#Porsche968

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If you could afford just about any sports car short of the exotics, why would you restore a more than 20 year old front engined four cylinder Porsche? That was the question that I asked orthopaedic surgeon Miles Singer, who completely rebuilt his Porsche 968. Miles is good at rebuilding things. I first got to know him through his wife, Debbie, a razor sharp PhD chemical engineer with whom I worked at DuPont. One day in 2001, while commuting to work on my bicycle, I entered a crosswalk on a very stale signal. The guy in the Infiniti SUV sitting next to the Airborne delivery truck in the curb lane didn’t see me till I popped out in front of him just after his light turned green. I actually saw the bumper hit my left knee. The next thing I knew, I was sitting on the ground and my lower left leg was at a funny angle to my thigh.

I was doing some legwork on a Reader’s Ride sort of thing that I’m hoping I’ll get to do with a Porsche 968. Time hasn’t treated the four cylinder front engined Porsches quite as well as it has the 928, and that, too, is kind of dismissed by Dr. P’s acolytes of the rear engined faith. You can buy a 968, the ultimate development of the 944 and a very nicely performing, exceptionally handling car, for less than a new Yaris or Versa will cost you and you can get a decent runner 944 for just a few thousand dollars. As for the 924, like the 914, it’s considered eine halbe Porsche.

In the thirties and forties, GM pioneered and brought to market some of the most innovative, successful and lasting new technologies: diesel-electric locomotives, the modern diesel bus, automatic transmissions, refrigeration and air conditioning systems, high compression engines, independent front suspension, and many more. But GM’s technology prowess was just one facet of its endlessly warring multiple personalities. Planned obsolescence, chrome, fins and financial rationalization were the real moneymakers, especially during the technically conservative fifties. But in the period from 1960 to 1966, GM built three production cars that tried to upend the traditional format: the rear engined 1960 Corvair, the front-wheel drive 1966 Toronado, and the 1961 Tempest. And although the Corvair and Toronado tend to get the bulk of the attention, the Tempest’s format was by far the most enduring one: it was a BMW before BMW built theirs. If only they had stuck with it.