Fred's Backyard LE Restoration Options

[friethmiller]

So, I finally decided to create a build thread for my 2nd 914.

Quick Story: Last summer (6/2022), I found this car listed on FB Marketplace and it intrigued me. It was listed as a ’72 but some of the pictures were telling me that this thing was probably a ’74 and possibly an LE. Against my better judgement, I decided to call. The man who owned the car told me that it was, in fact, an LE and that the “72” was a misprint. I told him I’d come pick it up and pay him his asking price of $1000. So, I rented a U-Haul trailer for $68 (incl. insurance), and drove 4 hours from Austin to Leonard, TX, which is about an hour northwest of Dallas. Got the car home without issue and shoved it into a storage unit for a month while I got thing prepared at my house/garage. Unfortunately for me, I had promised my wife that I wouldn't restore another car "in our garage". So, I'm stuck in the backyard [for now] attempting to restore a very rusty, old car. It’s kind of a pain when it rains and have to cover everything up, but I prefer being outside.

Condition: Poor! To say that the floor pans were a little rough, was an understatement. The car had been sitting in a field with all the doors/hoods off for years. This is never a good thing. When I saw the car in person, it had about 5 inches of wet leaves in the bottom. The trunk replacement was a "hack" with no welds to the transmission support. I can’t imagine driving the thing with the backend loose like that. The hell hole was in horrible condition with about ¾ of the passenger side longitudinal ripped open with rust. The list goes on. However, it did have its original 2.0L (minus FI) + transmission, and the dealer installed A/C. To be honest, the condition didn't bother me at all. I love restoring and repairing these cars. Plus the COA (or whatever they call it now) came back as a CanAm package car. This thing needs to be saved! I’m going to do my best to bring back this bumblebee. I've got a lot of pictures to post but here are some of the initial pics.

[friethmiller]

Drivers Side Longitudinal - Part 2 (12/31/2023): After a quick wire wheel of the longitudinal, you can see that the metal is in good shape. However, there are several small holes down the rail and a few larger holes through both skin and support metal around the seat belt bolt area. Unlike most I've seen, this longitudinal looks like it has rusted from the outside -> in. Note: the upper rail around the rear suspension really looks good. I don't see any holes.





Knowing that this car sat exposed in a field with a bed of leaves in the floor makes sense from what I'm was seeing from other side of the longitudinal. Here I have flipped the car on its side to attack the damage. My plan was to treat the rust in order to identify the troubled areas, and then replace the metal showing the deep pits. Note the cuts around the heater clip attachment point and how I pass this from one patch to the other.



Next photos show how the first and second patches were welded into place. The blue panel clamps really help when butt welding. The last two images show the patches complete just as I was losing the light of day.