That’s right boys and girls, I bought a Porsche. But don’t worry, it’s pretty beat up..
I’m giggling a bit writing this, because ‘budget build’ and Porsche don’t necessarily go hand in hand. Add to that by having a ’73 RS as your ‘ideal’ inspiration, and you’ll be laughed at by any Porsche enthusiast. After all, that is the holy grail.
With an ideal project in mind, I looked for a classic 911 for months, passing on countless cars, and even contemplating changing direction by going with a G-body car or even a 964 or 993. I was starting to give up hope, because every single classic 911 I came across was either a complete pile of crap or totally overpriced by the ridiculous amount of flippers and dealers slanging these things. Sometimes, even the competitively priced projects would get picked up almost immediately after being listed for sale. Then of course, the flippers would re-list them at a premium. I think in total I lost out on probably 12 to 15 good deals.
But just before I caved in, as fate would have it, I stumbled across a local add for perhaps the ugliest Porsche I’ve ever seen for sale… It was the one.
From Fritz To SiX
Alarmingly, the advertisement was up for over three weeks. I was actually surprised I hadn’t seen it prior, but I guess my narrowed search was filtering the car out of the listings (pro tip: when searching for a car, try not to narrow the search too much, as you’ll potentially lose out on other possibilities).
For a few days following, I found myself going back and forth on whether it was worth looking at. Despite being only 15 minutes away from my house, I was unsure about it, only because I had wasted so much time already looking at other cars that were described in similar light. But after consulting a few Porsche friends, I stopped doubting myself and decided to give the guy a call to schedule a time to check out the car, and an hour later I was en route.
When I arrived, the car wouldn’t start, was covered in dust, and as I imagined, was being sold by someone who happened to come across the car on the street, and persuaded the original owner to sell it to him. ‘Here we go again’ I thought to myself, thinking that this was just another flip. And to be fair, it actually was just another flip.
The seller had no idea about the car’s previous history, even though it came with a mountain a paperwork that he was too lazy to sort through to read. Interestingly enough, the paperwork alone had a story to tell, with clippings of other Porsches for sale, maintenance and previous restoration documents, and even receipts from EASY dating back to the 1980s, which was particularly exciting since I still frequent their monthly meet today. I know the guys will get a kick out of seeing some of this stuff when I take the car to next month’s gathering.
Eventually, it all worked in my favor, because had he actually took the time to understand the car, he would’ve asked quite a bit more than his already fair asking price. I left shortly after snapping nearly 100 photos for a Porsche specialist/mechanic friend to use for inspection. Ideally, I would’ve liked to have him come inspect the car in person, but because there were a few other potential buyers lined up for the car, I had no choice but to act as fast as I possibly could. It was risky, but a calculated risk nevertheless.
Despite having the Porsche specialist’s approval to pull the trigger on the car, I was still on the fence. My biggest constraint this time around, was that the car wasn’t actually a 911, but it’s dumbed-down sibling, a 912.
If you’re wondering what the difference between the two are, most of it resides underneath. When the boys at Stuttgart decided that the Type 911 (originally Type 901) would be their sole offering, they feared the potential loss of sales due to the increased price of the flat-six powered 911. So to keep things simple, they tossed in the last version of the 356 1.6-liter flat-four, along with the 902 transmission, and considered it the ‘entry level’ variant to the 911. I’ll dive more into that in the next update, but because of this, I knew for a fact that I’d never be satisfied with the four-banger version of the 911. Surely though, as the saying goes, a little bit of luck can go a long way.
Gotta Love It When The Stars Align
I kid you not going into this next part of the story, but that same day, that same specialist who I’d consulted about the 912 posted a red Carrera wing for sale. Intrigued, I messaged him asking what car it came off, and it just so happened to be G’s red Euro Carrera I drove during the Coastal Range Rally. ‘Interesting,’ I thought to myself. Why was this wing from that car up for sale? I knew G wouldn’t be modifying that car as it was basically his ‘around town’ car. I pushed my curiosity a bit further and asked my mechanic what the deal with the car was, only to find out that unfortunately for G, the car had been in an accident (not his fault), and was unsavable.
I quickly messaged G asking what his plans were for the car, and he said that he was just going to part it out. BOOM, the potato-powered lightbulb in my head went into full illumination, and the puzzle pieces immediately started coming together.
‘If I buy the ugly car, and I buy G’s car, then I can make the ugly car, the right car. I’d literally have everything I need.’ And just like that, I was the owner of not one, but two Porsches, both of which did not work. Sigh…
Now, it was all a matter of putting the puzzle pieces together – in real life. I’ll dive more into those details in the next update.
For now, we fast-forward a bit to this past week, with the car finally home after a long surgical procedure.
So far, I’ve already burned through the paint on the quarter panels of the car. It’s far from perfect in terms of paint anyway, so I’m considering these new blemishes as part of my inauguration process. Other than that, the shakedown period has gone rather well, thankfully, and now I can shift focus into getting all the little details done, which I’ll surely be sharing with you guys along the way.
Stay tuned as this is just the beginning…
Naveed Yousufzai
Instagram: eatwithnaveed