Thats it for now. I am pretty excited to be welding on the car!

I hope to accelerate now that I am at the point of making stuff and welding it in. Hell hole is next!!

That's choice Richard! And I wasn't even going to comment about the gloves. Just kudos about the backing plate tool you made. Carbon also works, but that pic shows a priceless practical example of a great tool for backing butt welds. Nicely done.

Hey Richard,

It's been awhile since I checked your progress. Awesome work!

I am getting ready to start my rotisserie build, inspired by yours. Keep welding, it will be done in no time.

Jim

Holy shit, Richard!!! Great stuff!!! You've got patience I could only dream of!!!

Its been awhile since I have posted an update. As usual I am having a hard time finding the time to work on the car. But I have made some progress. here is what I have been working on...

* A new "skin" for the area near the passenger rear inner suspension console
* Replacement for the bottom inside of the passenger inner longitudinal.
* Testing out ways to clean and protect magnesium parts (i.e. the transmission case)

As always my site has more in the way of photos and text. My signature line should always have an up-to-date link. Here are a few quick links...

Main page...
http://motorsport.zyyz.com/project_914.htm

Passenger side suspension console repair...
http://motorsport.zyyz.com/project_914_03_02.htm

Passenger Longitudinal repair...
http://motorsport.zyyz.com/project_914_03_04.htm

Transmission repair...
http://motorsport.zyyz.com/project_914_03_14.htm

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For the new skin, I want to replicate the indent that is located right where the four cylinder engine mounts are located. So I am making a mirror image of the driver side.

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Here is my paper template I made. I am using 18g steel.

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Here is the skin bent to fit with the indent parts tack welded into place. Needs to have final weld and trim.

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Back of skin with tack welds

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99% Finished product.

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Test fit. I have actually not welded this in place yet.

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On the left is part of the double wall that will be right behind the new skin. On the right is the inner double wall that is where the passenger seatbelt mount passes through.

This is the first time I have used weld through primer. I had researched to try to determine what primers are good. It seems like people like "U-Pol Weld #2". This is the product from the UK that is supposed to be good. I don't have anything to compare it to, but I can say that it is not easy to weld on. If you spray, let it dry and then weld, it is hard to get a good arc started. Then the pool may tend to lay on top of it a bit. So while I am still using it, if I have to weld a rosette plug, what I now do is take an air powered die grinder and rough up the surface (effectively grinding off the primer) on the inside of the rosette hole. I am then able to weld it up just fine.

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Here are both welded into place. I have not ground down the welds at this point.

Here I am starting a test to see what is the best way to clean and protect magnesium parts. With a target of trying to replicate what the factor did, but with easy to find supplies. The factory wants you to clean with "Stoddard Solvent" which is a type of mineral spirits. For coatings, it appears they did a chromate conversion to protect the parts during manufacturing (post casting and machining) and then follow that up (post assembly) with "Tectyl" which is a waxy coating. Chromate conversion is not easy to do at home due to environmental issues and Tectyl is nearly impossible to obtain in small quantities.

My cleaners are...

A. Soap and Water (dish soap)
B. Simple Green (straight)
C. Mineral Spirits
D. Glass Bead Blasting

My coatings are...

W. Nothing (unprotected)
X. Gibbs Brand Penetrating Oil/Lubricant
Y. CRC Heavy Duty Corrosion Inhibitor
Z. Gibbs + CRC

My test part is the magnesium differential cover from a 914 transmission. The cast in webbing naturally segments the part into 10 sections. Starting with #1 being the most upper right segment, I numbed them 1-10 in a clockwise fashion.

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Here is the outside after coating. Here is the key for the segments...

1. B, W
2. B, W
3. B, Y
4. B, X
5. B, Z
6. C, Z
7. C, X
8. C, Y
9. C, W
10 C, W

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Here is the inside after coating. Here is the key for the segments...

1. D, W
2. D, W
3. D, Y
4. D, X
5. D, Z
6. A, Z
7. A, X
8. A, Y
9. A, W
10. A, W

I am going to let this weather outside and see what works the best.

Ok, back to the passenger longitudinal. I had started on reproducing this section a few months ago, but was using 20g steel by mistake. I have redone that work with 18g. My metal brake is not wide enough to do the bends in once section, so I have broken this up into three sections and then welded them together. Even if I could do it as one, it would be hard as the first 1/3rd is different than the back 2/3rds.

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Here I have the first 2/3rds done and am test fitting so I can trim the back 1/3rd and them mate them together. I am using the level as a straight edge. This shows where this also go when done.

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Ok, here is is mostly done. I have some final grinding that still needs to be done on the recent weld, but otherwise, it is ready to go in.

