Interior shot. Love the Recaro seat. Still a bunch of work to do but a significant milestone to drive her. I will be back next Saturday to put more miles on, maybe some twisty roads.

First drive video 12/28/2013. Please excuse the quality... hand held iphone and I got a call at the end. Enjoy.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JNfbnc8FFxw

Congrats! It's almost finished.
Enjoy in good health

How exciting to be able to drive it finally. This is a great looking car and done correctly. The only thing that threw me off for a second was the rear valance. With the opening only on one side it made it look unbalanced until I realized there was exhaust pipes on both sides and an opening only on the driver's side. Regardless, that is a serious machine. Can't wait to hear more as you work out the final issues and get to enjoy the car.

Marv--wow!

I can't wait to have you bring your car out for a cruise!

Glad we connected today at COSI's!

Murrieta will be well represented with your rocket ship!

Thanks Felix, nice meeting you yesterday. I was quite surprised at the turn out of all the different makes and type of cars. I will be coming to COSI in the future.

Saturday 1/4/2014 Drove another 30 or so miles shakedown. Results are 1 sore neck from cornering forces. 2 ran out of gas. 3 the linkage for the 915 gear box needs work. After many many shifts to brake in the tranny, rowing thru the gears over and over it became difficult to find gears, sometimes first gear was hard to find sometimes it would not go into third, after an hour or so most gear were sloppy to find and fourth gear would not work at all and it would pop out of first.

I think the issue is the shift rods are rotating slightly in the "universal apex joint" I believe the solution will be to drill and pin the clamps.

Don at PMP has said this will be the best solution. Next week more shakedown runs. I hope to have the linkage issue fixed and so far none of the gauges are working. I have no idea how many revs I have been pulling. I can't wait to wing her out to red line.

i cant beleive i just found this thread. omg marv that car is beautiful. i had the same shifting problem in a baja i built. i pinned my linkage also. and i took a cut off wheel and grinded two slots 90 degrees of the pin holes. it helped to pinch the coupling to the shaft.

i wanna be part of the first major drive too. i live fairly close to you guys, just down the street from herschal. maybe we could get a drive in up to idylwild while the weather is still nice.

After a long read and meetings with Cheif Fraud Investigator E. Cannon, we will be seeking an indictment for false project thread.

Either that or an Academy Award for best effects in a fantasy film....



Seriously Marv, this is one bad ass build with a great (frustration) story attached.

The Patrick linkage is unmitigated garbage - with a high price. Well, atleast a few years back it was. You have a velios as I recall, and I have a wevo 915, but the kits share parts. Here's how I fixed it:

wevo shift linkage

This was a fairly challenging job for a diy'er due to the exacting dimensions. Shifting in the neutral plane from 1-2 to 5-R amounts to 5mm of rotation as measured on ther input shaft to the box. And you need to allow for slop. So, if off by 1mm the 1-2 plane may become unreachable. At the same time you need to enter the 5-R lockout properly. I had to cut and reweld the shaft a couple times before I got it spot on.

On July 4 the car was delivered to me, yay I was a happy boy. I now had the time to look at the car and admire her for her fineness. All was good in my world....except, as I had time to enjoy a few brews and look closely....almost everywhere I looked there was something not quite right. The list of strange work is long. There are issues with electrical, brakes, trans, steering and worst of all the suspension is totally wack.

Well guys what you see here is the car being loaded up for a trip to Phoenix. I am biting the bullet here and sending her to Jim Patrick @ Patrick Motorsports because I simply do not trust how the car runs drives and brakes. Jim has offered to go thru the car and make it right. Who knows what else Jim he will find that is screwy....I know this will co$t but WTF I am in too deep anyway.

Too nice a car not to have at 100%

How did you ever fix the door gaps?

The door hinge mount area on the body was given some healthy lovin with a blunt object.

In regards to the professional work done on the car. Even though nothing was said directly both Slits and Glen Sager gave me funny looks when I told them who was working on my car.... now I understand the funny looks.

You should be in good hands with Patrick Motorsports. He has turned out more killer 3.6 914's than anyone. I used to live in AZ and my favorite past time was drooling over the awesome 914's in his shop.

Yes agreed, I have known Jim for 10 years, all my suspension, go fast engine goodies and custom tranny are Jim's. Top notch products, top notch guy.

Back in my garage after a stay at Patrick Motorsports. JP sorted out many issues with the car. Now need to get new tires as the Bridgestones are 10 years old, have maybe 200 miles on them and hard as a rock. Thinking Toyo Proxes R888.

Will it be ready for the G&R?

Hi Marv,

Great to see you and your car last Sunday at G&R... i think you should re read
post # 410 on fixing your shifting problem. Good Luck.. i believe the problem
is in the shift rods ... needs adjustment ..and hopefully not in the trans.

Cheers,
Harry

Hey Harry good to see you to. I am hopeful that I may have found something that will make a significant improvement in shifting. It has been ten years since I took the car apart and I am finding that I pretty much have to relearn how to use the Wevo shifter properly. I have just rediscovered a few things I forgot about shifting the Wevo. The car maybe has 100 new miles on it so at this point I hope most of the problem lies with the nut that connects the drivers seat to the steering wheel. Time and miles will tell.

