1975 1.8 Driver Restoration, Driver quality restoration of a 1975 1.8 Options

[didenpx]

I’m a newcomer to the air cooled world. I picked up a 1975 914 1.8 project car last Fall that I’m just now beginning to work on. It seems to be mechanically stock and structurally sound and has ~120K miles on what appears to be the original engine (it doesn’t look to me as if it’s ever been pulled).

I found it on Craiglist in Maine where it was in the hands of a VW bus/bug enthusiast who was the third owner and had decided to focus his energies on a bus restoration instead. It was last registered an on the road in 2017 when the second owner had it. When I bought it it lot drove and came with an assortment of Restoration Design repair panels, several spare doors from earlier cars, some foglight front bumpers, spare seats, etc.. In a first for me when it comes to project cars the electrics all function properly and appear never to have been monkeyed with. Lights, blinkers, engine heater fan, hazards, everything.

Photos below tell the story but the worst of the rust appears to be in the aft section of the LH outer longitudinal. I haven’t pulled the battery and ECU out yet, but from what I can see underneath the car, inside the engine bay, and between the quarter panel and the engine compartment tin the hell hole appears solid (but I’m prepared to find surprises). The rear of the car seems worst off with rot from the foam above the tail lights partially cut out and partially corrected (I’ll be cutting that all back out and starting the job fresh). It was also hit from behind on the LH side and although I haven’t measured everything out yet, from what I can see underneath things don’t seem to be out of whack (maybe wishful thinking as the panel gaps for the rear trunk are uneven). The trunk lid itself somehow didn’t rust out along the rear edge, but it’s suffered a lot of abuse in the form of a now missing luggage rack and a black fiberglass spoiler that had been attached with wood screws. The front of the car doesn’t show any signs of impact damage but the trunk lid sits high when latched on the LH side.

My plans are to do a driver quality restoration (between a Hagerty 2 and 3) and get it on the road where I can enjoy it; I’ll cut out and weld the rusty sections, do as much of the body work myself as possible (thankfully it is very straight and the paint meter indicates there shouldn’t be a lot of bondo hiding under the old re-spray) and get a professional re-spray at a local body shop. I’ll either farm out or attempt to DIY the engine work myself. Since I’m assuming the engine will need a rebuild (see below) I’d definitely like to increase the displacement while staying with the stock FI setup.

I just started assessing the car in the last couple of weeks and have focused on the health of the engine. It’s still got the original L-jet FI (which I intend to keep). When I got it, it fired up easily but was extremely lumpy and stumbled badly coming off idle. After fixing vacuum hose routing (mostly anyways), adjusting points, doing timing, and adjusting valves it idles well at 850 rpm, sounds much healthier, and revs up from idle nicely (all this is based on stationary testing as the car is not on the road).

Today I warmed the engine up and did compression test (throttle propped open with screwdriver) followed by a leak down test. I think the results tell me that I have a tired engine needing rebuilding:

Cylinder Compression Leakdown
1 105 15%
2 105 20%
3 105 21%
4 105 23%

I didn’t crawl around under the car to listen for leaking valves, but for each the cylinders I could hear hissing in the crankcase as soon as I pressurized the cylinders, which I assume is a bad thing. I’m going to discuss rebuild options at a local multi-generation family garage that started out as a VW shop; if they can do the work within my budget then I’ll probably go that route. I plan to drop the engine sometime late this month.

One thing I need help on at this point is figuring out the remaining vacuum lines. I have a large inlet on the air box that looks from the diagrams as if it should go to the charcoal canister but there was no hose on it when I got the car and I don’t know where it should be routed, or even where the canister is (is it that plastic contraption sitting on top of the fuel tank!?). And just yesterday I noticed there is another nipple on the metal thing that the coil bracket attaches to…what’s that supposed to go to??

Looking forward to sharing my progress. This is a great forum that I’ve already learned a lot from!

[didenpx]

Fred,

It's been a number of years since I did any welding, which is why I chose to start with some smaller and simpler stuff before I have to tackle the sills.

But your (and others') comments warning about getting into the project only to find major structural rot later caused me to pause and do some more investigating.

The driver's side inner rockers obviously need patching. When I get to that point I plan to cut out the rusted parts enough to clean up any scale inside the structure, coat them with the Eastwood Internal Frame Rail coating, and seal them back up.










Some work has been done to beef up/repair the LH rear suspension console. It seems solid and I'm inclined to trust that it is ok as is (should I?).











I did a thorough investigation of the hell hole area and finally took out the seats and carpets to get a look at the rear firewall.

From underneath I was able to see perforation of the engine shelf near the hell hole.



Once I got the interior out I found a perforation in the lower corner of the firewall next to the door jamb that allowed me to get direct eyes on the hell hole/longitudinal. I think what I found is a good news story (is it?). Based on what I saw after grinding off scale, I'm thinking of further cleaning, patching pin holes, and possibly ply welding another layer of metal on top of the long. Based on scraping and banging the long seems solid to me.







I also found rot where the floor pan ties into the rear firewall, but I assume that's pretty usual when the rear window gaskets fail and leak. I know mine is leaky as I discovered someone feebly attempted to seal the bottom of it with a long strip of electrician's tape.




I found this between the center console and rear firewall padding. It feels pretty flimsy and doesn't have any mounting tabs on the back so I'm guessing it's not authentic...but nice artifact anyway.





I got so involved with the hell hole investigation that I didn't take a lot of photos of the RH inner rocker. The worst part of it is near the jacking point, but it's also perforated in the front of the car, about the same as the driver's side. Again - it doesn't look very concerning to me (am I in denial?).