Background

Any car enthusiast with an ounce of petroleum in their veins will be aware of the 1973 Porsche 911 Carrera RS, nearly every journalist waxed lyrical about it when launched and it was no coincidence that several formula 1 drivers had one for commuting to the circuit for their day job, ensuring its legendary status was sealed.

Amazingly, for a car that cost circa £6,000 when new, you will now likely require north of £500,000 to secure a genuine no stories RHD example and significantly more if you are looking for one of the 17 right hand drive M471 lightweights, ensuring ownership is for the lucky few today.

However, all is not lost for those wanting to enjoy some of the attributes of this iconic model on a more realistic budget, as the 911 RS was based on a regular model, allowing reproductions to be easily created. These fall fundamentally into two categories, the first being based on a genuine period car, and the second being based on a later 80s donor car with the attributes of being easier to drive and more creature comforts. The decision whether to stick with a period conversion or opt for a later car is a personal decision. However, what is common to all is how well the car has been executed. A well-built example will be a joy to own, whilst a poorly created car will always be that one you wish you had never found. Today if you were to create either from scratch, and have it built to a high standard from a reputed specialist, it will cost in excess of £250,000.

This M471 Lightweight conversion was carried out on a period correct 1973 911 Coupe identity in the late 90s for Michael Rigg to race in the Porsche Club Classic/ Intermarque Series where it competed regularly at the sharp end. In 2002, it was sold onto Mark Campball who continued to campaign the car with some success and had it prepared by Porsche Specialists JAZ during this time, including rebuilding the car to full FIA Appendix K accreditation with papers issued in 2007 with it racing at the SPA 3 hours when completed. An engine, gearbox and LSD rebuild took place in 2010 as well as bodywork restoration by renowned specialists Sportwagen.

Acquired by us in 2015, we were preparing the car again for FIA class GT27 this time with a freshly built 2.7 RS spec motor on unnumbered  7R cases, when an old client walked in, fell in love with its rorty hard core nature, and bought it on the spot as a fun road car.

Wanting to maximise the whole motorsport adrenaline fix, we fitted RSR megaphones at the same time.

Ironically, he has not used it as much as he would have hoped, and we had it back in late 2022 for an engine refresh to cure oil leaks caused through lack of use and fitted a new clutch kit at the same time. We also replaced the original spec M471 lightweight spec seats with ST specification items, although the originals can be reinstated if required.

Our Thoughts

If you are looking for the full motorsport fix on number plates, its right here! `Rorty and Snorty` this is a car that enjoys being driven hard and sounds simply glorious when doing so. In fact, the absolute polar opposite to the EV world we are being forced into today.

And… because it’s a genuine period facsimile of an original, with a few tweaks, full competition FIA papers could be reinstated, so you too could be lining up on a historic racing grid at Spa, as it did all those years ago.