Two red Porsche 911s caught my eye in the catalogue for the upcoming Aguttes sale in Lyon, France on November 9th. Values for both models soared when the Porsche market exploded but, as Orwell said, some pigs are more equal than others. Their potential selling prices are poles apart.
1966 Porsche 911 2-litre
Estimated at €180-200,000, this Polo Red SWB Porsche 911 – chassis number 304392 – was supplied through Sweden in May 1966 to a racer from Trollhättan. Built with triple Weber carburettors instead of the usual Solex, it lived in Sweden right up to the turn of the century, until it turned up in Germany.
Porsche 911 2.0 auction – photo by Aguttes
The car then sold to a museum in Austria and, when that closed, it passed through keepers in Switzerland and on to Normandy in France. By this stage it needed some money spent: the 2L market was buoyant in 2014 so it was fully repainted in the factory colour and restored to period spec.
Prettied up, it sold to another French collector and was sent to the racing mechanic, Pierre Modas, for an engine and transmission rebuild. Porsche dealers changed a few other bits and in total over €30,000 was spent on the mechanical restoration. The same work in the UK would probably cost a bit more, which perhaps suggests there was not much to do at the start or there may be a bit more to do now. Webers take less restoration than Solex, for sure.
1966 Porsche 911 2.0 interior – photo by Aguttes
The auctioneers claim this is an authentic example, but who can know without inspecting. A lot of 2-litres passed through various specialists while the market was freaking out and some work is better than others. The history is certainly interesting: particularly the Swedish angle.
1976 Porsche 911 Carrera 3.0 at auction
The other car in the catalogue that caught my eye was a 1976 Porsche 911 Carrera 3.0 Coupe. Estimated at €45-65,000, chassis number 9116600485 is a matching numbers example, first supplied by Dieteren in Belgium, that has been refinished in Guards Red/Indian Red from its original grey.
1976 Porsche 911 Carrera 3.0 – photo by Aguttes
Restoration or replacement of bits including half-floors, front crossmember (likely front pan) and the bumper mounts suggest the car was used well from new, or perhaps even caught a bit of damage somewhere, so the speedo reading of fairly low kms for the year may not be verifiable.
It has also had a new fuel tank (pretty standard for impact bumper cars of this era) and the suspension, brakes and steering have apparently been refurbished. The gearbox is also said to have been overhauled, though there is no mention of the engine or K-Jet being stripped. The car comes with bills for over €40k and plenty of photos for bidders to check.
1976 Porsche 911 Carrera 3.0 interior – photo by Aguttes
Owned by the current owner since 2010, this car was entered in the Hotel de Ventes sale at Monaco in July 2017 with an estimate of €60-80k at the time. It failed to sell for whatever reason and so returns to the sale rooms with a lower price tag attached. The drop of €15k on low estimate is where I see the market for a nice C3 right now: if I owned a car like this (assuming it is all as described) and if it didn’t fetch €45k, I would probably keep it. In a market as tough as this one has been through 2019, they could have done better pics to get interest going.
Porsche Colour Change vs Market Price
The factory colour is always what people get hooked on, but it is hard to say whether this 1976 Carrera 3.0 Coupe would offer a better sales prospect in original ‘grey’. Red is rare and looks good on early impact bumpers. The car also retains its original 5-bladed fan and has the 15″ Fuchs, which are more correct than 16s on a ’76. It’s starting pretty cheap for a C3 at €45k, so we’ll see how it goes on the day.
1976 Porsche 911 Carrera 3.0 engine – photo by Aguttes
My interest in this one is obvious – the effect of colour change on a Carrera 3.0 Coupe. My ’76 C3 was repainted in Continental Orange from the original Copper Bronze Metallic and, while I like the colour a lot, it will have to be redone at some stage. The option to refinish in the original or something completely different will therefore be mine somewhere down the road and more information may help make a ‘better’ decision.
Prices only matter when you sell and that is not something on my radar right now. Never say never, though. The clock is ticking and my kids won’t want it.
