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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

#311

Post by drewg123 »

My first car was a 22 year old (at the time) 1964 Triumph TR4 that my dad and I found in a barn. A lot of the issues in this 914 were present on my car as well. My car had a minor engine oil leak, and the oil would drip onto the exhaust system and fill the cabin with smoke. I remember when the brakes went out and I drove the car ~25 miles with nothing but the parking brake.

The best was when I got out of this tiny car with manual everything and drove the land-yacht Pontiac Parisienne we used for driver's ed in highschool. Its brakes were so sensitive, and I was so used to having to use a LOT of force to stop the TR4, that the first few times I'd stop the car everybody's seatbelt would lock up.

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#312

Post by jacquesm »

Very recognizable :) I had a Citroen DS that had locks that were so bad that it was pointless to try to lock it, and getting it started required 10 steps or so and getting one wrong meant you weren't driving that day (or at least, not until the excess fuel had evaporated away again).

Probably more secure than the class-5 alarm on my current car :)

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#313

Post by fhood »

acjacobson wrote: post #291

My family kind of prides itself on driving manual cars even though you have to go to extra effort to buy them new in the U.S. these days. Once my Dad brought one of them into a mechanic for an oil change and the guy asked 'How do you like your anti-theft device?' My Dad was a bit puzzled because there was no extra alarm or device he could think of, but the mechanic meant the stick shift. Apparently manual cars are no…

No manual option on the mazda3 now. That was the biggest punch in the gut.

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#314

Post by BoorishBears »

ho_schi wrote: post #132
BoorishBears wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most automatic transmissions are horrible because most cars are horrible. Good cars have good transmissions, regardless of transmission style. The ZF8 is an excellent transmission that's seen everywhere. PDK does justice to the most performant modern Porsches in a way that manuals struggle to keep up with. Even relatively small volume DCTs like the one in the 4C are pretty great these days.

ZF8 seems to be used by Audi only for cars sold in America? btw. ZF means Zahnradfabrik Friedrichshafen. Which is owned by the Zeppelin Foundation. Which was founded to support the built of Zeppelin Luftschiffe and social purposes. Weird story. And the Zeppelin Foundation was for a long time owner of Cherry. The company behind most mechanical keyboard switches. They should've kept that, growing business area - mechan…

Now would not be a great time to be in that area when "knockoff" switches have pretty much out-innovated Cherry into irrelevance

But that aside, as other comments point out the ZF8 is not Audi specific, Plenty of non-M car BMWs use it, and even heavy duty pick up trucks are running with ZF8s now

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#315

Post by mavhc »

digisign wrote: post #260
gambiting wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>none of the new electric car offers that Eh? I literally got a brand new electric VW e-Up last week, it's exactly that. It even still has analog dials, and VW provides a mount for your phone instead of an "infotainment" system. The height of sophistication is DAB radio and heated front window and seats. I highly recommend it, it's a hoot - and with 150 miles range and rapid charging capability it's more than enough…

The problem isn't only the dashboard, it is the pervasive surveillance. This car is better than most but I've read here before that it still had some flaws. Can't find the post at the moment however.

Find the radio, remove the aerial/sim card, done.

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#316

Post by technothrasher »

Melatonic wrote: post #268
tricky wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

I had an early 944 - it basically had all of the negatives of the 924 and only a few positives :-D

Come on now, the Porsche engine in the 944 is miles better than the Audi one in the 924. Got rid of all the vibration issues. Granted the base 944 is a bit slow, but I’ve currently got an ‘86 951 and it’s still a great car today. The weight distribution on it is just perfect. Much more fun to drive and way more reliable than the ‘85 Ferrari 308 that I recently sold.

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#317

Post by colburnmh »

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…

It's really a weird Volkswagen/Porsche frankenstein, despite what the badge says. Porsche designed it, Volkswagen built it. Outside the US, the Volkswagon version is 914/4, and the Porsche version being a 914/6. (The last digit references the number of cylinders). In the US market both versions were branded as Porsche because US buyers were deemed unable to understand that two different car brands used the same body style. (Times have changed.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porsche_914

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#319

Post by Havoc »

Fine writing.

Frankly I'm more intrigued by the fact that this seems to have gotten an easy #1 spot on hn. Writing about sketchy clutches on old cars does not generally attract wide hn acclaim.

I'd love to hear opinions as to what made the difference...clearly something here is different.

Re: A few things to know before stealing my 914

#320

Post by abruzzi »

914s had an engine and transmission from the VW Bus. Since the VW Bus had a rear engine setup the shift rod was straight into the very front of the transaxle. IIRC, when they reversed the transmission to put the engine in front of the transmission, the shift input eas now in the very rear so the shift rod started in the middle/front of the car, had to transit back, around the engine and transaxle assembly then completely reverse into the what was now the very rear of the transmission. Which is why the 914s were notorious for sloppy transmissions. Later years of 914 made a change in the transmission so the shift rod entered the side of the transmission, which probably helped a little.
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