This shows the old rusted section and what would be the "inside" that you will not see.

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Again the same rusted section and new section. This shows the outside (which would be the very bottom on the longitudinal where the floor pan is connected.

The curved section is the very front of the longitudinal where you curve into the wheel well.

Thats it for today.

I am taking off next week and hope to get the passenger longitudinal back together. I have yet to fabricate the section directly behind the jack receiver tube. I have the restoration design outer longitudinal as well as the receiver tube and pyramid.

I also am shopping for a seat and since I can't test fit the seat in the car, I am driving to a place that has the seat I am looking for and am going to fabricate the wooden replica of the driver floor area. Mostly the width between the longitudinal and the center tunnel as well as the cross member. This will allow me to lay the box on the floor, place the seat in the box and then sit in the seat.

This is great stuff, thanks!

It gives me inspiration to start digging into the small holes that have appeared on my lower inner trailing arm mount. Heck, what is the worst I can find, LOL?

Excellent work that impresses and inspires me.

eric

Made some progress last week. I had taken the week off for vacation and worked about four hours a day over five days. I made more progress than these pictures show...

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Here the part I fabricated is welded in. When butt welding thin sheet metal, you have to do short welds and space them apart and let it cool. Rinse and repeat until you are done. You should alternate back and forth between front and back as when the weld cool they will pull the metal toward the weld. That will help cut down on warping.

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With it welded in place the car is strong enough that I don't need to support it with jacks and can now rotate freely on the rotisserie. This also allows me to put this section level with the floor so I don't have to weld out of position.

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Close up of the rosette "spot welds" near the passenger seat belt anchor. Also you can see the unfinished but welds on the joining seam. Upper left is some welds in a previous butt weld that had some pinholes.

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All done. I grinded down the butt weld on the interior all the way to achieve a smooth finish, but on the inside I didn't grind it down flush as there is no need. This will be hidden and I just dressed up the welds. I then lightly media blased the welds to remove all oxidation and then sprayed with Metal Ready. Metal Ready is great stuff.

"thass purty"

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Next I fabricated this piece. As you can see it is part of the front fender well as well as the base for what the front of the outer longitudinal welds onto. I just need to drill holes in the bottom for the rosette welds and then butt weld the top and side.

I don't have photos, but I also refurbished the front and rear metal pipes for the heater tube. That is about as far as I got last week. Next steps are...

* Fabricate new brackets for the pipes (have template from old)
* Weld in floor section
* Weld floor to longitudinal
* Finish welding in section (skin) behind inner rear suspension console
* Clean and wash out interior of box section near rear suspension console
* Final Metal Ready treatment
* POR 15 hard to reach places
* Weld in heater tube brackets and pipes
* POR 15 remaining places
* Weld in section shown above
* Weld in outer longitudinal

At that point it will be done other than the area around the jack point and stuff like the sill plate and other surface items.

Thats it for now!

Richard,

THis is awesome stuff. I have taken on a similar rebuild project, but have begun to cringe at the idea of digging into the Hell Hole!

I have a couple of questions . . .

1) Are there any cross-section drawings or photos that show the layers of metal for the rear passenger longs - near where the battery tray leaks?
Or do I just have to cut through one layer at a time?

2) You may have mentioned it in a previous posting (and if so point me to the page) - but what type & model of welder are you using (Mig, Tig, Flux)?

Thanks & keep up the great job!

Hey don't be afraid. It is scary, but you will sleep better at night knowing it is done. I have felt depressed at times when it was all torn and cut apart, but now that it is going back together I feel much better.

Regarding question #1. Here are two good threads...

http://www.914world.com/bbs2/index.php?showtopic=66790

http://www.914world.com/bbs2/index.php?showtopic=66637

The first is AA showing a bunch of repro parts welded together. Look for the post #13 from McMark. He talks about how the repro parts are not 100% accurate in that the section below the battery on the inside is two layers. The inner layer has a corrogated shape (which the repro has as well). Then there is an outer skin that covers this. Both make a "C" shape and it is the outer skin that has the flang that is spot welded to the rest of the car.

In the second you can see some nice detail photos taken from where the jack receiver would be back into the inside of the hell hole. You can see the corrogated metal and how the "C" is built and how the corrogated part is not as wide as the rest. I have some similar photos in this thread and on my site, but I think these are a bit better than mine.

Regarding #2. I am using a basic 220V Lincoln MIG unit with non-flux .025 wire (using gas). Because this is thin metal welding so a 110V unit would be just fine. I really expensive unit with more flexability on settings would work even better (with regards to setting on the welder), but I think that successfully welding thin sheet metal is 90% technique. Just practice a lot and get used to what setting/technique work well for you.

