The Porsche that started it for you - your first one or....

[S Mclean]

1978 was my first purchase a 1955 rhd coupe still driving it & still can't figure out how to post pictures here.

[sladey]

Ha! The one that really started it for me was the road test report in Hot Car magazine written by one Mr Seume of this parish. From memory he did a new SC one month and the next month he did the turbo. After reading about all the jacked up Anglias and sit up and beg ford pops he seemed to be smitten and it really aroused my interest in them being something very special. I believe in the turbo on he recommended selling your children to buy one....

Years later, having run a MkII jag as my daily driver we bought my wife a (clapped out) BMW 7 series which was also the family car. She suggested now we'd got a family car I could sell the MkII and get a Porsche as I'd always wanted one. I nearly fainted. Bought mine shortly afterwards and had it ever since

[KS]

Guilty as charged!

[brembo]

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2jmVzic]Hoped to ... .jpg[/img]

Been a few changes since purchased in 2005.

[911hillclimber]

My first contact with a 911 was around 1985, barely gave one a thought before then, knew nothing about them other than being German.

Josh Sadler was campaigning his 3.5 then on the hills, maybe this famous car:



Also in the same camp was Bill Goodman and his turbo T which I think Josh had a hand in.

[jwhillracer]

My first contact with a 911 was around 1985, barely gave one a thought before then, knew nothing about them other than being German.

Josh Sadler was campaigning his 3.5 then on the hills, maybe this famous car:

No, that belonged to Tony Bancroft back then, has since been campaigned very successfully by Richard Jones, and currently by Phil Price.

Bugger, I'm showing my age now!

JW

[911hillclimber]

Yes, thought the same, but the google pic said Josh.

[neilbardsley]

I was driving near Tower Bridge with the Kids. There were some old cars on the street. I got out took a 68 912 for a test drive and bought it. This is when they were cheaper. The car was featured by Keith in his mag. It became a bit of a long journey. Never ran right. Appears it had an old Eric Engine in it with a more aggressive cam. This included it stalling in the Blackwell Tunnel and not restarting. They rebuilt the engine at the sellers cost. Then bashed from behind. Then an engine failure. Then stolen!



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[Winston Teague]

Jenks. He was a great friend of my parents, and I devoured his books as a car obsessed youth. I knew i wanted a 356 one day. Then in 2003 Isabel and I had a holiday in California, visiting a mate who was working in Christies car dept in LA. They lived just down from Sunset and one eve we were people watching in a bar and a glamorous lady pulled up in her silver 356, and came on for a drink. I fell for the car! The rest of the trip was spent Porsche spotting, there were plenty about. On our last morning, Nick recommended a trip to Auto books & Aerobooks in Burbank (I think) my flight reading became 'Dry Lakes & Dragstrips', Airstream' & 'Buying, Driving and Enjoying the Porsche 356' by James Schrager. The damage was done..... Airstream, and Hotrods are both cool but only in America... Bit like drinking Pastis in England, it tastes better in France.
Fast forward to 2008 and I'd given up mobile working and rented a workshop, so didn't need to grind around in an old Mondeo estate any more.... And with a 5 mile commute, air-cooled was the way to go..... Swotted up, lined up some viewings and went shopping. Ritchie King had a car with snags that was just in budget.... Three hour viewing with a magnet (lots of filler), and a screwdriver (central tub was solid) and my well thumbed copy of Schrager, and I'd bought it. It seemed mechanically and structurally pretty good, with bad corrosion around the edges of the body and peeling paint. 'cheap for a reason'. Train to Southend a week later, a bit of starter motor faff and drove it home, loved it ever since..... Sweet engine has now carried us 40000+ miles as a non-salt season daily driver. Welded and painted 5 years ago, it lives out and gets used a lot. Pretty much the only car that would displace it is Jenks actual one.......
The plan had been to try all sorts of things, not keeping it forever, Alfa 105, Fulvia, etc, but they just won't be as good......

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[Lightweight_911]

No, that belonged to Tony Bancroft back then ...

Bugger, I'm showing my age now!

JW

- & prior to that he used to campaign a fairly wild V8-engined TVR Tuscan.

I seem to remember that, for some unknown reason, he often went under the name 'Spotty Smith' ...

.

[Winston Teague]

12 years on and this is the view as I write this!

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[jwhillracer]

No, that belonged to Tony Bancroft back then ...

Bugger, I'm showing my age now!

JW

- & prior to that he used to campaign a fairly wild V8-engined TVR Tuscan.

I seem to remember that, for some unknown reason, he often went under the name 'Spotty Smith' ...

.

His parents didn't allow or approve of him competing...………

This was Josh's 3.5 from the early 80's, later campaigned very successfully by Nigel Garland


JW

[911hillclimber]

I was driven over, sideways and under by Sadler, Garland and another on the way to Prescott to spectate in my MGB GT one Sunday morning, about 1987.
The 3 of them all came past at the same time I swear.
Gob-smakin'!

[rhd racer]

This thread got me thinking last week and tonight I managed to get in the loft and find the evidence.

1978, a six year old boy was obsessed with cars. I could name everything on the road pretty much and had a photographic memory for number plates. The obvious thing to do with this passion was collect matchbox cars and my favourites were Porsches. The 911 is from 78 and the land shark from 79.



