Oh man, now that I know I’m being supervised the pressure is on. But I guess since I haven’t gotten or responses from you guys, then my decisions are at least acceptable lol… or maybe just morbid curiosity to see if any of them turn into a cautionary tale

#dobetter

After laboring through the gummy nasty second layer of paint on the driver side rear quarter, a funny thing happened on the passenger side. I noticed a small section delaminating as I was working with my coating removal disc. So, I pulled on it a bit while it was still warm.

My instinct was correct, the paint was not at all bonded… anywhere.

So, I took a torch and chisel and stripped it like old house paint lol! Unfortunately, I found a terrible excuse for dent repair that was rusting away underneath. Because I have all the records for this car, I know exactly when and who did this “repair”. What I didn’t know until today, was the extent or quality.
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I suppose one silver lining is that this was the fastest I’ve ever stripped the paint off a car lol… and dust free!
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at this rate when i touch down in dc to check out the lunar module in the smithsonian - i won't get a ride. (i'm really going to check out the plywood german flying wing from WW2! and the Bee five two if they have one? )





@StarBear will have to come to the rescue with his bernardsville vicinity original so i can relive my wasted youth enjoying your fine country back in the late 80s.
i shoulda stayed, married the girl and become a citizen.
then i could drop in and help you rip the paint off.

keep going. it will be great.
esp if you can reproduce that fantastic undecideable yellow or is it green.
same as phoenix red or is it orange.

its still a good car despite the minor prang in its distant past of being

i'll be demanding an up close special clearance inspection of an F117 if i have to stand around your car on jack stands drinking a beer.

ps
love the wheels. good look oh yes.
am almost ashamed of my star steelies, but you know.
got to go with the corny VW attempt at sportiness because i was born a nerd, much to my mother's despair.

Wonki, I can't fathom how many surprises hide in the small, finite space that a 914 fills. But in my case, the answer is still more lol...

Nice progress......love the wheels!

Ha! Thanks buddy! No take backs though!

Wonki I noticed that the left and right side photos show the color change perfectly. Bright yellow in the infrared and yellow green in the UV shade. The blue light from the awning definitely helped it slow up on camera this time.

Oh and you'll have to venture westward for a sighting of the few of those still in the air as test mules

Paint delaminating is what lead me to paint my '76 too! I was able to strip the lids and large areas in other spots with a scrapper and a couple of boxes of razor blades. In retrospect I'm glad it happened or I would have missed the qtr panel repair. What is a coating removal disc Van? @wonkipop you might consider adding the Space and Air Museum in San Diego to your travel plans. https://www.sandiego.org/members/museums/sa...ace-museum.aspx

@76-914 I use these bad boys in 7” diameter on my polisher.

https://www.3m.com/3M/en_US/p/d/b40071650/

Doesn’t gouge into the metal unless you get on the edge accidentally. And with a polisher you can slow it down to control the heat you put into the panel.

The last time I looked at this thread you and Wonki were talking about furniture

Now I check in and the car is torn to bits and missing paint.

Do you even 914?

Sadly . . . No. Mine is buried in storage while it awaits its new home to be built. It’s even more buried than this once I got all my parts and shop equipment in there

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I’ll have to live vicariously though your project .

I got some of those but I didn't know the name and I don't have any that large. I've got some 4" ones that go on an angle grinder and 2" roloc style. I wish I'd known of the 7" that fit my polisher.

quite a multi storey shed you got there mate.
you could really bury a 914 under a lot of sedimentary layers of "kipple".
i think that is the word phillip K dick used........for stuff or .......whatever.

its kind of like where i live.
no windows.
but i am top lit.

looks like i will be going to fresno?
wonder if i am up to skating a few empty swimming pools with steve alba.
not likely at my age and with my knees.
wrecked the left knee about 2006 bailing on a grind. in a steep aussie pool.

little stevie caballaro owned a 914 back in the 80s

You’re on your own there wonki. I’ve never been on a skateboard in any real way. Where I grew up, roads were flat and rough and pools were above ground lol

we didnt have real above ground pools here where i grew up.
they were wading pools 6 inches deep for kiddies to cool off.