Good luck on your car!

Richard

It has been quite awhile since I have updated this thread. Here is some progress over the late summer and early fall.

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Welded in the replacement skin for the area directly behind the 4-cyl engine mount. Also part of the suspension console covers this.

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View from below. I will do some final grinding of welds when doing prep for paint.

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Working toward finishing the passenger longitudinal. Here I have painted the interior with POR-15.

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More POR-15, but this is a shot from under the car into the hollow bulkhead behind the seats.

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Some flash rust on the part I put on above, but here I have welded in the main "Hell Hole" repair section.

Now we move onto the inner passenger suspension console. This is a part I sourced from Restoration Design awhile back. First I drilled all of my plug weld hold, media blasted the replacement part, treated with Metal Ready, painted the interior non weldable areas with POR-15 and then finally the interior weldable areas with U-POL weldable primer.

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With POR-15. Not I bent the upper flange out so I could get a good tight fit on the bottom.

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More POR-15 on non-weldable areas. This shot doesn't show the weldable primer that I am about to spray on.

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Here is weldable primer, but I don't really like it that much. So I used an air die grinder with a stone and knock off the paint on the spots I will be doing my plug weld.

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Clamped into place. At this point I measure to make sure it is in the correct location (use the good driver side as a guide), then tack weld one or two places, remeasure to make sure it hasn't moved and then do more plug welds. Again you can see the top flange bent up for the moment.

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All done except for welding down the plug welds.

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Shot from below. I will eventually need to rebuild the "bridge" that goes between the inner and out consoles.

I generally do the welding stuff on the weekends when I can be noisy. If I work at night, I need something a bit quieter to work on. So I decided to refurbish the front suspension. I sourced a 911 front end that uses OEM Koni style struts. I have about 90% or so of what I need to rebuild much of the front suspension. First task is to disassemble the struts, strip and then powder coat them.

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Here is the OEM Koni strut. This is not an insert in the style of the current self contained Koni inserts, but rather this is the shock internals along with the shock oil that had to be drained. I will be putting in newer Koni "yellow" sport inserts into this strut.

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Here is something that I don't think many people do when redoing a strut. I am pulling off this ring that is on the spindle. Why am I doing this?...

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Because there is an O-ring behind it that I want to replace. This O-ring looks to be pretty dead.

Great attention to detail!

Thanks! I think this car is a keeper so I am trying to do it right.

Now comes the fun that I have been looking forward to for a long time. I have had a Caswell powder coating kit and a junk yard oven for over a year, but have not had a chance to try it all out yet. So my first powder coating is with my strut dust covers as well as the special gland nuts that allow you to use a Koni insert in the OEM Koni strut

First I stripped the old paint off with Jasco. Then I washed them with soap and water and solvents to get the grease and oil off. Then I glass bead blasted them. Then I treated them with Metal Ready. I then washed them in water one last time then oven dried them.

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Powder goes into cup.

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Hang part. Ground it to your corona gun. Make sure you have a swivel so you can rotate part as needed.

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Gun all loaded and ready to go.

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Part is now coated with powder. Sorry no action shots as I couldn't take photos and use the gun at the same time. Powder can just be wiped or blown off at this point. So you have to be carefull as you...

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...transfer into the oven. I drilled holes in the top of the oven to install some loops that I can hang parts from. Oven was pre-heated to about 400 F prior to me putting the part in.

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Powder spec says 392 F for 10 minutes. Within just a few minutes that part has warmed up to 390-400 F and the powder will melt. Crack open the oven just a bit and check temp with IR thermo. Once you are sure part is at cure temp, let it bake for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, turn off oven, crack door a bit and allow it to cool down slowly.

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Finished product looks awsome! Especially as this is my very first part!

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Other cover that has been stripped with Jasco, but prior to media blasting, etc.

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Here is one of the gland nuts. I used high temp green silicone tape to cover the threads. You can see some of the cured paint on the tape, but once you pull the tape off you can see that the threads are untouched by paint.

Ok, that is it for now. I hope to work on powder coating the struts tonight, but that is on the assumption that I don't run into problems getting the holes and mating surfaces taped up and that the strut hangs in the oven correctly.

this is awesome and I love the work...great detail.

One question. The high temp tape.
where do you get it and what temp can it handle???

Rich

Rich,

I bought my supplies (kit, powder and tape) from Caswell. Here is the link to the tape...

http://www.caswellplating.com/powder/powder_tape.html

I used the green tape which is rated to 400F. They also have tape rated to 600F. You can also use silicon plugs for things like bolt holes, etc. that you don't want paint in. I didn't buy the silicon plugs and am going to try to use tape for this. I will post here as to how well that works.

