Hi, I am new to this forum. Allow me to introduce myself. Since a few years I have become a porsche 914 enthusiast. I bought a 914 '73 in bad shape with my first bonus money and have been working, improving and enjoying this car ever since. It is my daily driver, not a showroom model by all means but just plain fun, has a 2.0 engine w/ dual 40 dellorto's and a monza dual exhaust. I just love the sound of it.

In the meantime I acquired two other porsche 914's. One was given to me, by someone who lost interest. The other I bought on ebay a few months ago. This last model I want to turn into a hotrod kind of fun car.
This car is a '75 2.0 w/ GT flares. It has the hubs drilled out to five studs. It cam without wheels. I had to take of the studs and put 4x130wheels on it just to bring it home. Those wheel wells are big!! need something big to fill it with. Luckiliy on ebay I found two cheap big tires, 245/60/15, I know they are big and not super high performance given the 60 series but I thought what the heck. Problem was it took me a lot of time to find the right wheel to match. Finally this weekend I bought two replica fuchs wheels 15x8 w/ 4 7/8 backspacing, that match perfectly. Looks very impressive
Now the question, What to do for the front. For now to as mentioned it has the standard 5.5 wheel w/ standard backspacing, I believe 4 1/2". There is about 3" of space between the tire and the fender lip. At first I thought the 15x7 would be the way to go, but thinking about it , the fuchs wheels I can get (15x7) also have 5" backspacing, that means that the wheel is .5" more inwards and only sticks an inch more outwards compared to the stock wheel, that leaves me still w/ 2" gap.

Of course one can use spacers, but 1.5" of spacers would be pushing it. And to go with 15x8 in the front you also need a lot of tire, I am not sure if that is desirable, performance/handling wise. What should I do?


Another topic is the engine, the engine in it is stuck. Previous owner left car outside without rain drain under engine lid, and without airfilter and throttle body, You can imagine what that would do over time. I was thinking that the way the car looks in this GT outfit, would demand a little more powerful engine. I do not have the resources to go to a porsche flat 6, although I love this engine, ( we also need a new roof etc.. )
So the question is , suppose one would consider a different engine choice ( I know not politically correct), what are the rules regarding California smog. My car is built in 1974 and is a 1975 model, I checked the DMV website and I am fine there (smog exempt). I should mention that since this car has been out of the loop for a long time the vin nr is no longer recognized. According to the previous owner I must go to dmv and have them check the vin number when i register. This means that they will look at the car. And will notice any obvious engine change. Being smog exempt, do I have to stay with a certain engine year to be safe, I would think that if I put a newer engine in the car, the newer engine is not smog exempt and dmv would require me to start smogging based on the engine year, which ofcourse I want to stay out of. On the other hand an older engine might not be accepted by DMV because you are putting an engine in it with probably worse smog quality than the year of the car. Am I thinking right, Seems to me the easiest way is to stay with the same year 1975. But that might not be easy finding the right engine for that particular year.

Anyway, I see so many people w/ smog exempt cars with engine conversion using modern engines that I begin to think that I have it completely wrong.
Anyone who can shed some light on this issue please tell me how it works. Any input would be greatly appreciated.

Ragazi