Then this slightly later and larger Turbo was acquired and became my favourite. It had working suspension so I could make the tail end squat just like JW’s car!



I then saw a black RHD 914 at the Volksworld show after painting a string of VWs in Porsche colours (Rubystone / Sepia) and I had to have one. A couple of years later I got the 914 which I kept for 20 years. I then fell in with the wrong crowd (several of whom of this parish) and the rest is history!




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[jwhillracer]

I think this definitely come under "or" ……….

My Dad and a few friends bought a VW Devon camper, and headed off across country to the Holy Land when I was 15 or so. They arrived there in time to dig a lot of slit trenches on a kibbutz, and left Haifa on the ferry to Cyprus at midnight, just a few minutes before the 6 day War broke out …… They had a slightly less adventurous journey back, and all that they had needed to do to the old Splittie on the journey was replace a noisy front wheel bearing. He was impressed!
Just before I was 17 he bought a 1956 Beetle (RZ 3827) from Robert McBurney in Ballymena. We tidied it up, I learned to drive in it, and passed my driving test in it. I drove it, modified it, and eventually and inevitably crashed it as well...…...


My brother Mervyn later took it on, repaired and improved it. It never looked that good in my custody! The registration lives now on his Autotest Beach Buggy

I needed another set of wheels, so bought a VERY rusty 62 car for £200. It was quickly obvious that it was beyond my skills and pocket to repair all the rust, but luckily nearly all of the rust was in the body shell, the chassis was OK. I found a sound 65 body shell that someone was getting rid of to build a Beach Buggy, and swapped everything into that. Engines came and went day by day and week by week. My ever-so-patient girlfriend turned up to my parent's house several times to be told that we would go out as soon as I got the engine back in...…... Surprisingly she's still around, and still puts up with me.
It was driven in and out of Uni, I was runner-up in a QUB MC rally to a chap in one of those fancy new Twin-Cam Escort things, Autocrossed it, and generally thrashed the daylights out of it.


I'm sure I must have better photos of it somewhere, but this one was taken at a Motor Enthusiasts Club autocross just outside Naas, near Mondello Park. I think the guy who unintentially photobombed it was Larry Mooney, who was a very quick VW driver at the time.
We had a big engine blow-up on a rally just outside Wicklow shortly after, the tale of the recovery back to Northern Ireland would take a whole chapter by itself, so I'll skip that!
A good 1600 transporter based engine was found, and a nice set of 356 wheels and spacers on the rear, so it really looked the part. After a year working, I went back to college, but in Bedfordshire, so the car was made slightly more civilised for the journeys back and forth through Scotland and down the motorways. My lovely patient gf then needed a replacement for her woody Mini Traveller. Another mistake, getting rid of that! But, I rang her one night, and told her the glad news that I had found the ideal car in Luton, a 62 VW with a Porsche Super 75 engine! We bought it, and drove it all the way back to Stranraer. It made it, just!!!
That summer was spent firstly tidying up the Luton car, 881WPK in the photo above, removing the Porsche engine, instruments etc, and fitting the 1600 from the rally/autocross car. We sprayed it the then trendy Aubergine, and made it quite civilised, so she was happy.
We then started on my car. One of my pals needed a replacement 1500 engine for his car, so we bought a damaged 1970 1500, he had the engine, and I had the rest. We replaced the damaged body with my good 65 one, so I had disc brakes, a higher final drive, and a self-rebuilt Super 75 engine. It was all finished off in Daytona Yellow orange-peel with a black bonnet.
That was fun! Before the speed limit came in to NI, it would sit at over 100 (on the clock) on the way to work early in the morning. I can also remember coming away from the Stranraer ferry one afternoon just behind a Lotus Cortina, who was extremely peeved at not being able to shake off a little old Beetle all the way to Gretna!

It was a great car, it never let me down, it would sit on the motorways at 80-ish when I was being sensible, and return a regular 35mpg.
I was hooked on the Porsche efficiency.
Things changed, I finished college, went to work, got married to the still very tolerant gf, and moved to Somerset.
Then, of course, we found a local motor club, and started competing in autocross again.

We ran the S75 for a season or two, but we were badly lacking in power, so I took out a loan (for £300 I think!) to buy what turned out to be a fairly crappy 2.1 litre roller-crank VW engine - on Strombergs It would always go like wotsit off a shovel in practice, and then a bag of nails in the event. The poor old car was "developed" and stripped out, as it was no longer roadgoing. It finally ran on 6 x 13 steel rims with ex-BL works team gravel rally tyres, through a solid welded diff, as I couldn't see the point in spending vast amounts of money on a limited slip diff to race on grass and mud.

My very patient wife had enough of recovering a sick noisy beetle from all over the South-West after nearly every event, and I was
instructed to buy a trailer to go behind our Devon camper.
Unsurprisingly, fairly soon the poor old Beetle had had enough. I started to build a Beach Buggy, but my heart wasn't really in it.
Then one day in 1977, I had a phone call.
"What about a Porsche for next year?" I reminded my mate that I wasn't in that sort of league, but he kept on. A 1970 Porsche 914, fire damaged for £500.
Well, if they were so good for autocross that Griff Griffiths was building one with his 4 Cam Carrera engine in it, then it had to be worth a go!

To be continued........... maybe

JW