Ferdinand blogs my freelance adventure with Porsche at the centre. To support the blog or engage with me in other ways, you can:
I caught the first Porsche Supercup race of the Mexico Grand Prix weekend tonight. While I haven’t missed a Grand Prix in over ten years, it’s been a while since I watched a Supercup race. Unsurprisingly, not much has changed since last time.
Michael Ammermüller has been a smooth operator since coming to Supercup in 2012. A former Red Bull Racing test driver, he raced single seaters before Porsches, so, when he does not start on pole, he has a way of getting to the front without inflicting too much collateral damage en route. This is not the Supercup norm.
The first race in Mexico exemplified the contrast between the man from Passau in Bavaria and most of the rest, when the championship leader took an early lead and wasted no time building a gap. Meanwhile, the young hot shots who have vied for Weissach’s attention and championship honours all year were dropping bodywork and running miles beyond track limits to ultimately slow each other down and finish well off the pace.
Holding on to positions by cutting corners and chicanes is amateur stuff: they could all do with watching how the champion brought his third title home. It was a surprise that the race director did not pull them up a bit harder. I guess that is probably fair enough in the title decider for a one-make championship but, if drivers knew they would be penalised for running off track and gaining an advantage, then they might drive accordingly.
Ammermüller is now just two races off a new record of wins in the series and has matched René Rast for total championships won. Four would match Patrick Huismann and five would set a new benchmark. Onwards and upwards, Michael.
Porsche Supercup renews F1® contract to 2022
Porsche recently renewed its contract to run Supercup races as part of Grand Prix weekends up to and including 2022. “We’re proud to forge ahead with this close and long-established partnership,” said Fritz Enzinger. “Formula 1® offers an exclusive setting with a unique flair. This fascination and high media importance represent an ideal overall package for our racing series.”
Supercup has been part of F1’s support programme since its debut season in 1993. Famous and fashionable circuits such as Spa-Francorchamps, Monza and Monte Carlo are regular fixtures on the racing calendar of the international one-make cup. Drivers compete in 485 hp Porsche 911 GT3 Cup cars: the racing vehicles are technically identical, as are the tyres and the fuel, guaranteeing equal chances for all.
“We are pleased to extend our long-standing partnership with Porsche for a further three years,” said Ross Brawn, F1’s Motorsport Director. “This one-make series provides some of the most spectacular racing of any series and contributes significantly to the show that’s on offer over a Grand Prix weekend. Furthermore, in the thirty years during which it has run alongside Formula 1, the Porsche Supercup has provided an excellent launch pad for many drivers who have also made their mark in international races at all levels.”
Porsche works driver, Earl Bamber, is so far the only Supercup champion (2015) who has gone on to win a World Endurance Driver’s Championship title (2017), although 2014 champ, Nicki Thiim, did win a World Endurance GT Driver’s Championship title with Aston in 2016.
René Rast was one of the most thrilling Supercup champions to watch. He has gone on to win the 24 Hours of both Spa and the Nürburgring, as well as DTM titles in 2017 and 2019. Double champion, Richard Westbrook (2006/7) went on to win the 2009 FIA GT2 championship, while 2001 champion Jorg Bergmeister won the 2003 Daytona 24 Hours and the 2006 Rolex Grand-Am championship.
In recent years, the Supercup series has become a bit of a proving ground for Porsche Juniors, with Sven Muller winning the 2016 title and Dennis Olsen running Ammermüller hard in 2017. I like to see cut of the Juniors in Supercup, but it does give me a thrill to see a proper gentleman-racer-with a-day-job like Ammermüller take the title. His trademark speed and class is what Supercup is all about. What a great job.
Ferdinand blogs my freelance adventure with Porsche at the centre. To support the blog or engage with me in other ways, you can:
My last four-hour flight to Lanzarote was a breeze, thanks to a great chat with Joe, a spritely seventy year-old parked alongside. After early retirement from an engineering career, Joe dived into volunteer work before joining a local friend’s burger van business. They threw themselves into growing the business and now run the bars at some of the world’s biggest music festivals and sports events.
