cleaned up the rubber parts...

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Then I decided to start working on the steering column. It was pretty clogged with 40 some years of dirt....

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The deeper I got, I found the crud just continued. The ignition switch doesnt look good at this point and the bearings in the steering shaft sound and feel like there is about a ton of dirt in them...

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So tomorrow I will pull the shaft and see what the bearings look like.

So, as I suspected the upper bearing is shot, feels like someone filled it with sand, the lower isn't too bad, but since I have it torn this far apart, I will just replace them both.

For those who have never torn the entire steering column apart, it really isnt a bad job to take on.

After all of the electrical components and ignition have bee removed the process is fairly simple

First remove the 6mm bolt from th under side of the housing

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Then you can use a soft mallet to separate the Lower support from the black housing by tapping on the end of the shaft at the lower support end. I recommend doing this over a padded surface or have someone to hold the housing, becuase when the shaft falls through the housing end will drop like a rock...

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This leaves you with the support with the bearing in it. You simply remove the circlip, then with a long punch or screwdriver gently tap the bearing out from the inside. Warning, if you plan to re-use the bearing, make sure you are tapping on the outer ring of the bearing. At the same time you will have to avoid the circlip that secures the underside of the bearing.

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This should leave you with two individual components, The upper housing with the shaft in it and the lower support bracket.

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To remove the shaft from the upper housing you will need to remove two circlips holding the shaft in place. the first is the ring on the shaft where the steering wheel mounts. I am sure they make a tool for this, but I don't have it so I just use needle nose pliers as positioned in the photo, give it one sharp blow and it comes right off.

Then you have to remove the circlip that holds the bearing in place. Then using the soft mallet, gently hammer the shaft out from the opposite end. Then simply pull the bearing off of the shaft. If this is done without a lot of force, you can generally re-use the crush washer that is between the bearing and the shaft.

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That should leave you with a completely stripped steering column, to clean 45+ years of dirt and grime from.

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The part numbers for the bearings are 91134777102 for the upper and 90005203100 for the lower. If you do need the crush sleeve that part number is 111 953 535 D

Hope this helps anyone considering this job

Dang.. nice jobs with that
I wasn't planning it, but now you got me wanting to do the same.


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You might consider using generic bearings instead of Porsche as you continue. Not all bearings are generic but they are a lot cheaper. Porsche often assigned 900xxxx part numbers to generic parts.
In your case, the upper bearing has 6003 engraved which is an identification of the bearing type and size under the metric bearing system. FAG has a catalog online that lets you decipher the numbers.
I checked the US internet and saw the Porsche bearing cost $17. An FAG 6003 cost $6. Over here in Germany, Porsche costs Euro 27 ($30) and an FAG 6003 Euro 3.
The other bearing appears to be Porsche specific but I imagine it is a standard metric bearing in a plastic case.
Last point is only use name brand bearings. There are many poor quality Chinese made bearings offered.

You're right. The FAG 6003 was fairly easy to source and is the way I went, The other bearing on the other hand, seemed that no matter where I went they could not find a cross reference for. It was quite difficult, so I went with the OEM bearing. Unfortunately there aren't too many places out here in east Texas to source this stuff unless I want to make the 2 hour drive to Dallas...lol

So today it was nice enough to park the hot rod outside, so I decided to address some of the more minor body issues.

First was to replace the spare tire hold down in the front trunk so I welded it into place and then hit it with some self etching primer. I have discovered that unlike in Colorado, any bare metal left for more than a day in Texas and its got rust all over it.

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