I spent part of yesterday writing a blog for the Classic Retrofit website covering Patrick Motorsport’s latest project car: a 1986 Porsche hot rod 911 Carrera 3.2 backdated to ’73 RSR style.
Originally supplied as a factory black 911, Patrick retained the original colour and went with blue as an accent shade inside and out. The blue interior is all about impact and takes zero prisoners. The result is a head-turning build that took the Sponsor’s Choice award at the recent Werks Reunion in the Corral de Tierra Country Club, Monterey.
Jonny’s electric air conditioning for air-cooled Porsche 911s was part of the spec for the award-winning build, hence the blog on his website. Patrick Motorsports did a video of the A/C in action, showing a reduction of 30°C at the dash vents versus the ambient temperature. No doubt that was impressive, but the additional spec of the car looks equally impressive.
The builder went through a rough spec on a video shot at the Werks Reunion prize giving. It apparently runs a turbocharged engine, later transmission (I presume this means G50), big brake conversion and more but if the story of what sounds like an interesting build is available online, I couldn’t find it. I think I understand why this might be.
We can all allow what is everyday in our world to feel normal and unworthy of mention. As we do more cool stuff on top of cool stuff, the cool stuff becomes normalised and starts to feel old hat and uninteresting to others. If you were a chef and knew how to poach the perfect egg, poached eggs would feel boring to you. Egg plus boiling water: what else is there to say? But there is lots more to say: poaching the perfect egg was a challenge that took me boxes of eggs to master. Cooking is simple when you know where to start, but that does not mean that a Michelin chef explaining how to poach the perfect egg is something no one wants to know more about.
I have now been writing about Porsches for over fifteen years and have spent most of my working days with at least one 911. They feel very normal to me, so I am probably guilty of skipping across stories that others who don’t spend as much time around these cars would find quite interesting. Clients who have been in this game much longer than I have can be quite blasé about their work on road car restorations or engine rebuilds, but these things are always of interest to owners and they are always worth mentioning.
The weight of life’s other projects – raising kids, maintaining investments, running a business and keeping clients happy – sometimes makes it inevitable that we will take things for granted. Mindfulness and other practices of increasing awareness can help us fight this and focus on what is important, but there are not enough hours in the day to do everything, including enjoying the fruits of our labour.
If your 911, 944, Boxster or GT3 has begin to feel normal and perhaps even boring, stop and think about that. These cars are definitely not boring, so have you just normalised ownership? If you’ve managed to keep Porsche ownership fresh across decades of ownership, how have you done it? I would be interested to know your tips and techniques.
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The most irritating thing about watching Youtube on a smart TV with a slightly clunky UI is scrolling past endless suggestions from promoted channels. Five things new motorbike riders don’t know, top five disturbing church videos, top five lowest jet fighter flypasts and so on. Porsche also latched on to top fives a while back and, while this format is not my favourite, they have buried some nuggets in there.
The last Top Five feature on the Porsche Youtube channel was Wolfgang Porsche’s Top Five Porsches. Filmed in the bright, spacious garage at Zell am See, the programme follows Ferry’s youngest son (above, with Hans Klauser and his dad at Le Mans 1956) through five of his favourites. The garage is packed with special cars, but his choices seem very authentic, rather than a list from some corporate PR type. Forgive my ever-present inner cynic.
Porsche 993 Turbo S
Dr Porsche’s first choice is a 993 Turbo S. 345 Turbo S models were built from 1997 onwards, with just 26 examples made in RHD. The Turbo S had a 450bhp twin-turbo flat-six and shot from 0-60 in 3.6 seconds. Distinguished by several features including air intakes in the rear quarters, yellow brake calipers and a unique rear wing, all Turbo S models were built by the Exclusive department. The cars feel pretty special inside and have become highly desirable.
Wolfgang Porsche 993 Turbo S
“The 911 was the successor to the 356,” says Wolfgang. “All the diehards who drove a 356 said “How awful, what kind of a new car do you call this? This can’t be right.” The 911 has now proven itself in fifty years and has forever been undergoing further development. The diehards quietened down and there are many who now drive a 911 instead of the 356.
“My brother Ferdinand Alexander created the aesthetic design and always insisted that it should be a puristic design. He was always the one who said that cars shouldn’t have many frills. The family green was my father’s favourite colour: he had almost all his cars in green.
“The 993 Turbo S is one of the last to have an air-cooled engine. And for this reason it also has a good sound. It’s a good car in any case.”