Here are a few projects slash updates on the hot rod. This is a pic of the front valence. I have fabricated a bug screen for the front air inlet opening to the oil cooler. It turned out nice, one of the mount brackets I will have to redo as it is slightly out of straight.

Also have replaced the black button head fasteners on the the spoiler lip with stainless button heads. You should be able to see in previous posts on this thread those were black not silver. This change makes the car look a tad bit racy-er I think.

Here is a cool change. What you see is an in tank fuel pump installation. The tunnel lines were replaced with a single stainless line with a regulator mounted up front. The fuel is pulled up thru the top of the tank.

My car had BMW fuel hose running thru the tub. This hose was showing signs of "chafing" so when the stock carerra 3.2 pump died it was time to make a change and remove the fire hazard line and update to in tank.

Here is a cool little bauble. This is a new shift knob it's a Wevo SL knob. This knob is CNC'd from 6061 T6 billet and is very light weight.

Last item of the day. I have been tired of the lap belts and wanted something more up to date. Because the roll bar blocks the stock mounting locations I had seat belts plus make me some new belts. I found these cool billet clamps for a Polaris quad and went about making some mods and installing new belts. Works just like stock.

Ok one more. Here is a beauty shot on one of my favorite loops. There are a some fun roads up in La Cresta behind Murrieta Ca.

Man, what a beautiful car. Gonna go back and read the whole thread now.

Terrific build and beautiful car.

I love the idea of a modern fuel pump in the tank. Can you give us some of the details?

Thanks

David

Lookin' good Marv. See you in Palm Springs?

Or seeing you at WCR?

Dang nice looking car! I don't think I've ever seen that front bumper or spoiler before. Who made them?

edit: I looked back to p. 1 of thread. La Mesa Body?

I like it.
A subtle curvature of the valance and bumper,likely as a measure for room,not merely as a stylistic exercise.
Very nice work.

Even more awesome to see in person !
Good meeting you and this car at last year's G+R
You should come out to our next Hollywood cruise in.
Marty

There have been a couple of requests for information regarding installing an in tank fuel pump. The information I looked into I was able to find on Youtube. Most of the project parts are available in a kit form.

My particular install is unique due to the fact I am running a Patrick Motorsport 914 Fuel Safe fuel cell. This is an advantage due to the fact that the top of the tank by the filler literally unbolts and comes off easily and allows access to install the pump thru the top, also that the fuel cell is already using AN fittings makes it easy peasy.

Hope this helps.

Yes La Mesa Body. However the bumper La Mesa made.... the curvature was made almost completely out of bondo...so I had to have a custom fiber glass mold made by a local fabricator. The chin spoiler is made out of steel BUT flexed badly so it needed to be reworked and reinforced significantly.
Lastly the chin edging is made from ABS plastic and is available from a NSX aftermarket vendor. I have over the years replaced that piece more than a few times due to scraping on driveways. I scrape it good every 6 months at G&R

The look is unique and would be quite hard and expensive to duplicate. (I am not interested in selling copies of the bumper)

Marv...save the date: Sunday, April 26, 2015, see the thread here in the Garage section. There will be Porsche factory rep (Kerry) at the cruise-in, he is a big 914 and aircooled gearhead.
Hope to see you there !
Marty

Hey Elliot. I will be at G&R and then going to Marty's Hollywood cruise. You going also? how bout a caravan

Love the eyebrow delete.

Subtle but cleans it up a lot.

John

What does it look like with the headlights on- extra sailing area?

On another thread someone was wondering if this car was ever finished. This car is done, finished and on the road. It is everything I thought it would be. This car with this power is easy to drive, you can just lug her around town or wring her neck. I have torque from about 2k revs on up to red line. She is incredibly quick even just short shifting at 3500 thru 1st 2cd and 3rd.

This 3.6 has been a wonderful engine so far. The light flywheel the RS cams. she has a mild lope when at idle, which I love. Now that it is all sorted there is virtually nothing to do except check the oil.

The 915 trans is working very well, after some initial shifter issues things are now working just fine. These transmissions can still be a little balky at times but most of the time it is a thing of beauty to row thru the gears.

The last and final big mod I did to the car was to add the 4 small fans on the front mounted oil cooler, after some initial fusing problems, and a slight redesign on the power circuit it has been perfect. She has a thermostatic switch and operates as per design, I have not seen any high oil temps since the install.

The next item to complete is a full corner balance alignment. I am curious to know what her final weight will be, she should be pretty damn light.

Is this car done, are these cars ever really done... they are a hobby and we will always find something new to work on. Love my hotrod 3.6

Added new side stripes recently.....

Oh and COTM Thanks Guys!!!

Very cool car.

First time reader of this thread, going to have to talk with JP about your fuel cell install.

Beyond cool. Not enough said for this car of the month. Saw Marv's 914 at the Riverside swap meet this past weekend this was the third time I've walked around this car maybe the best 914 I've seen. You hear this car arrive sounds extremely nasty turn and look and you know you need to walk over and look a little closer.

Nice! I prefer the stripes on the rockers to the door bottoms.

JP did not do the "in tank" fuel pump install, don't know if he does those.

PMS does this and sales the tank but to much $$$$$ to justify this mod.

Wow nice car,great selection off surfboards what more could a man want .