the only ceeement pond i desecrated back in the 70s was in an abandoned display pool showroom in an industrial suburb of melbourne. and it was a steep as all sh$5.
no one got above the scum line. the tiles were at the edge of the universe.

i think at this stage of life i will go nowhere near a pool again.
i did get a good run at some in the early 2000s while i was still sort of an approximation of my early form in terms of body structure. the surfing breaks here were getting unfriendly so i just went into find a pool with some mates and enjoy the hard crunch of a wipe out alternative.

i will just park myself at the end of the runway in fresno.
i got to see one of those things while they are still flying.
call me stoopid, but those planes are way weird. like a lunar module.
american thinking at its finest even if somewhat outdated by the stuff now being done.

F117 = L jet 914. numero uno? you can see my drift.

On one of my solo cross country trips 30 years ago (in a 75 911, what a great car) just outside Vegas I saw a pair of them flying, pretty low, maybe a mile away. I remember being pretty excited about it. Wasn’t much I could do but watch, not like I was gonna whip out my phone and try to snag a couple pics, like most of us do today. Filing to the ever diminishing memory bank was my only option...

Making problems, then solving them and declaring it an accomplishment lol…

Made a video detailing my method for preemptively solving door alignment issues.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GhrzzHzztLE?si=Tt_KvG2v4HPywOqZ


https://youtu.be/GhrzzHzztLE?si=N4kM7ySNODyXjxqM

Don’t mind the red tape, I was paid a visit by my in resident auditor. I gave her the tape and said mark anything that doesn’t look right to you… she found a lot

Work and weather stalled progress for s bit, but I got some things going again. I decided a while back that I would do my own replating and what better place to start than on parts that I will paint over!

I went with the caswell kit vs making my own solution. I have made my own brew before, and had good success with electropolishing, but plating never came out cosmetically the way I would like. Other than the easter egg chromate dip on the caswell kit, which I’m struggling with, everything else is great.
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I also, refit the doors again after bolting the hinges back up, just to see it all work and those pins did exactly what I needed. What a relief that I won’t have to fight that down the road!
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Your plating turned out good. I may try that one day. Years back a body man told me to drill those door hinges. and trunk lid hinges with a 1/8" bit before removing them. When re-mounting the pieces insert the drill bits stub end first. It help[s to place a bevel on the stub ends. Fast forward to present day: A neighbor who was a body man years back came by to check out my work last year and gave me the business for drilling those holes. A couple of weeks ago he dropped by to lend a hand remounting the front lid. We loosened /tightened the hood several times before he sheepishly relented and let me do it my way. Now he is a believer. Can't wait to see your finished product.

I knew there had to be similar approaches. I prefer the roll pin due to the interference fit i.e. really tight tolerance. I hammered the pins flush after torquing down the bolts, and with a little dab of epoxy or filler, you’ll never know they were there.

I appreciate the confidence vote… I’m definitely in that make or break moment where the finish line seems further than ever! Bizarre how a physical object as small as a 914 can begin to feel like an infinite black hole lol…

I hear you. 90% done and 90% to go. I actually enjoyed the metal work but there is a lot of other items that were pure drudgery. You're car is going to look so good and you can now see the light a the end of the tunnel.

yes i think light bends around a 914 altering time and space.
leaving you stuck on an event horizon never arriving and never leaving.
its such a 1970s car but then again it isn't.
it was kind of out of time and place when new and sort of remains that way.
all on its own in some kind of other design period all of its own?
probably explains both its appeal and its dislike and nothing in-between.

it is actually a definition for avante-garde? and its sort of stayed avante-garde.
no one has really copied it. since. so its just remained original and unique.

you will get there and you have the benefit of working from a very very good base.
wisely purchased.

....and then .......when done-------you can put us all to shame with our slightly malfunctioning L jet systems.

that plating looks great. top job. you are a bit of materials scientist i see.