What struck me most was not the stories my seat neighbour told, or his success, but the enthusiasm and energy that shined when he spoke about life. He was still pushing hard. The meeting put me in mind of another energetic 70 year-old that I’d read about: former Porsche CEO, Arno Bohn, interviewed by Keiron Fennelly for a story in Panorama magazine.
Born in Rheinfelden in March 1947, Arno Bohn was Porsche boss from 1990 to 1992. While CEO, he famously wrote a letter to Ferdinand Piëch suggesting that Piëch (grandson of Ferdinand Porsche) should retire from the Porsche supervisory board. This was in response to a letter from Piëch calling on Ferry (son of Ferdinand Porsche) to resign, as the company was verging on bankruptcy. The interview contained several insights into Porsche culture of the time, including factors behind the mission creep which sent costs spiralling on projects like the 959, the cancelled 984 (924 replacement) and 989: the aborted four-door 911.
Bohn’s predecessor, Peter Schutz, extended the 911 line and presided over 944 development, while his successor, Wendelin Wiedeking, oversaw the combined Boxster/996 platform (developed by Horst Marchart, according to Bohn) and the launch of Cayenne. Bohn was the bridge between the two trajectories: not an easy or comfortable role.
‘The car that saved Porsche’
Porsche retrospectives have a tendency to rate CEOs and the cars they help launch on the grand scale of company saviours, but that’s not how I see it.
Running your own business is all about ups and downs. When things are up, you reinvest, ploughing resources back in to product development, training new people and adding new capabilities. The cost of this work takes a balance sheet down – often close to breaking point – but the rewards of clever investment pay off in the long run. Keeping said “long run” to the absolute minimum is part of the role of a good CEO.
There are countless assertions as to how the 924 and Boxster saved Porsche, but it was largely the work that went into these cars that caused the balance sheet falls which were later reversed when the cars came to market. These projects start long before the CEOs credited with the product successes. One could say that there are no ‘cars that saved Porsche’. Instead, Stuttgart ploughed profits into these cars to widen its reach and build a better corporate future.
Arno Bohn’s Porsche legacy
Recruited from the IT industry, Bohn was used to quick product development times and tried to push the same through at Porsche, but his hands were apparently tied by longstanding inertia and in-house politics: no surprise to anyone who has studied the company’s story.
While Bohn was not an experienced car-making man, he’s said to have been a very good listener and that letter to Piëch – a powerful figure who helped bring him to Porsche – shows he was true to himself and brave when it mattered. The politics may have stitched him up a bit but, as commander-in-chief through a critical period, and the last CEO to leave Porsche as a fully independent operation, he’s earned a place in history.
Bohn is the link between Schutz and Wiedeking and his experience through the final years of Porsche independence is a fascinating window into what was going on. Bohn notes that Ferry was keen to build a four-door Porsche and, while some 989 prototype angles make it look like the unholy union of a Ford Mondeo with a 911 Carrera, there is perhaps is a slight regret that the project never took off.
Last year, I sold a Porsche Panamera V6 PDK for a friend of mine: a 2010 model in perfect condition with less than 50k miles. It took a few weeks to find a new home and eventually went for just over £20k: a bargain for the quality and engineering contained. Turns out that Arno Bohn also now drives a Panamera.
Had Bohn managed to introduce the 989 and helped to find it a place in the luxury market, giving the Panamera a slightly earlier start point and more engaging origin story, his legacy and that of Panamera might be rather more strident. In any case, he merits remembering as more than Weideking in waiting.
A version of this story first appeared as my column in GT Porsche magazine, February 2019. I now write a column in BMW Car magazine.
Ferdinand blogs my freelance adventure with Porsche at the centre. To support the blog or to engage with me in other ways, you can:
It’s been a steady year for insurance claims: I’ve helped in several claims via agreed insurance valuations I supplied on various classic Porsche models. Some of these claims are still ongoing, so I won’t go into specifics, but a write-off claim for one client with a 1988 Porsche 911 Carrera 3.2 G50 Coupe recently settled and he’s given me the OK to share details.
