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  #51  
Old 10-12-2020, 05:59 PM
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Well, it's been waaaay too long since I made any progress on the car. Don't really have much of an excuse, except life gets in the way sometimes.

Anyway, I finished and painted the battery tray. I also cleaned up and painted the little metal pieces on either side of the decklid and reinstalled the rear window and trim. Still have a ways to go, but I feel better putting some pieces back on the car.

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  #52  
Old 10-22-2020, 04:12 PM
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It's finally time to take on the last "DAPO" thing I've found so far on the body -- the hole in the passenger-side latch panel.
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Sorry, I forgot to take a picture of the rust holes inside the DAPO-hole all welded up. It's done, but you'll just have to trust me that I did it.

I was able to buy a patch piece cut out of a donor car. Here's a pic of it trimmed to fit.
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I bead-blasted the patch and painted the backside to protect it. Then, I cleaned the metal around the hole and tacked the patch in place.
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In the next update (whenever that might be), I'll show the second half of patching the hole -- welding, grinding, filling and painting.
__________________
2016 GT4 warp 7
1999 SPB warp 2, maybe
1973 914 2.0 1/2 impulse if it ever gets out of space dock

Previous:
1973 914 1.7 1/4 impulse
2012 Cayman R warp 4
2006 Cayman S warp 3
1999 SPB warp 2, maybe
1966 911 warp 1.5

Last edited by BillC; 11-02-2020 at 04:20 PM.
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  #53  
Old 11-02-2020, 04:24 PM
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I was able to spend some time with the car this weekend, and I finished the passenger-side latch panel.

Here's the patch fully welded in:
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Here's the patch ground down:
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Here's the patch filled, primed and painted:
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Not the prettiest job, but it will work until I have a chance to do a full restoration some time in the distant future.
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2016 GT4 warp 7
1999 SPB warp 2, maybe
1973 914 2.0 1/2 impulse if it ever gets out of space dock

Previous:
1973 914 1.7 1/4 impulse
2012 Cayman R warp 4
2006 Cayman S warp 3
1999 SPB warp 2, maybe
1966 911 warp 1.5

Last edited by BillC; 11-02-2020 at 04:33 PM.
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  #54  
Old 11-02-2020, 05:28 PM
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Cant see it from my house!

Nice work, thanks for keeping the thread going
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  #55  
Old 11-03-2020, 08:41 AM
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I hate it when you guys do fantastic work then self-criticize. Nice job, Bill.
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2016 Cayman S
1999 Miata ("SM") race car
2016 Toyota Highlander--tow vehicle/wife's DD
2017 VW GTI SE (DD)

Gone and missed:
1992 Miata ("SSM") race car
2009 911 C2S Coupe
2004 Toyota Prius - sold to son's girlfriend
2006 Dodge Durango
2003 Acura MDX
86 Black 911 Coupe race car
86 Gold 911 Targa
82 WineRedMetallic 911 Targa
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  #56  
Old 11-11-2020, 05:12 PM
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I took advantage of the federal holiday to spend a little more quality time with the car today. Today's task was to fix the six bolt holes (3 per side) used to attach the bottom side of the rocker panels. I was hoping that all I would need to do was drill them out with a left-handed bit and everything would be good, but nope, the DAPO had other ideas.

Every single hole had a broken bolt stuck in it, and every single broken bolt had a hole drilled off-center through it. Like this:
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You'd think after boogering up one or two holes, the DAPO would take a step back and try to get better instructions and/or tools for this job (or an f'ing clue), but nope, they charged forward and screwed up all the holes (only one shown for brevity).

For five of the holes, I was able to use my dremel tool with a tiny carbide bit to grind out the remnants of the bolt. Then, for each hole, I drilled the hole oversize, tapped it and installed a helicoil.
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However, one of the DAPO-holes was so far off-center, I had no choice but to grind the hole oversize and weld it up. I then drilled, tapped and installed a helicoil in this hole so it would be consistent with the others.
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__________________
2016 GT4 warp 7
1999 SPB warp 2, maybe
1973 914 2.0 1/2 impulse if it ever gets out of space dock

Previous:
1973 914 1.7 1/4 impulse
2012 Cayman R warp 4
2006 Cayman S warp 3
1999 SPB warp 2, maybe
1966 911 warp 1.5

Last edited by BillC; 11-11-2020 at 05:19 PM.
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  #57  
Old 11-11-2020, 06:21 PM
Cairo94507 Cairo94507 is offline
 
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Some people should never own cars.....let alone a 914.
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  #58  
Old 11-28-2020, 11:01 AM
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I had some time yesterday to work on the car, so I decided to take care of prepping the passenger-side door for a mirror.