Wolfgang’s body language when he talks about the sound – a broad emerging smile and a quick glance to the top left – speaks volumes. Big smiles are hard to fake and looking up is a sign of thinking. Looking up and left is said to show information being processed and related to a past experience or emotion. Watch for this when someone talks about a car or a bike they are trying to sell you. If they never look up and left, they really didn’t like this machine. It’s one clue that you can do some damage with your bids!
As an opening choice, the 993 was a good one. I liked the dig at the 356 crowd: socially correct Porsche banter. Hang around 356 boys long enough and you’ll learn that they all love a bit of 356 vs 911 chat: Wolfgang has clearly spent plenty of time in both camps.
The next choice is a Carrera GT and the third is a Panamera Hybrid. “My father would surely have wanted this car because he always said “the newest car is always the best.” Whenever I added an old car to my collection, he always said “why are you driving such an old car? The newer one is always the better one.””
Cars four and five get to the real meat in the sandwich. Four is the America Roadster. Finished in Stone Grey (akin to the Chalk colour chosen for the Panamera Hybrid), the 1952 America Roadster has a 70 horsepower in just 600 kilograms of aluminium bodyshell. “It’s a proper sports car from the ’50s.”
1962 Porsche 356 Carrera 2000 GS
The final car chosen is a 1962 Porsche 356 Carrera GS: Stuttgart’s ultimate performance car of the time. Fitted with the 130 bhp 2-litre four-cam engine, the Carrera 2 cost a fortune when new and just over 400 were manufactured. The cars are now highly desirable: good examples can fetch $350-400k or more at auction.
The Carrera 2 had the Type 578 engine, which had a bigger bore and stroke compared to the earlier 1.5-litre Type 547 Fuhrmann four-cam. The new engine offered more torque but it was also much larger than the earlier motor and hung down lower in the chassis.
“Underneath the skin is a proper sports car,” says Wolfgang. “The ‘Carrera’ in the name means that it’s a very sporty car from this model range. It’s got 130 hp and, in my eyes, it’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing because you don’t realise how powerful it is at first sight.
“The only thing that gives it away is the low-slung exhaust and this tail piece: that’s why this car is also nicknamed ‘the pregnant cat’. This car has a fantastic sound – the exhaust is simply great and the power is great. The Irish Green is one of my favourite colours.”
The Porsche Top Five videos are a slightly off-kilter explosion of brash graphics, choppy edits and Hollywood voiceover, but there is no mistaking Wolfgang’s obvious delight in the cars and what it means to own and enjoy these things: it’s all right there in one cheeky grin when he drops the pregnant cat.
Wolfgang Porsche 356 Carrera GS – Enstall Classic 2017
To me, it seems like the 356 Carrera might be his actual favourite. He’s used it on at least one Enstall Classic (above) and it is right at the point where the 911 kicks in. Perhaps no 911 could ever be as special to one of Ferry’s sons as the ultimate road-going expression of one of their father’s original cars. I can sort of understand that, if it’s the case.
Watch the video below and check out what else is hiding in the garage: 904, 959 and a row of 356 Roadsters. A sports car guy, for sure.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCzrSaaWd_0
Wolfgang Porsche: Top 5 Porsches
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A friend in Ireland has asked me to help find a buyer for his RHD 1971 Porsche 911T, which he has owned since 2013. It is a matching numbers car and has covered an indicated 90,000 miles from new. I have just had the car brought back to England and am offering it for sale on his behalf (now sold – many thanks).
Built in Stuttgart at the end of 1970, the Porsche was sold through AFN and registered as YBH 760J on May 14th, 1971. The history pack for the car shows no details of its early life in the UK, but it ended up having a colour change to red somewhere down the line. In 1999 it was sold by a London garage to an owner in Somerset.
History with that owner shows a series of bills including torsion tube replacement in September 2000, conversion to pressure fed cam chain tensioners in 2001 at 74,500 miles, a new fuel pump and several services. The car covered minimal mileage through to 2003, when it was MOT’d with 75,428 miles on the clock.
The car came back to the market in 2009 and was sold to Brian Kane, a well known air-cooled Porsche specialist at Harmonstown Motors in Dublin. Brian imported the car into the Republic and carried out a detailed restoration, including a conversion to non-sunroof spec using genuine new Porsche parts from the scuttle panel back. There is a huge spread of parts bills right through Brian’s ownership, showing that more than £10,000 was spent on parts alone from 2009 to 2012, with Brian’s labour and other trade services on top.
