One of the very last 1.7s made is up for auction on BAT this week!

I debated on posting this here or in the Originality forum, but since it is about a car that is for sale at a current auction, it belongs here, I think? It is one of the very last ’73 MY 914s made with VIN 4732927189 of 4732927660 and one of the very last with a 1.7L engine every made with a total of only 470 cars made after it. In 1974, the 1.7L engines were replaced with 1.8L engines.

It is almost comical that the COA says “European Equipment” instead of “North American Equipment” because this car while obviously made in West Germany, contains just about every single piece of equipment that appeared on cars bound for the USA. The small button amber side lights, the P-O-R-S-C-H-E letters on the engine grille cover, the lack of the VW logo on the back rear trunk panel, taillights are solid red w/o the amber lenses, front turn signal lenses are all amber instead of amber and clear/white or all clear/white, then the US DOT sticker inside the driver door rear door jam with the VIN and build completion date is present. The Porsche logos and emblems were not used in Europe because it was seen as a VW, so there would be no Porsche Crest on the butterfly horn button instead of the Wolfsburg Crest that came on VW made cars. I believe the European hub caps had VW logos on them or maybe they were plain. The only ones I have seen in North America either had no logo or had the Porsche Crest in the center of the hub caps. Very nice, very original, North American ’73 MY 914 1.7L car.

However, I just noticed this car has chrome bumpers with front fog/driving lights in them and they are not listed on the COA. 73s came standard with black bumpers and chrome bumpers and fog lights should be equipment listed on the COA as that those were not standard equipment on European or North American cars. We do know that a lot of changes happened between the '73 and '74 MY cars, like the little center dials on the tach and speedo gauges which are both silver and not black on this one. Also it has the black plastic door sill guards rather than the silver aluminum ones which came new on my car made only few weeks before this one.

Looks like a nice car, but there's a bit of a disconnect with the seller saying there's a small hole in the battery tray that's easily repaired, and picture 86. It looks like the passenger engine shelf is mostly gone and more holes through the inner fender. Hard to tell what I'm looking at, but it doesn't look like a solid car.



The fuel pump mounting looks quite questionable for what otherwise seems like a nice car.

It looks like the passenger side engine shelf is also rusted worse than most in picture 87.

Yeah, I certainly cannot disagree with your observations and I honestly didn't look so closely at the condition as I did the originality, history type stuff. At the right price it could be a good candidate to make a fun driver is probably the best I could say without seeing and driving the car, pretty much like most other 914s not including the obvious rust buckets or parts cars and certainly a concours car. It does need some TLC, but is well worth restoring for preservation's sake if nothing else IMO.

I will say that the person selling this car is the reason I got into 914s and is a great friend. The car is exactly as represented. The odd fuel pump mounting was to avoid having to put any holes in the car to mount a replacement fuel pump as the original wasn't available when he had to replace it.

I don't know of any reason that the bumpers, sills, etc., are not as delivered on the car. It really is like a time capsule and has been maintained in his ownership to keep it original, but still use it.

Good Evening,
As the owner of the car, I will add the car has won its class and division in preservation at the 2008 Porsche Parade and came in 2nd in class and division in 2016 at the Jay Peak. The late Allan Caldwell who is one of the foremost 914 experts around judged the car at both Parades and he had no problem with anything on the car and this was with the COA present for him to review. I can't answer why the COA has listed what it does, but the car is shown as it was delivered when new according to the PO upon my purchase.
The 2-3 inch hole under the battery tray caused me to have to relocate the fuel pump using a custom made bracket with existing holes. If the next owner wishes to patch the hole and relocate the fuel pump back to the original location, it should be an easy job for a quality bodyshop. Thank you again for looking at the car, it is a pleasure to drive and will make an exceptional car for someone.

also has black plastic headlight surrounds not white like most 73s.

looks like a few 74 changes made their way into very late production 73s.