The car was a high mileage example that had been fully restored over time, with bodywork refinished in original Baltic Blue, rebuilt engine with a LSD in the G50 transmission, full suspension rebuild with Centre Gravity setup and front seats re-trimmed in correct linen leather. The car had certainly lived a life and the owner had toured extensively in it, clocking up 75k miles over ten years together, including a long road trip with mum as the navigator.
In a Danish ferry queue en route to Iceland this summer, the Carrera’s engine was started to move through check-in, then the engine cut out and smoke began to waft from the engine compartment. This was quickly followed by the stomach-churning woof of flame, as petrol from what is thought to have been a failed fuel hose ignited. Small flames became big flames and there was suddenly lots of activity, with fire extinguishers rushing in from cars all around. Here’s a video that no one wants to live through:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nE_WMBZ7vc
Engine fires catch quickly and can be difficult to extinguish. The owner disconnected the battery sharpish when the starter began to engage of its own accord, but fuel pressure kept the fire going. By the time the fire trucks arrived, the damage was done.
The car was insured with Classicline in the UK, with European breakdown cover by ADAC. Part of my insurance valuation service is to make myself available in an advisory capacity if something goes wrong while the valuation is valid, so the owner got in touch immediately after the incident.
A quick look at the pics told me the car would end up as a write-off (an uneconomic repair). ADAC inspectors decided the same and declined to repatriate the car to the UK, in line with their terms and conditions. The owner was then left to sort things out via his insurers.
Classicline was very sympathetic following the traumatic event and the loss of a treasured 911: the firm gets a huge thumbs up from the owner in every respect. The car was brought back to the UK and inspected by an experienced assessor. The cost to repair using all new Porsche parts was put at £34k including VAT and the additional costs of repatriation and moving the car around the UK – including to the owner’s preferred specialist for a detailed inspection on site – put the total claim value into the write-off zone.
Insurers usually hold agreed valuation certificates as valid for two years at a time, but given the up-and-down nature of the market in recent years, the owner had been careful to update his agreed valuation annually. My most recent insurance valuation was at similar money to a car with half the mileage, but this car had been cherished and kept in superb condition.
History has taught me to prepare for the worst case scenario, so my policy is to set agreed valuations in line with recent data and independent market observations at as high a level as I would feel comfortable later justifying in court. This honours my professional responsibility and is fair to both sides. Classicline did not dispute the agreed valuation I had supplied, so it all came down to the final settlement offer.
The offer to retain the salvage came in at around the level expected. The final decision to repair or to take the full payout was not made lightly: there were some lengthy late-night phone calls discussing other options, especially considering current market conditions. After ten years and many miles, the owner decided to let the car go and move on to the next chapter. I’m not sure what might arrive in the garage next: a very nice Saab 900 Turbo is currently filling the hole.
Total Loss: nightmare vs opportunity
I have regular conversations with valuation clients who are thinking of selling their cars, or whose cars are subject to a total loss or write-off claim, so thoughts of what I would do with an insurance payout or sale proceeds are never far from my mind. I don’t drive my classics all that often, but losing any one of them would be a heartbreak and the last thing I want in the middle of that is to be battling with an insurer, so I use agreed valuations on all of my cars and motorcycles for maximum peace of mind.
As someone who has been working with owners and insurers and valuing cars professionally for almost twenty years, it never ceases to amaze me just how many classic cars are insured on market valuation rather than agreed valuation policies and how many owners recommend market valuation. This is madness.
If this car had been agreed on a market valuation, the owner would now be in the middle of a battle to get the best settlement and the final number would likely fall well short of what was achieved. Market valuation may save a few pounds at policy start, but these pictures of the damage, the repair estimate and the swift, no-hassle resolution put the one advantage of going with a market valuation (saving a small sum of money) into perspective.
I cannot stress strongly enough that people should agree their insurance valuations from the start. Get an agreed valuation from a trusted, independent source and don’t add to the misery of total loss. Contact me via classic-car-valuations.com or use the links below if you need any help or advice.