Richard

I wonder if in a emergency and you don't have a appropriate plug for a hole if you could use a quetip and just clean the hole out before curing?

I think that would work but you would have to be really careful to not accidently knock off some nearby powder. So far I have had pretty good luck with using the high-temp tape. I just create a "cone" shape like a plug, but the sticky side out and insert it into the hole. Or if the hole is really large just tape up the inside. Even if they shrink a bit in the oven thats fine as really the goal is to keep the powder off prior to going into the oven.

I need to update my thread with the photos from when I did the struts as you can see how I did this. The struts have a lot of holes to cover up..

Very nice work.

How's that diff cover coming along?

Thats a good question. It has been hanging outside for a few months. I will try to take a few photos of it tomorrow or Monday and post them. I will say that the "CRC Heavy Duty Corrosion Inhibitor" looks to be doing pretty good while "Gibbs Brand Penetrating Oil/Lubricant" is only doing so-so.

That's what I was curious about. I bought some (Gibbs) a while back but haven't had a chance to use it for much.

Here are the photos of the diff cover. It sat in my garage for about two months and then outside hanging under my back porch for about six months. Roughly in these photos the top 1/2 are untreated. The bottom half are Gibbs, CRC Heavy Duty Corrosion Inhibitor (waxy "Tectyl" like coating) or a mix of the two. Around 3 and 9 o'clock are Gibbs + CRC. Just below that is Gibbs alone and at the very bottom is CRC alone.

Observations...

1. CRC Heavy Duty Corrosion Inhibitor is working really well.
2. Gibbs Brand Penetrating Oil/Lubricant does provide some protection. But not as good as the CRC product.
3. Gibbs + CRC together seem to work fine, but I can't tell any difference than just using the CRC product by itself.
4. Areas that were cleaned via media blasting corroded the most.
5. The chromate conversion (even if mostly gone) is still providing some protection.
6. Areas that might get abraded via handling, weather, etc. have the most corrosion. Specially the Gibbs protected area show corrosion in raised areas that are most likely are due to the Gibbs being either soaked up or abraded/weathered away. You can see this clearly on the inside on the right hand side (that was media blasted) at approximately 4-5 o'clock position. On the raised ring, you can see magnesium corrosion in the Gibbs area.

My conclusion so far are...

1. Media blasting is the best at cleaning, but it removes the chromate conversion that may still provide some corrosion protection.
2. Gibbs Brand Penetrating Oil/Lubricant works, but it's not a miracle product.
3. CRC Heavy Duty Corrosion Inhibitor seems to work the best. This is not surprising since Porsche also used a waxy protectant (Tectyl) on the magnesium transmissions parts.

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outside

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inside

It may be hard to see the corrosion from the last six months in the photos above, but if you want to download 8 MP images you can find those at the following link on my site...

Repair and Restoration - Part 14 - Transmission

Just click on each thumbnail image to open up the larger image.

Ok, back to fabrication and welding!!

Now I need to work on putting the metal heater tubes back in. First I need to fabricate replacement brackets. I created a template based upon the remnants of the original rusted brackets. The same template works for both the front and rear bracket. However both have the "tabs" folded in a different direction.

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Paper template plus two brackets cut out.

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With tabs bent

Brackets and the metal heater tubes all welded into place. Everything has been painted in POR-15. It all went together pretty well. I have test fitted the actual heater tube and it fits fine. I have the three "U clips" that hold the tube in place ready to go. Those are riveted into place. However before I put them on, I want to finish some welding on the interior side of the longitudinals. Those welds will burn through some of the POR-15 and I want to touch that up before I close this section up.

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It's hard to believe that it's been nearly a year since I created the replacement floor section, but it is now welded in.

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After welding, but before I finished grinding down the welds

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Welds grinded flush, treated with Metal Ready and POR-15. I also removed the factory "U channel" reinforcement from the old floor. It was in pretty good shape. I media blasted it, treated with Metal Ready and POR-15. It just needs to be welded. When I test fit, I mark the locations that the plug welds will be done and then grind the POR-15 off a small circle so I am getting a good weld. You can't weld through POR-15.

You can also see that I welded in the last floor patch on the passenger side right under the firewall bulkhead.

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Action shot of me working on fabricating the small section of the cross member that is on the interior of the car. This is the box section that runs left to right. I had to cut out the passenger side as it was swiss cheese and could not be repaired.

