Indholdsfortegnelse for April 2024 i Classic Porsche

PORSCHE AIR-COOLED CLASSICS BOOKAZINE During more than five decades of production, Porsche’s now legendary air-cooled sports cars afforded the Stuttgart brand a reputation for delivering formidable racing machines capable of dominating motorsport. Away from the track, the manufacturer’s road cars were just as impressive, bringing automotive technology developed in the heat of battle to the world’s dealer showrooms. In this chunky 164-page celebration of air-cooled classics, the makers of 911 & Porsche World and Classic Porsche magazines chart the design and evolution of Porsche’s air-cooled sports cars, from events leading to the development of 356 no.1, all the way to discontinuation of the 993. Along the way, we get behind the wheel of key models, delve into owner stories, explore ground-breaking engineering and salute racing success. Essential reading (and a…

Today, regardless of your preferred gearbox, it’s inconceivable there would be no availability of automatic transmission across the Porsche product range. Indeed, PDK significantly outsells its manual counterpart. Things were rather different sixty years ago, when Porsche was still a fledgling maker of two-door sports cars. Its strong image was built around the 356 and the early 911, but sales became relatively stagnant in the mid-1960s and, with the demise of the 356 in 1965, Porsche embarked on a program to broaden appeal of the six-cylinder flagship. Given how the USA accounted for the largest proportion of Porsche’s sales, and considering drivers in North America had already moved en masse in the direction of automatic gearboxes, it made perfect business planning sense for Porsche to do likewise. Enter Sportomatic, unveiled…

Here’s a question. Why, in the nearly twenty years I’ve been scribbling about Porsches for this title and its sibling, 911 & Porsche World, have I never dropped in on Export 56? Obviously, this is a rhetorical question, but even so. Indeed, such is my Export 56 ‘black hole’ of knowledge, I was preparing to set off for the company’s former premises in Newport Pagnell, a town famous for its connections to Aston Martin. Today’s photographer, Dan Sherwood, corrected my trajectory of travel. “Export 56 is based near Bedford,” he told me. “The business left Newport Pagnell more than four years ago.” It always helps to know where you’re going, doesn’t it? IN ANOTHER CORNER SITS A PRE-PRODUCTION 901 ACQUIRED FROM SERIAL RESTOMODDER, MAGNUS WALKER Okay, I’m exaggerating a little,…

As 911s go, it looks pretty young, but this SC retrospective sets out to evoke the 911 ST. What exactly is an ST? Let me take you back to 1967, when Porsche was not the given race winner we take for granted today. Sure, during the 1950s and 1960s, the brand was regular class victor in top-line international motorsport, even winning the Targa Florio outright, but it had yet to top the podium at Le Mans, which it did for the first time in 1970. The 911 was slowly gaining ground in the lower orders, but was yet to realise its full potential at international level. The first factory racing 911 was simply designated R (for Renn) and was unveiled in 1967. It was an austere, pared-to-the-bone, hot two-litre coupé…

Chuck Stoddard, founder of the famous Cleveland-based Porsche parts and sales centre bearing his family name, recalled how the Speedster tempted some of his customers into a 356. “They became enchanted with the Porsche driving experience, but many began to hate how cold and leaky a Speedster could be,” he said. “They soon traded up to a ‘real quality’ Porsche coupe. The unexpected consequence of this trend was that many used 356 Speedsters became available at low cost and were snapped up by budding SCCA racers working with limited budgets. These Porsches then began showing up in quantity at weekend racing events. Needless to say, this gave Porsche tremendous exposure to North America’s growing sports car crowd.” In California, two friends and eager competitors saw 356 Speedsters as their way…

Many of us can trace our passion for Porsche to an event occurring during our formative years. What was the catalyst for your love of the marque? An encounter with a family member’s air-cooled 911? Maybe the Zuffenhausen concern’s dominance of sports car racing, plus the 959’s rule over motoring headlines following model launch, was enough to trigger a deep-rooted love for Porsche lasting to the present day? Perhaps, as a child, you were given a toy Porsche to play with, an event leading to your name appearing on the logbook of a full-size Stuttgartcrested car in the here and now? Ask Sam Murphy to identify the event inciting his affection for Porsche and he’ll give you an answer amounting to ‘all of the above’. “My father has owned various…

Few cars command the level of adoration poured on the 964 Carrera RS 3.8, assembled just fifty-five times in order for Porsche to meet homologation requirements enabling the 964 Carrera RSR 3.8 to go racing. Developed in 1992 as a punchier sibling to the 964 Carrera RS (a 3.6-litre model based on the 964 Carrera Cup and produced in comparatively gargantuan production volume of 2,276 units), the RS 3.8 upped the ante by exploiting a blueprint laid down by the Carrera RS 2.7 two decades earlier: more firepower and firm focus on ‘adding lightness’. That said, the RS 3.8’s appearance was far more pronounced than the somewhat restrained standard RS. In fact, if you park a 964 Turbo, RS and RS 3.8 next to one another, you’d probably guess the…