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A few things to know before stealing my 914

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Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#101

Post by criddell »

fabioborellini wrote: post #22

So, apparently there is no mandatory vehicle inspection in the US. Of course there isn't, it would violate the freedom to drive with an unroadworthy car.

The state of Washington is an interesting case. They had annual inspections and then somebody ran the numbers and found that so few cars were being flagged, that it was an enormous waste of resources. They got rid of their inspection requirement.

More programs should be run like that. Set a goal, create a program, then periodically evaluate if the goal is still the same and if the program is effective.

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#102

Post by Finnucane »

jamroom wrote: post #59
Finnucane wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was gonna say, I took a long road trip in a 1971 VW microbus and this was triggering some memories. Especially the description of finding the gears!

Yes the gears! The amount of "play" in the gearbox was insane. Couple that with the like 3 foot long stick handle and IN GEAR I could wiggle the stick in a like foot wide circle. Once you had driven it for a while you got to know the "feel" of it and had no problems, but like in the article someone new to driving it would have had a really hard time lol.

Someone new to driving now probably doesn't even know what a gear stick is.

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#103

Post by telesilla »

optymizer wrote: post #65
quadrifoliate wrote: post #24

> Depress the clutch as you would in any car, and pull the knob from its secure location out of first gear. Now you will become adrift in the zone known to early Porsche owners as “Neverland” and your quest will be to find second gear. Prepare yourself for a ten-second-or-so adventure. Do not go straight forward with the shift knob, as you will only find Reverse waiting there to mock you with a shriek of high-speed g…

What a blast from the past. I learnt to drive using a VW Golf, and I've always thought this shift pattern is just standard on German cars with manual transmission (at least in the 90s). One thing I don't see mentioned is that you first have to press down onto the knob, then shift forward, in order to shift the transmission into R. Simply pushing the knob forward won't go from N to R.

First time I rented a German car I yelled out in the parking garage for help! Some kind strangers explained this to me about the reverse and I got on my way.

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#104

Post by tricky »

Eric_WVGG wrote: post #76
blastro wrote: post #11

In high school, my friends and I managed to resuscitate a 914 that had been stowed away in a garage for over a decade. We towed it to the top of a hill with a pickup truck and attempted a clutch start after we'd picked up some speed. None of us (especially me in the driver's seat) expected this to work, but amazingly it fired right up. One of my friends managed to jog alongside and jump into the car as I tried to kee…

My father had one of these just sort of gathering dust in the garage when I was growing up, utterly shocked when I turned 16 and he handed me the keys. I still like to casually drop "oh yeah, I used to have a Porsche back when I was 16." Although I must say it was in immeasurably better shape than this one :D I still dream of finding an old 914 and giving it an electric conversion… I'd have to do something about that…

Hello to a fellow member of the "my first car was a Porsche" club. Mine was a $400 924 that broke at least once a week. Good times.

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#105

Post by anarticle »

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #4

He could write pretty much the same article about owning an OG Chrysler minivan, which is arguably a more historically significant vehicle but built by a make that prompts sneers about reliability and credit scores from most here, and it would just be considered trashy or prompt pearl clutching by most of the readership. Amazing the breadth of preconceived notions that can be leveraged with a badge on a grill. Having…

Sheesh, it's ok to like something! No one will think less of you.

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#106

Post by js2 »

bombcar wrote: post #88
kstrauser wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love it. On the plus side, I learned so much about how cars work that I can fix a lot of things now. My personal peak was going from “uh-oh, the alternator on the Oldsmobile died” to having replaced it with a new one from the store in 43 minutes.

Old cars had an accessible amount of "troubleshooting" available which greatly helps learn tinkering skills. New cars are substantially more reliable, but that same troubleshooting can be helpful but somewhat harder to learn I feel.

Troubleshooting is a lot harder for a variety of reasons. Things are hidden away under plastic panels, the vehicles have a lot more electronics, and everything is fit into much tighter spaces.

