Mine also has black guards and the rear trunk foam is a rather thick, somewhat stiff foam. More of a pad but not very thin. Contoured in places.

does it look like this (mine - soft pad) , or is it the more rigid type that most earlier cars have.

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apologies @Van B . not intending to side track. (excuse = bringing it back/originality).

More of a semi-rigid, high density foam pad. Need a pic?

not necessary. fairly clear you have the other type. thanks for that.
just tracking that change. happens between yours (nov) and mine (jan 74).
be interesting to see what is in Van's car.

I have the same.

thanks @Big Len

apologies @Van B (predicting you have as per starbear)

Wonki, this is mine. Glued down and doesn’t come up… I tried but it feels very old lol.

@davep sorry for the delay, this is for your interlock research:

thanks @Van B

(ah the interlock, the horror, the...... )

That is a great photo set. The painted male spade is just the same as mine; paint does not make for the best of connections.

Van; does this help? From George’s Tech Tips 700, page 103.
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It ain’t listed there either @StarBear , but if you’re going to reuse the original bolts, go with the same torque listed for the engine support nuts, 21.7ft/lbs.

Ok; wasn’t sure. Weird.
Would like to use new ones, not 48 year old ones. Will check the ratings.

Almost everything new you can buy will be 8.8 at least. As I've been going through my car, I'm finding a lot of grade 5.

Been spending a lot of time LARPing as a type 4 engine these past weekends lol…. But, I want to uncover any and all issues as well as set myself up for a quality finish with my high dollar 3M undercoating. Today I spent the afternoon soaking the 50yr old Ziebart in mineral spirits and using all manner of tools and rags to remove it.

Pretty pleased with how much I removed today and the condition of the metal and paint underneath. I learned that the battery tray was replaced some time ago… and not properly primed or painted lol.

Yuck. Keep up the great work, Van!

Undercoating hides all kinds of sins, especially on 914s.

So true!

How come you took it apart. It only had 53k.

Basically because the car was 100% original in all the wrong ways. Every bit of rubber was leaking pretty aggressively or nearly disintegrated. Then, I found rust that was about to get out of hand.

I will only reseal and refinish the engine though, no rebuild. I want to enjoy the engine for its full lifespan.

looking good @Van B .
luscious saturn yellow been protected all those years.
nothing like a bright engine bay to cheer you up when you flip the lid to fret about fast idle and AAVs.

tip - install some new trunk torsion bar rollers if you have not already thought of that.
one of mine shat itself and shattered as we were doing the recommission. sheer age of brittle nylon at this point in time. got some nice new tidy repros from 914 rubber and replaced the broken one and put the other away as a spare.

@Mikey914
Mark, in the pic I posted yesterday, the grommet in question is for the hole between the rain tube and the fuel line ports. That's where the hard vent line goes through on my 74. And yes I agree replacing the hard line is a good call. Let me know how to add that to my order

Thanks

Van

I'm still planning to go smooth undercoating for the engine bay. But I may look to leave a second exposed if I have a clean section that makes sense... Maybe the back wall?

hard to know. the yellow is very attractive and 1970s.
30+ years ago i treated the areas similar to yours on top of longs.
and repainted just those areas. in black paint. it was just the lower parts of the the tops of the longs where it does the dumbo water trap dip down. i kind of cut the paint into a line around those hollows. its still holding up.

looks like you have more extensive areas to deal with from a repaint point of view.
you are likely correct with your approach.
the original paint does look pretty good where its been hiding under the zebart.

Man… such an absolutely tedious task. But I know I will be glad I did it in the years to come. The problem with Ziebart and other traditional undercoatings is that when it’s not sprayed properly, it foams… And that traps moisture.

The new stuff, like 3M Dyna-Pro 544, is vastly more expensive, but it doesn’t trap air bubbles and is paintable. After seeing all this yellow for the first time in 50yrs, I’m considering the idea of painting the bay yellow. But also, my original plan was for a smooth satin black finish that would let the refinished engine be the star.
It’s important to me the car should keep its stories. It is a survivor after all.

yes its a survivor.

half the fun is working out a legit and interesting path of preservation alongside making sure it is still functional, useable, reliable and --------->FUN to drive?

i guess folks didn't have that "problem", if it is a indeed a problem, 30 years ago.
you just fixed em up and drove them. they were just another old car.
but the longer time goes on and the thing survives the more interesting it becomes.

imagine a model T ford in 1970. still being driven around and still in the state your 914 is in. you can't. it was unimaginable. but thats what i guess a 914 is now.

I think a lot of it has to do with the car itself. One day, there will be no Chrysler K cars. Mostly because they were crap, but also because there was nothing about them that made them worth owning or keeping.

