New 914 owner (North Staffs)

[RichardJ]

Hi, I've been reading many of the 914 threads on DDK for a while, having wanted one for 20+ years. I thought it was time I joined now I've finally bought one.

My 914 is a '75 California spec import 1.8 in Anacona Blue (badly resprayed , seemingly with aerosols). It's a project car needing relatively minor welding (as 914's go). In rust terms it is quite a bit rustier than 'chief's', but nowhere near as rusty as 'defianty's' projects on here. I'm currently stripping it back to a bare shell ready for repairs. It have never been accident damaged, and has next to no filler in it (just one miner rust hole and a dent in the boot lid seem to be the only filled bits so far. Not too much older history came with it, but enough paperwork to show it's always been in California, until it was sold to the guy I bought it from in the UK around 18 months ago. As a California car, most of the trim which has been exposed to the sun is beyond repair.
As well as stripping down, so far I've been concentrating on buying replacement trim parts. Not too much new stuff yet, mostly used parts which are in not beyond repair.

I suspect the car has been sold on as a project multiple times, as it seems that all the interior trim, etc have been in and out multiple times, with some of it having got damaged on the process, and some having been stuck back in with something like 'no more nails'(!). No real restoration work has ever been done, apart from fibre glassing rust in the back of the floor pan. The car has never been welded. As project cars go, it's in vastly better condition than the others I looked at, all of which were a patchwork quilt of previous bodged welding, yet cost more then mine did.

I run my own engineering company, and will be doing all the work on the 914 myself (except paint), as and when I can fit it it. The project will take me a few years.

Many of the locks had no matching key when I bought it, so I dismantled them expecting to find key codes on the lock components like VW, only to find Porsche didn't do that, despite many of the internal lock components being interchangeable with VW. Sorting this out became the first job of my restoration. It had a modern aftermarket VW (T25) ignition lock barrel having been fitted with a totally different key profile, and I found the original 914 barrel in a box of bits, then discovered this particular lock design impossible to get apart without a key, unlike it's interchangeable VW equivalent. With no obvious way of finding out the original key code, I bought a new genuine 911 key and barrel plus a used '75 / '76 914 lock barrel off ebay, the latter of which seems unique to those two model years of 914 despite the zinc lock housing and plastic cover being Beetle parts. I'd bought 8 exterior door handles to get two in salvageable condition, so set about salvaging tumblers from the worst of the others, which I've used to match all the other locks to the new key.

I'm currently researching whether to have the shell pyrolytically stripped of all paint, and de-rusted in phosphoric acid, having already ruled out the lesser methods used by some of the stripping companies (dipping in methylene chloride to remove paint, de-rusting with hydrochloric acid, etc).

Maybe I should use the above few paragraphs as the start of a build thread.......

If anyone else is local, and has a pre-impact bumper 914 in pieces, I'd really appreciate being able to have a really good look at the rear towing eye bracket and some front body bumper details, as I'm converting to early bumpers, and although I've found as lot of info online, it isn't as detailed as I would like to to be.

Richard

[middlefour1]

Welcome aboard Richard, sounds like you have quite a project there. Plenty of help and advice available here!!

[defianty]

Welcome Richard, good to see another 914 being given some love. I look forward to seeing your build thread. Don't go looking for too much rust like I did. It's hiding there somewhere.

[RichardJ]

Thanks folks!

[KAS.750]

Welcome along. There is lots of good advice available on here.

[914 KEV]

Welcome Richard to the world of 914 ownership.

[Green Ernie]

Hi Richard. I backdated my 75 bumpers and rear tow hook last year and took pictures of the work entailed if that's any help.

[RichardJ]

Thanks. I've seen which bits of impact bumper bodywork need to be removed to make early bumpers fit, but have not been able to find any really good pics of what the details in front of the bonnet and headlights were actually like on an earlier model. Similarly, I have a few photos of the rear towing eye bracket on an earlier model from behind, but can't find any detail of where it extends forward of the rear valance under the rear floor.

Ideally I'd like to measure up these details on an early car which has no bumpers on, so I can replicate them along similar lines on mine.

I'm also unsure of the thickness of the 'dog bone' rubber bumper mounts, as I've not sourced these yet. I was planning on making wooden ones for mock up purposes so I can get the holes drilled and my early bumpers bolted on before cutting the lip in front of the lights and bonnet.