Sorry, I did not mean to imply that the black plastic door sill plates were not correct, they are correct. All of them are black plastic after VIN #4732918919 and this car has VIN #4732927189 which is way after the change was made if the information in Dr. Johnson's book on 914s is correct. The one thing we know for sure is that the manufacturing dates do not closely follow the VIN dates, especially in certain MY cars for whatever reason. The Karmann Chassis numbers seem to track pretty close, but I have little doubt this car is all original except for the noted fuel pump relocation.

As for the the judging at the Parades, and with all due respect to the judges, you must take those things with large boulders of salt. I have not doubt that it was at least the 2nd most original car at the Parades. Expert Judges are like Dr. Johnson who wrote the book on 914s, they are human beings who used the information that they had or learned prior to that date. The past few years here on 914World have been very revealing regarding things that were once considered Gospel. Such as the black sills, you will find statements from some very knowledgeable 914 "experts" that will say they did not appear until MY 1974 cars. We know this to be incorrect today and in fact they appeared at least as early as April of 1973 on '73 MY cars. My car was made in March of 1973 and had the silver aluminum sills new from the factory when I received it in May of 1973. This is just one example of a few mixed MY part changes that occurred during the switch-over from 1973 to 1974 MY cars during the summer of 1973.

As for the COA, there have been many noted errors in the documents, although this one goes beyond most of the others. Incorrect Paint Codes are almost common place, missing info, even incorrect VIN numbers which are just typos I'm sure, and lack of QA/QC. Information under the "Optional Equipment" is often very unreliable. Record keeping at Karmann, Porsche, VW, and even PCNA did not exactly give a high level of confidence back when they were still being sold. You can get a 'Porsche Classic Technical Certificate' for $500USD+tax from one of a dozen NA 'Classic Porsche' dealerships or a 'Porsche Production Specification' doc for somewhat less money but for a piece of paper that gives color codes and the often poorly translated options list, and nothing much else. Even the Kardex cards can contain errors, typos, and incorrect translations, but dpateman can still get a Kardex type report over in the Originality and History forums AFAIK and for a modest fee and it doesn't take several weeks to get like the ones from PCNA.

I have corresponded with the seller and with what I can learn from him, the description, pictures, etc without being to view or drive the car personally, it is a very fine example of one of the last 1.7L 914s made. I wish the seller well in his auction on BAT. https://bringatrailer.com/listing/1973-porsche-914-80/

Just a heads up on some of the "facts" being mentioned here. On the CoA, the paint code is in fact correct, but in a different format than the badge; the CoA uses the marketing code that is recorded in the production ledger that PCNA uses for the data to write up the CoA. The do the same thing for the 911's of the period also, and it can drive knowledgeable people nuts, but that is their policy. They do not list the engine code EA that is stamped on the engine case, but PCNA assumes that if they provide the model as 1.7, then people will figure it out. PCNA knows the car is a 1.7 model because they have the marketing model code for the car (but do not include it) that also has information on the base specification. In this case it would appear that the car has the appearance group option, and thus has the chrome bumpers, fog lights and sail panel vinyl amongst other features. I would have to see the production data to understand the European Equipment since there is no such thing, and the light metal wheels should be alloys but of which variety is not known. This could have been a dealer swap; one never knows. So while my Report provides much better detail, this one is not too bad.
Kardex can have errors or omissions. Out of perhaps 2500 Kardex in my files I have spotted only 2 errors, however perhaps 20% have omissions due to poor clerical work.
I am not sure why the first post mentions VIN 4732927189 when the last post is showing VIN 4732927447; these are two different cars.

i think @MCShack might have made a mistake transcribing VIN# in his first post about the car. but he is generally right, its pretty close to the end of 73 production. 213 from last. K# is a thursday. maybe second last day?

re engine bay rust. would have copped that in its first decade of life? looks like a case of arrested decline for decades since with dry storage? hopefully not too bad and restricted to the engine bay shelf corners. certainly looks that way on passenger side.
pretty good car going by the photos depending on just how far drivers side has corroded.