Oh I forgot to mention the bird shit on the trunk hinge pin bracket I now get to grind off and weld up correctly lol

there is probably some little club of K car fans out there that will keep a few examples rolling. not sure why, but it happens.

the only contemporary USA car that caught my eye when i was there as a post grad in the late 80s was the ford taurus. the wagon version. that thing was so good as an everyman car. really stylish. ford nailed it with that car. they even drove nice.

i wouldn't mind one just to cruise around in here with the steering wheel on the wrong side. just for laughs.

So, last weekend I bought an abrasive blaster tank to deal with the engine bay only to learn that I need way more drying action on my air lines lol… So, I’ll be dealing with that tomorrow hopefully. Today, however, was dedicated to buying another classic Porsche design. And quite possibly the slowest Porsche ever!

I was perusing Craigslist, as I often do. And I found a beautiful FA Porsche table and chair set. The owners DID NOT know what they had, only that it was a hand-me-down and good quality. So, $550 dollars, an adventure through Washington DC, and a few hours of polishing later, we have a new breakfast table!

I’ll be back on task soon, I just thou you all might like to see one of the last furniture designs by the man who penned the 911

I like that table and chairs; good find and buy.

very nice.

cast aluminium.

don't get me started on 20th C furniture. rabbit hole.
good buying sniffing those out.
the few sets down here seem to exchange hands for at least double that.

Thanks guys. I really like the idea that this thing is old enough that old man Ferdinand likely signed off on this design himself.

Score!!

I did some sand blasting in the engine bay yesterday and realized that I will need to learn how to do body soldering/tinning/leading or whatever you want to call it. I’ll post more on that tomorrow if I get the blasting all done. For today though, I cleaned up my mess from poor taping, retaped the car, and took the rockers off… more acorns! The PO tried his damnedest to kill this car. 90% of the rust issues I’ve found were under piles of acorns.

Both sides had a decent stash, but the passenger side still had one bedroom apartment in there. The Ziebart gave its life to save the longs

Did some fine grit soda blasting on the longs… definitely got lucky there!

As for the engine bay, I’ve finally reached the bottom of the rabbit hole… and I found some Swiss cheese on the drivers side. I’ve spent a lot of time in there and despite the perforations, the metal is still strong. So, I’ve decided to do some tinning (lead free). Nothing is structural, thank you Lord! I even ran a scope down into the longs and everything is very clean on the inside.

some people are lucky.
blessed with it.

you are one of them.

what a great car.

if i burn my one and only rev limited rotor i'll hop on a plane and bang on your door and demand one of the 2 you have.

Getting a little behind on updates here. I know this thread is pretty boring up to this point, but I’m also recording here for posterity. Hopefully soon, I can get to some more enjoyable phases and provide some better spectating lol.

I decided that welding was going to be required in a few spots. I decided to start with the firewall just because it was easier access. Unfortunately, what I thought was going to be one spot expanded rapidly once I was both sides. I’m not real happy with how it turned out and will probably go back in there with correct thickness metal in the future. It for now, it’s super solid and will have its ugliness hidden.
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After the firewall, a lightbulb came on that resulted in a trip to harbor freight for a punch and die set. I adopted the technique of making plugs. I reamed out the larger holes and welded in perfectly fit plugs. I used some aluminum angle and some magnets to keep them from falling through. You have to watch out with how close the magnet is to the welding arc or the magnetic field will destabilize your arc. 6” of aluminum gave enough separation though. And, it also did a pretty good job of holding onto some backing gas. I really like this method if you want to save a panel.
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Van,

Really like your Table & Chair addition. The wood flooring 5" or 6" wide color/finish really compliments your new addition.

I used to think I wanted to grow up to be like ConeDodger, now your being considered

Tom

Thanks Tom lol… it’s a tall order to ever get my car as nice as yours

Been working on the trunk hinges:

It was super difficult to to but I managed to tack a nut in place by threading a bolt through the original hinge. I couldn’t get photos because I was struggling so bad to make those tacks through such a tight space. After I got those in I had to repair some tears that had been hiding behind the poor hinge repair.
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Then I decided it would be wise to test out this fancy copper based weld-through primer I bought. I’m actually very impressed! It burns away real clean under the tig arc and holds up pretty well around the weld.
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New hinge assembly time:

Decided to radius the outside edges for aesthetics and to hopefully even out the torsional forces on the hinge.
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And of course, I had to deal with nasty zinc
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And this is where I ended up tonight:

I got the hub welded in, and managed a test fit… very pleased. These replacements are 23mm tall while the originals were 22mm, but I’m sure it’ll work fine.
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The last thing I did was spray everything in the weld through primer. Tomorrow I’ll weld it all up.

Glad I thought of the nut as an alignment tool, definitely made setup a breeze
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On the other hand, welding was a real challenge I had more blowouts than a Florida highway in July!
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No doubt those birdshit welds put a lot of trash into the metal… like soviet landmines long forgotten lol…

copper weld through primer is good stuff.
used a lot of it on the falcon ute.

nice work on the hinge plates.