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The Brits say: “Once you’re in the hole, stop digging”. This, now wonderfully handling car, is another example of an intuitive purchase and a restoration gotten out of hand! And it’s not over.

The Hulk is a 1974 Carrera, which came with the Carrera RS 2.7 911/83 engine. It was originally registered under Ben Pon’s name and was delivered in metallic Viper Gruen. The car was sold not too long after, and ended up rusting away merrily for several years. The then owner decided it was probably better to make something special out it, if it was going to be resurrected anyway and had Van den Berg turn the car into an RSR chassis shape, using a donor body shell. The chassis number was transplanted to the donor and the result was a dead-straight, lightweight 1974 RSR clone. The car went into storage again, was sold due to the then owner’s ill health and was [...]

Having nearly dropped out of the last Winter Trial with the Silverado, running the 3.0 SC engine on Webers, I have developed a fuel pump phobia… I guess that if you go through three low quality items in two days, it becomes time to dedicate research to the problem. Due to our business relationship with Francis Tuthill Ltd, TwinSpark Racing got access to these special items, which Richard Tuthill uses in all their client cars. As Tuthill cars usually finish and if they drop out it’s usually due to human error, these pumps must be tough cookies. If you see what the Tuthill cars are put through on events like the Safari rally, then surely these pumps must be good enough for heavy navigation rallys.

Yet I asked our mechanic to mount two… just to be absolutely sure. He crafted a beautiful lightweight panel, which fits straight into the smuggler’s box and provides damping, both [...]

In a few weeks Silverado will start in the 2010 Winter Trial. Under the skin this car is essentially a 2.7 Carrera RS. It has the suspension, engine and gearbox of that type, all mounted on a standard 911T body. The front brakes are S-type, it has stabilisor bars, but retains the narrow body, for now…. The rear torsion bars have been uprated to 26 mm Turbo items and this has all turned this 911 into a terrific driving tool. But it wasn’t always this great.

Silverado was my first classic 911, bought in 2003 and has gone through all the evolutions you can imagine. When I bought the car, it was a basket case, bog-standard 911 T with a carburetted 2.2 ltr engine. One the way home the clutch gave in and it all went to hell from there… The car was restored, taken apart again, due to the poor work done by a [...]