I'm tempted to say the hole in the passenger side engine bay shelf almost looks deliberate. like the original owner or an earlier owner drilled out a hole in the sheetmetal to allow for water drainage - given the "dubious design" original factory drain plug still visible. i still have those same plugs in mine and i always raise my eyebrow looking at them - like how could these really work?)
the hole looks circular but has gone on to corrode away from one side? ???????? i dunno.

a green 1.7 a month or so back on BAT appeared to be in even more remarkable original condition. amazing how these un-meddled with 1.7/1.8s from 73-75 pop up that have been left alone for 50 years.

That was a real quiet end to that auction. I thought it would go for a bit more but it looks like the market has really cooled.

@davep Dave, my apologies, yes I somehow got VIN #'s confused between two different cars I was looking at or answering questions for someone(s), but my comments were intended for the 27447 car, obviously two different cars. I am blaming it on severe chronic insomnia or general sleep deprivation which I have been suffering for a few months now. I rarely claim things on 914s to be 'fact' for good reason, there seems to be an exception to every previously known 'fact' and I'm relying on 50 years of 914 ownership along with a few books and websites such as 914World and Jeff's 'bowlsby.net' site which is packed with good 914 information, especially his section on the CanAm Limited Edition cars.

Yes, the paint code is correct and I certainly never intended to imply that it was incorrect for this car, not sure where that came from. The EA engine code is easy to decipher by the number alone, but I didn't mean to suggest it was incorrect or incomplete, it is fine as far as I am concerned. This car however does not contain all of the items such as the center console w/clock, oil temp gauge and voltage meter normally included with a $300 Appearance Group car, but regardless it is not listed on the COA as either AP or have the components listed. My point was mainly regarding what the "European Equipment" was supposed to mean since this car appears to have every item included for "North American" or "US" cars such as the small amber side marker lights, turn lenses, P-O-R-S-C-H-E engine grille cover letters, Porsche crest horn button, non-VW rear trunk panel badge "914-1.7" rather than "VW-Porsche" badging, but most importantly the US DOT sticker, but I'm repeating myself, again...
I have learned a lot of this information from you as I have always considered you to be a leading expert on all things 914. We are a community here at 914World that collectively have more knowledge on these cars than any other place available, so please forgive me if I have misspoken in some way, it definitely was not my intention, quite the opposite in fact. I even suggested to the owner by PM that he try and contact you with any questions regarding the Kardex info, but if you would rather people not contact you I will refrain from doing so, just a little too enthusiastic about these cars sometimes. All that said, everything I said is still true other than my "typo" and inferior "copy and paste" skills regarding the VIN number in the earlier post. Please only use the VIN from the COA which matches all other VINs on the car.
Peace and stay safe out there everyone!

Did the appearance group include the console for a 1.7? I assumed the same at first but looking at the some other sources including an excerpt from Dr. Johnson's book, it appears the appearance group on a 1.7 was available and included the items this car had but did not include the console. Just curious as I continue to learn. Cheers.

Please consider any criticism on my part as trying to educate the members. It is never intended as personal attack. I also make mistakes and certainly want any of my mistakes criticized so that I can learn from them and improve my knowledge.
I will have to delve deeper into the appearance group, and the performance group items. I tend to forget details, so it is important to keep copious notes. Also, unless I have the Factory data on a particular car (and that costs a considerable amount) then I cannot be certain how a particular car was built. That can be different from how it was delivered to the first owner since the dealers were always willing to make a deal, and some items could have been added or deleted. Then after delivery there has been some 50 years where owners could have made changes. I have aided Brett Johnson on the 356, 911 & 914 books, however, it was much less on the 356 since it has been 40+ years since I owned any. Still learning a lot every day.
Yes, you can pass my name on to people that may want a report on their cars.