Ferdinand blogs my freelance adventure with Porsche at the centre. To support my work or engage with me in other ways, you can:
I’ve always been a bookworm. From seven or eight years old, I pored over every issue of the legendary ‘Motor’ magazine, relishing the data and reviews. As a car-obsessed kid on the west coast of Ireland, there was no one to share any of this geekery with, other than a handful of less obsessed schoolmates. But that didn’t stop me from soaking it up.
Unforgettable ‘Car’ reviews had brilliant photos with text from a lyrical genius. Whether it was Aussies Cropley or Nichols, Austria’s Kacher or the brilliant George Bishop, their work seemed effortless – the words just flowed out. When you do the right homework, that’s how it goes.
Stuck in a place where these dream-sequence pieces could never come true, I absorbed them like sunlight. Exacting attention to detail went into these features and that shone from the pages: the least I as a reader could do was give them my undivided attention.
If the laser-beam focus that we shot into the pages of the magazines of our youth was absorbed as raw spirit energy, then a solution to climate change is stacked all around me. I have thousands of old magazines on shelves and in boxes: decades of Autocar, piles of Car and Performance Car, the complete works of Street Machine, Custom Car and hundreds of Bike magazines. The energy contained within these pages must be pretty incredible.
Much as I love what these magazines encapsulate, most will be recycled at some stage. While I enjoy leafing through tokens of my well-spent youth, they are not a must-have reminder of my boyhood fascination with car reviews. Somewhere along the journey from young reader to driver, I realised that comparing one new car to another no longer mattered to me. The story mattered – it always does – but the actual product was less of a draw.
Nothing much interesting happens with cars until you drive them out of the showroom and into the world. It’s a bit like having kids: the delivery is special, then a few days of bright fascination, then the glow of strapping them into their child seat and heading home from the hospital. But then, the newness softens. Months go by where not very much happens. Of course you are bonding, but really it’s just clocking up the miles until they get interesting.
Then they start moving, and failing. Every fail is a thrill: fail, fail and succeed. Progress is swift – you learn fast when you fail. Their failure exposes vulnerability and brings out our empathy. As the days pass with small fails and small wins, thoughts of what life was like before this empathic connection starts to fade. It begins to feel like they have always been around. The energy pored into them begins to shine back. They tell part of your story and you contribute to theirs. Your part is a privilege.
As such a huge percentage of my emotional life has been wrapped in the romance of cars, I find distinct parallels in connection. Car stories worth telling have cracks in the windscreen. Memorable protagonists come with a back story. A life well-lived is defined by the stone chips and the stories I love come with this as the subtext.
Of course, second-hand stuff is not for everyone. Some people love the no-story of newness and, having owned and sold many new cars in my life, I get that. But newness is not my primary trigger. I like things that are scratched: the wear on a camera or the cracks in the leather. In the same way that I liked it when my kids would fall over, I take some pleasure when they ring me in tears: they are living a life and writing their story through authentic experience. When the question is new versus used or shiny versus scratched, there is simply no contest for me.
New Porsche Macan is a thriller
Used car admirers would be pretty stuck without new car obsessives, so hats off to them. New Macan is out and about and, as someone who has run 4×4 SUVs for decades and can see no impending end to that, of course I like it, but of course I would only buy used. The used Macan I would buy is still thirty grand and unlikely to fall into my price range anytime soon, so I scratch the vague itch vicariously, by chatting with friends who own them and watching Stuttgart’s Youtube content.
The latest Macan video wants to talk about thrilling. Printer paper and water coolers: they are not thrilling. A Macan at dawn on a twisty road: that’s what thrilling is like. But that viewpoint depends on the watcher.
Printer paper carrying the first draft of a book is thrilling. Rising from a long desk stint for a cool cup of water: also good. An empty Macan on a twisty road first thing in the morning feels like a bit of a waste. My early morning drives are all about taking the dog to the woods or heading out to collect yet more reclaimed architectural salvage. An early morning drive in a Macan with the dog in the boot and an empty trailer on the back? Now that would be cool.
Ferdinand blogs my freelance adventure with Porsche at the centre. To support the blog and engage with me in other ways, you can:
This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.AcceptRead More
Privacy & Cookies Policy
Privacy Overview
This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
