A race bred icon.
Most of you guys already know by now that I love homologation specials and on this Teutonic Tuesday we take a look at another beautiful race to street machine. Desire to go up against giants like Ferrari with their V12s in the Group 4 Special Grand Touring class that created the Grandfather of all the hardcore Porsche RS models we know today.
Porsche started with their most powerful at the time 911S model, they beefed up the engine to produce 210hp and used every weight saving strategy they can possibly think of. Stripped out interior with all creature comforts eliminated even the carpets were replaced with rubber mats and using cloth as door handles (something we still see in current RS models). The Porsche engineers aren’t done yet, all the windows use thinner glass and even the sheet metals are thinner as well. The large protruding steel bumpers were replaced with slimmer ones made out of fiberglass as well as the engine lid.
To make sure their new creation can utilize the new engine and weight saving modifications, the chassis was retuned with new suspension and re-calibrated steering with the new lighter fenders house wider tracks for better traction. To round up the handling aspect, the introduction of the classic “ducktail” rear wing that is part of the fiberglass engine lid to help increase donwforce and stability for high speed cornering which was very innovative at the time with only a few road cars that have it and none of them were as efficient.
Porsche originally planned to build just 500 units only to comply with FIA Group 4 rules. At first, there were people within the company specifically the sales department worried the RS would be a sales flop believed that buyers would demands more features for such an expensive car. They were very wrong, people found the bare bone interior in exchange for the exhilarating driving experience of the RS worth it. All 500 units were sold quickly with 51 orders filled on the day it was unveiled at the Paris Motor Show in 1972. It became such a high demand that Porsche agreed to increase production number which totaled at around 1,580 units. With the huge sales success, it also allowed Porsche to enter the RS in the FIA Group 3 Grand Touring race category that mandated a minimum production number of 1,000 homologation units and continue to dominate the track.
Track focused, usable on the road. Porsche been doing it for decades and the magic still remains to this day.
This is another excellent Tomica Premium that I was looking forward to since I heard about its release. The tampos are neatly done, pop in light pieces and suspension as usual on all Tomica Premiums, and the Fuchs wheels is well done. The only slight niggle I have with them is the openings for the wheels aren’t colored black which would contrast the wheels and thus make them more realistic.
I love it and hope that Tomica would release a different color of this cast like they do with some of their other casts (preferably green).
That’s all for now. Until next time. Cheers.