After several years ownership and enjoyment, the car was seemingly involved in an accident in Ireland at the end of 2012. The parts bill from Porsche Centre Dublin including many genuine panels, a new Porsche oil tank and genuine heat exchangers totalled over €27,000, but an assessor’s report of the time shows the “concours winning car” car had a pre-accident value of €80,000, so the second restoration began on a jig with a Porsche approved repairer. Interestingly, a letter from the insurers in the history shows the damage was not recorded.
This restoration during 2012-2013 put the car back to its original factory silver and into the condition seen here. Bonnet, bumper, front wings, front wing joiners and front pan are all new and rust free. The engine and transmission were rebuilt by a noted Irish specialist in 2017 and prepped for regularity rallying. The car was running on throttle bodies for a time but has now been put back on Webers and runs very well, starting at the first turn of the key. It drove from Dublin to Northamptonshire with no dramas.
The Porsche 911’s rallying history was an important connection for the owner and this car carries a distinct sports purpose theme, with the hood-mounted Cibie Pallas lights painted in body colour over a simple front bumper, the twin-centre exit exhaust and those classic 6 x 15″ anodised Fuchs all round.
The interior was planned as simple T/R spec until the decision came to sell the car, so the interior may be something for the next owner to work on. The leather trimmed steering wheel, dash, seats and door panels are in good order and the seats and original seat belts are as one would expect on an old 911, so they may simply be retained or upgraded. The carpets are original and a new carpet set would give the cabin a lift.
There are a few areas that would yield improvement with a bit of time spent. The engine could do with a new sound pad and detail, a geometry and ride height adjust would be a good idea, I would add an RS bonnet prop as the lights are quite heavy and there is some wiring here and there that could be tidier. But as a vintage Porsche ready to drive, with body restoration and engine and transmission rebuilds all done, it seems a good opportunity to obtain an affordable pre-’73 911 that can be modified and enjoyed.
The car is still registered on Irish plates but it is not a hard job to import to the UK and there should be no duty to pay. Most cars brought back into Britain go back on their original registrations. This one is now MOT and road tax exempt as it is over 40 years old. An MOT may be required as part of the re-importation process. If the car is being exported to further afield, then the paperwork is easily done.
The asking price for this honest 911 is a sensible £54,995 and I am happy to assist potential buyers from the British Isles and beyond. Inspection is recommended and that can be done at the storage facility. The car is stored near Junction 11 of the M40. Drop me an email with any questions.
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Ferdinand blogs my freelance adventure with Porsche at the centre. To support the blog or engage with me in other ways, you can:
I visited well-known Porsche collector, Frank Cassidy, last week and enjoyed a guided tour of his new Boxengasse development. Set in a beautifully landscaped 100-acre property in the heart of rural Oxfordshire, the Porsche-only business park is a bit of a game changer.
Independent Porsche specialist Autofarm is about to move in as Frank’s first tenant. Their new buildings combine old-school brickwork, smooth polished concrete and modern LED lighting and insulation and offer more than enough space to lay out a free-flowing Porsche workshop. The transformational workspace is one of the main drivers behind the relocation and is something that the company’s current premises on the other side of the M40 cannot facilitate.
Hats off to Autofarm bosses, Mikey Wastie and Steve Wood, for embracing the challenge to relocate the comfort and charm of their loft-like current reception space, which I really love, and take such a familiar customer experience to the next level in an all-new environment. I’m excited to see how Autofarm develops in the new location.
Oilcooled Porsche Festival
Helping that settling-in process along is an Autofarm/Boxengasse open day sometime in spring, followed several weeks later by ‘Oilcooled’: a two-day festival over a mid-August weekend aimed at air-cooled enthusiasts.
Oilcooled begins with a Saturday track day at Silverstone, then a cruise back to Boxengasse near Bicester, where an open-air cinema will show a Porsche-themed cult classic that is rarely seen on the big screen. Oxford Fine Dining is supplying the catering and Onassis Events is bringing in cars and enthusiasts in from all over Europe for a big open day on the Sunday.
These two days of Porsche-centric activities have been split up into separate components, so one can drop in and out as preferred. I can envisage arriving for the Saturday evening cinema in some sort of Porsche convoy, enjoying a warm August evening in a beautiful landscaped estate, surrounded by friends old and new in what will hopefully become a regular fixture on the air-cooled calendar that doesn’t require a round trip of several hundred miles to attend. Tickets are now on sale on the Boxengasse website.