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Here is a top view of the replacement floor section and the replacement end for the box section (it still needed work)

Well, that's it for now. I hope to finish up much of the interior of the passenger longitudinal in the very near future. Then I need to work on recreating the section right under the jack receiver tube. I have the replacement tube and pyramid, but I need to fabricate the section below that.

Comments and questions are welcome!

Its looking good man!

Did you say the metal heater tubes would be welded on all joints?

You would hate to develop any play where they could clank every time you hit a bump.

John

Thanks!

When I removed the pipes, they seemed to be welded in place on both end. For the front, there was two small stick weld beads run (total pain to grind so I could remove the pipe) where the pipe enters the passenger area as well as two on the brackets. Actually the pipe to bracket connection were brazed and not arc welded at the factory. For the rear it was a similar thing. Two or three small arc weld beads in the engine compartment area and one or two on the bracket. I have the front welded in place 100%. I actually haven't welded the rear in the engine compartment area, but it's on my to-do list.

The brackets themselves are attached in two places. On the side and top of the longitudinal. It's all pretty solid.

Ok, it's been months since I have updated this. Instead of going into a lot of details on how and what I am doing, I will just point you to my 914 blog instead...

http://motorsport.zyyz.com/project_914_Blog.htm

I think that tonight I am just going to post a bunch of photos. I always enjoy other people's progress threads when they have lots of photos. So here it goes...

Car is upside down so this is driver side...

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PO removed most of jack point tube and pyramid

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Gotta fix the front as well

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Quick media blasting to see extend of damage.

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Same for front

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Drill out spot welds of whats left of the pyramid

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More media blasting

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Media blasted and treated with Metal Ready. I have decided at this point I am going to remove and replace the driver side sill.

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POR-15 on the inside of where I am welding back my crossmember on the passenger side.

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Replicated the half-moon bump out. Getting ready to weld outside of longitudinal back into place

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Spray inside with CRC anti-corrosion. I will probably go back and do a proper cavity wax at some point.

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Heater tube back in place.

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All welded on. Fabrication takes a lot of time. Welding it together goes quick!

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Now for the double wall section where the jack receiver is located.

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Replicate the bump in recess for the receiver tube. This is just the inner layer of the double wall

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Just need to grind down the welds and add in the rest of the inner layer

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My son wanted help. He can't really help with the welding yet, so we decided to work on taking apart the rear swing arms. All he wants for Christmas is his two front teeth.

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He used the impact wrench right before this. I wish I had a picture of that.

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First two bends on the fabrication of the outside layer

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Inside layer just about all ready to go. I painted it with weldable primer right after this.

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Here is the main section for the outside. It's ready and painted. Just need to weld.

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About 1/2 done with my welding.

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While the car was rotated to get at the bottom of the stuff above, I decided it was a good time to put on the replacement donut and triangle

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Jumping ahead a bit, I have prepared both the driver and passenger side for the receiver tube. I measured (based upon location of previous pyramid) and tacked into place.

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Double check that it's in the right place and then...

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Finish welding the tube

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Mostly welded and about 90% ground down. Just missing the bow-tie.

Note this is not a perfect replica of the shape of the factory stamping. They have a flat spot that you weld the tub to. I decided it was going to be too difficut to replace that flat spot and was not going to be seen anyhow.

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Bow-tie in place. This is the reverse pyramid that creates about a 13mm recess for the receiver tube.

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Tube welded in, welds ground down, media blasted and treated with Metal Ready.

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POR-15 on the inside. I will grind off some of the POR-15 for my rosette welds on the pyramid

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Same for the front. I need to fabricate the section that covers this.

Well that is it for now. I am going to continue to focus on the passenger and driver side longitudinal. I had tried to order the sill plates from Restoration Design, but Bill was out of them. That's unfortunate as his price is very good on those. Alternative is AA. They probably have them in stock, but they are pricey if you compare to RD. I am kicking myself that I didn't know this prior to the AA Valentine Day sale. Budget continues to be tight, but I am just going to bite the bullet and order them from AA. Bill said it may be months before he gets to doing the sills.

Questions and comments are welcome! Enjoy the photos!

Excellent work, it really is encouraging to see this sort of stuff, i still have a long way to go on mine.

Really nice quality work Richard!

Thanks for all the great pictures too, it is always educational to see how
someone approaches repairs like that. I don't think I have seen anyone
reconstruct the inside of the jacking point so thoroughly, that looks like
the best way to do it...I can't remember now what I did, but I am sure
it was a hack job compared to yours...

Keep it up, you are on a roll now.

John

Nice welds! ...what are you using? I'm so glad the longs the 75 project only has one rust area on the passenger side jack pyramid. We ended up deleting the pyramid since we're not gonna use it. And probably also weld up the hole on the rocker panel.