I'm finished beating the dead horse

Tonyakavw · 10:05 AM

Back in February I decided to drop the engine out of my 1973 914 (the engine is a 1975 1.8) because the oil cooler had formed a serious leak. So in the process of taking the engine out to change the oil cooler, I disassembled everything, cleaned it meticulously, and replaced things such as the pushrod tubes, injector seals, and about 50 other little things. I also opened up my transmission disassmebled it, ended up buying another, etc., the story goes on. So today, having finsihed putting the engine back together I decided to do some welding. A long time ago I had noticed that the passenger side floor board had essentially rusted away form the longitudinal. So I bent up some steel to weld in. As I was welding them in today I decided to pull of the rocker panel out of curiosity, and concern, as I had accidentaly jabbed a screwdriver _through_ the longitudinal... So I pulled off the rocker and sure enough there's a huge crack in the longitudinal. I poked away with a screwdriver and the crack became nearly big enough to put your hand through... So the conclusion to this story is that I have decided to ditch the body of this car, after a lot of heartache to get it back to running shape (it was my daily driver for over a year).

So I am left with a lot of really good parts, including a whole drivetrain, new exhaust, wheels, tires, gas shocks, good springs and suspension parts, decent interior, electrical system, new brakes (320i on front) 911 M/c and so on and so forth. I suppose I am an ideal candidate for finding a rust-free roller now.

-Tony AKA VW

Tonyakavw · 09-06-2003, 08:17 PM

Tonyakavw · 09-06-2003, 08:18 PM

Tonyakavw · 09-06-2003, 08:20 PM

mikester · 09-06-2003, 08:34 PM

Sorry man, happens to the best of us. I'm on my second car myself.

914GT · 09-06-2003, 08:37 PM

Tony, it does not look pretty. Obviously not a native Cal. car. You can buy replacement inner and outer longs. If the rust is mainly in those areas it may be worth saving the car, but it won't be easy. Maybe it's worth getting a pack of cutoff disks and perform major surgery and see what you have, just make sure you provide plenty of support to keep things straight. You better check under the battery tray, behind the firewall pad, and the inside trailing arm mounts and see how much rust is in there as well. It might be too far gone. Good luck, hope you can save her.

Zeke · 09-06-2003, 08:44 PM

Get the clamshell and drive on. Unless your rear suspension console is bad with rust, you can fix that car.

Tonyakavw · 09-07-2003, 12:41 AM

Well, the rust is bad in some places, in others its not. Here's the list so far:

>firewall to floorpan seam - mostly gone, on each side of the center tunnel
>front suspension mounting point (drivers side, front point) - fixed sorta, but was rusted away...
>firewall is warped, causing engine lid to sit father back, pushing out the trunk (its definitely warped and not broken hinges)
>targa roll bar is composed of mostly fiberglass and bondo as I discovered today, some kind of massive repair there.
>The inside longitudinals are very wavy, like the metal has warped along the whole length.
>the only remaining part of the drivers side longitunal is the top part of it, the inside, outside, and floor of the longitudinal have rusted away in many spots.
>battery tray was completely rusted away but I have since replaced it, though that part of the suspension console is hole-free.
>rear trunk - the place it always rusts on every 914

So in my mind there are too many serious issues that transferring everythnig to a rust-free-roller would be a much better use of my time and money. I'd like to save this car, but I think its too far gone.

-Tony

Bleyseng · Bleyseng's Garage

Look for a better tub to transfer your good parts to.
Start off with something solid, you are ahead of the game then.

Geoff

jkeyzer · jkeyzer's Garage

Tonyakavw · 09-07-2003, 11:03 PM

Thanks for the words of encouragment. I took apart more of the car today and I keep finding more rust. Its going to take me a while to get this whole thing apart, but I should have a really nice stack of parts in the end. Probably some extra stuff to sell off at some point too.

-Tony

jkeyzer · jkeyzer's Garage

Does anyone know of a good source for a roller for Tony?

He is willing to invest a lot of time and hard work into making himself another 914 so I would like to see him get a good one. At the same time he is on a budget so it's got to be cheap!!