January 2019 has been a busy month for Porsche insurance valuations and market discussions activity. Porsche 964 prices have popped up in conversation several times. As serious buyers seem to be gathering data and preparing to compete for what pops up for sale during 2019 and insurance valuations for standard Carrera 2 models in good order now touching £60k, this year could be an interesting one for 964 prices.
Porsche 964 Production Numbers
Manufactured from 1989 to 1994, the Porsche 964 had a comparatively short production life versus its predecessors. The model years spanned a global recession, so sales were relatively low. The German publication, Deutsche Autos seit 1990 (Eberhard Kittler) gives global Porsche 964 production totals for volume models as follows:
Model
Total
964 C2 Coupe
18219
964 C2 Cabriolet
11013
964 C2 Targa
3534
964 C2 Cabrio Turbo-Look
1532
964 C2 Speedster
936
964 C4 Coupe
13353
964 C4 Cabriolet
4802
964 C4 Targa
1329
964 C4 Jubilee Coupe
911
964 Turbo 3.3
3660
964 Turbo 3.6
1437
964 Carrera RS Coupe (3.6)
2282
A document put together in the early 2000s by the Porsche Club Turbo Register of the time is said to show that just 130 RHD 3.3 Turbos and only 42 RHD 3.6 Turbos were sold in the UK. I have not checked this data but it would not surprise me, given the scale of the recession at the time and the astronomical cost new of the Turbo models.
However, with both 964 Turbo and 930 prices retreating from the highs of 2015/16 and no sign that values have settled as yet, buyers are wary of these models. Instead, most potential buyers I speak with are considering standard C2 and C4 Coupes. Good examples of both are in short supply.
Pistonheads currently has 96 ads listed under the heading of 964 for sale. Removing the non-964s and silly POA ads gets us down to 64. If we look solely at narrow body cars being sold in the UK with an advertised asking price, then here is a summary of what is available as at January 30, 2019:
Porsche 964 C2/C4 Cabriolet (manual plus Tiptronic)
13
Porsche 964 C2/C4 Targa (manual plus Tiptronic)
4
Porsche 964 C2/C4 Coupe Manual
8
Porsche 964 C2/C4 Coupe Tiptronic
3
Distilling the stock available on what is probably the biggest advertising portal for these cars in the UK to solely non-RS narrow body 964 models, we end up with a total of 28 cars, less than half of which are Coupe models. Just 8 of the 28 cars are Coupes with a manual transmission and several of those cars are either modified or optimistically priced, such as the 66k-mile C2 Coupe for sale by an OPC at £80k. This reduces the choice even further.
The low supply creates a problem for buyers. Low supply pushes prices up, but the general market trend is still downward, as the investors who were fuelling the spiralling prices cool their spending or spread their asset portfolios across other brands or hobbies and the classic Porsche market unwinds due to lower demand.
Potential buyers are therefore faced with a gamble on what the future holds for 964s. Will low supply and persistent demand keep things as they are, or, faced with an entry cost already higher than other air-cooled options, will buyers eventually move on to different 911 model lines including well-priced 997s, causing the micro-market to capitulate and bring 964 prices down with a bump? Hence the conversations this month with potential buyers and a number of potential sellers.
If a 964 Coupe is your must-have 911, then you are not alone: many others share your desire. While the supply of air-cooled cars in January tends to be lower than later in the year, there is a marked preponderance of soft tops and Tiptronic Coupes amongst the available stock. This is probably a true reflection of what is available in the UK and may not shift to any great extent as the season gets started.
As the low supply supports Coupe prices (within reason) – particularly for the holy grail of a low mileage 964 C2 manual Coupe – buyers will have to decide whether the 964 is ultimately worth the current premium over a well preserved 3.2 Carrera Coupe or a nicely priced 993.
No doubt the 964 makes a fun car to drive when modified in the usual ways, but the £55-60k start price on a decent 964 Coupe is a fair chunk of cash for most of us. I can’t say that I would opt for an average 964 at this price point given the available alternatives if investment was a priority, but it will be interesting to see how 964 market trends play out through 2019.
Ferdinand blogs my freelance adventure with Porsche at the centre. To support the blog or engage with me in other ways, you can:
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