Still, between YouTube and enthusiast forums dedicated to whatever model car it is, you can usually do a lot. Typically if something goes wrong on your car, the same thing has gone wrong to a lot of other folks with the same car and someone has posted about it.

If you're handy enough and have the right tools, an official manufacturer shop repair manual is what you really want. (Chilton is better than nothing, but you really want the manufacturer repair manual.)

But... some things are just a pain in the ass w/o a lift and the right tools. Find a good independent mechanic for older cars (easier said than done) or just take it to the local dealer for cars still under warranty.

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#107

Post by protomyth »

ehnto wrote: post #37

Speaking of security through obscurity, my car is a 96 Nissan and it's had a few attempts on it. It's easy enough to steal, but it's getting hard enough for me to find replacement parts that I'd be surprised if thieves have everything, so I take some bits of the car with me if it's sitting for a while. I have a quick release wheel to deter the average opportunist from breaking my glass and ignition barrel, and with s…

It's not about being perfect when it comes to car security, it's about being too much of a pain in the ass, so they'll give up and move on.

Yeah, my Dad had a Ford F-100 that had a gear shift that would come out. He drove it to work and took the gear shift inside and left it in his locker. Not the best location (a town in Oregon in the 70's), but he never had any trouble with someone stealing his ride out of the parking lot. I still remember the sound of the gas sloshing in the tank behind the seat.

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#108

Post by rob74 »

Great article! Makes me wonder if in 40 years people will write about how to (not) get an old Tesla Roadster or BMW i3 going again? Although, rather than pumping the acceleration 4 times to get enough gas into the engine so it will start, that will probably begin with hacking the car's system so it allows you to start it...

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#109

Post by rascul »

criddell wrote: post #101
fabioborellini wrote: post #22

So, apparently there is no mandatory vehicle inspection in the US. Of course there isn't, it would violate the freedom to drive with an unroadworthy car.

The state of Washington is an interesting case. They had annual inspections and then somebody ran the numbers and found that so few cars were being flagged, that it was an enormous waste of resources. They got rid of their inspection requirement. More programs should be run like that. Set a goal, create a program, then periodically evaluate if the goal is still the same and if the program is effective.

Many states barely even check anything anyway. Out of six states I've had a vehicle inspection in, only one (Maryland) did more than check lights, wipers, brakes, and horn. Inspections seem to be more a revenue stream than anything else.

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#110

Post by Johnny555 »

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #49
gkoberger wrote: post #42

This is one of my favorite styles of writing. I have absolutely no clue what this person is talking about and have no interest in cars, yet I read every single word. I love when people have such a deep knowledge of something that they can write an essay as unique and thoughtful as this. It reminds me of Kitchen Confidential, Surely You're Joking Mr Feynman!, or any rant about British politics by David Mitchell.

Depth of knowledge is impossible to assess for anyone that doesn't have similar depth in the same subject matter. The author could be bullshitting (he's not) but how would anyone who's not driven vehicles that are decades beyond their design life know?

how would anyone who's not driven vehicles that are decades beyond their design life know

I think you just need to have driven a car from that era to understand this post and believe it -- the car doesn't neccessarily need to be that old. I had a '77 Civic in 1982 and it had many of these same "features" as his Porsche - any key (or screwdriver) could open the door or turn the ignition, it had a manual choke lever installed because the automatic choke didn't work, there was an art to pumping the gas pedal before starting in cold weather (there was a fine line between being able to start and flooding it), there was no clutch interlock (or it was broken) to prevent starting the car in gear, and a bunch of other quirks similar to his.

And it was only 5 years old.

edit: And the oil use! I'd forgotten about that until reading his post, I used to carry a few jugs of oil in the trunk since the car was using almost a quart per fillup, and many gas stations kept a display case of oil out by the pumps so you could easily buy a quart if you needed it. My current 7 year old car doesn't use any noticeable amount of oil between ~8000 mile oil changes.

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