The 1973 914, "Green Machine"
Or how NOT to buy a 914
In the fall of 1997, I decided to buy myself a 914. I looked aorund the Baltimore area at a number of 914's. Some of them in retrosepct were disasters. All of them had rust. One in fact broke in two between the time I called the owner and the time I showed up.
"It hit a bump in our driveway, there was a CRUNCH, and now the doors won't open..."
Oh boy...
Regardless, I finally found a 1973 914 1.7 for sale. Green, but looked good, had an excellent interior, and best of all it was for sale for $2,000. I checked for rust, and it seemed pretty good; floor panels were in excellent condition; so I took it for a MD inspection as a condition of the sale.
Well, the mechanic called me and told me to drop in. I stopped by and he showed me how the right rear suspension console was completely rusted from the firewall to the shock tower. Damage was so severe that there literally was nothing holding the rear wheel to the car aside from the shock. Someone in the past had welded a metal plate over the hole, but the metal plate (being one dimensional) had literally started to crack apart under the stress. Once it gave, the car would fail.
Good reason to get the thing inspected.
So a $2000 car suddently became a $500 parts car. I bought it for $500, took out the engine and looked at the rust. Not repairable was the summary. I would have had to remove the entire longitudal, and weld in a new one (new longs cost about $4,000). About another 4k for the welding/cutting and you have a 10k car that is worth 5k at most.
So I parked it and looked for another car. Found Tina down in TN, a solid car with floor pan rust, a completely solid longitudal, and no options. Brought it back, transplanted all the options from the Green machine, and finally scrapped the green machine's hull in 2000 (it had become a home for wasps at that point.)
Pictures of the Green machine can be found by clicking here. It's gone now, but the lessons it taught me were quite important.
Chris