All 914s came from the factory with nut plates for mirror mounts welded inside both sides. However, normally only the driver's side was drilled out for the mirror. A factory passenger-side mirror was a rare option; it seems like most original owners that wanted two side mirrors just installed a pair of aftermarket mirrors. But I want original-style mirrors.

All I could find for instructions was to just "drill out" the sheet metal skin so you could screw the mirror to the nut plate. However, there are two issues with that simple guidance: First, you have to locate the holes from the inside to the outside; and Second, with my luck, I'd end up going too deep and drilling the threads out of the nut plate, ruining it as a mounting site.

So, here's what I did:

First, I unbolted the door and laid it on towels on a workbench. Then, I located the nut plate inside the door -- it's located just outboard of the post between the sliding window and the fixed triangular window. Here's a pic:
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Then, I drilled pilot holes from the inside out. This was the only way I could guarantee getting the outside holes in the right place. It's very tight inside the door, especially with the window frame still installed, so I pulled out every right-angle drill attachment I own -- both of them -- and was able to cobble together a way to drill the pilot holes with a stubby 3/32" bit. Here's what the tool looked like:
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And here's what the pilot holes looked like on the outside:
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Then, I took my dremel tool with a small pear-shaped cutter bit and carefully ground the holes out to full size. This was actually the most time-consuming part of the project, but it let me make sure the holes were centered on the threads in the nut plate. After grinding, I chased the threads with a 6-1.0 tap and then touched up the paint. Here's the final result:
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Then, after I was finished with the mirror holes, I went back and painted all the rusty areas inside the door with rust-converter. It's not ideal, but it should stop the door from rusting inside-out before the car can get a full restoration.
__________________
2016 GT4 warp 7
1999 SPB warp 2, maybe
1973 914 2.0 1/2 impulse if it ever gets out of space dock

Previous:
1973 914 1.7 1/4 impulse
2012 Cayman R warp 4
2006 Cayman S warp 3
1999 SPB warp 2, maybe
1966 911 warp 1.5
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  #59  
Old 11-29-2020, 05:12 PM
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Now it's time to tackle a common 914 problem (woohoo! . . . err, I think . . .) -- the jack points. Mine actually looked pretty good externally, but I discovered that both were packed full of sand and rust. Here's what the driver's side looked like after getting the sand out. Those little "lines" next to the vent hole are actually rust perforations, not scratches.
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The passenger side was actually in worse shape than the driver's side, so that's where I started. Here's what the passenger side looked like after I took some tin snips to it:
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Pretty nasty inside.

At this point, there really isn't much choice except to replace (at a minimum) the jackpoint reinforcements. When I've read other people's projects, they usually chop off a good-sized chunk of the quarter panel behind the door opening. While this makes access to the top of the reinforcement much easier, it requires a lot of work to fix the quarter afterward.

I decided to try a different approach. I bought one of those little belt sanders you see on various car restoration shows.
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This thing works great! I'm astounded, I wish I had bought one many years ago. The 36 grit belt just zipped through the sheet metal, making it very easy to remove the spot welds on the bottom and the sides. The plan is to reach down from above (inside the quarter panel) to remove the top of the reinforcement.

I got about 80% through the removal process today -- the bottom and both sides are gone. The top part will have to wait for later, since I'm out of belts. The sander only came with one 36 grit belt, which lasted through taking off about half the reinforcement. The other belts that came with the kit didn't last very long, since they were finer grit. So, now I have to wait for a new order of belts to come; they should be here in time for next weekend.

This is what the piece looks like now:
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Haven't quite decided what to do about the inner sheet metal. There are no penetrations and the jack post is solid, but the sheet metal is rather thin in spots. I'd like to replace the sheet metal, but replacement stampings are rather pricey, especially for the small pieces I'd need from it. On the other hand, McMaster sells galvanneal sheet -- I can get a 2'x2' panel for less than half of one of the pre-formed parts, and have plenty left over. I guess we'll see once I get the rest of the old reinforcement out.
__________________
2016 GT4 warp 7
1999 SPB warp 2, maybe
1973 914 2.0 1/2 impulse if it ever gets out of space dock

Previous:
1973 914 1.7 1/4 impulse
2012 Cayman R warp 4
2006 Cayman S warp 3
1999 SPB warp 2, maybe
1966 911 warp 1.5
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  #60  
Old 11-30-2020, 09:22 AM
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Any issues when welding galvanized metal? I seem to recall something about toxic fumes?

Enjoying the updates.
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2014 Cayman (Aka "Rubber Ducky")

1971 914 (back in the day)
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