Custom Off-road Baja 911 is Crazier than You’d Imagine
The definition of luxury and performance in one package strikes again in the world’s premier off-road 911.
While we might not see off-road 911s on a daily basis, these unique Porsches are ingrained into the motorsport’s history of the brand. There are a couple of people still gunning to keep the off-road 911 alive. One of these individuals is TJ Russell, from Russell Built Fabrication. While you might not know Russell by name, you will recognize his work. His company has been doing the majority of the fabrication work for Singer Vehicle Designs for many years. Yes, that Singer.
Russell thought it was about time he built a custom Porsche for what he loves: off-roading. Thus, he tells us in this video by Trophy Burro, what his motivation was for this build. “A lot of inspiration from luxury pre-runners and a little bit of everything off-road. I’ve spent the last 9 years building custom luxury 911s for other people. Being on off-road enthusiast myself, I just had this crazy idea to kind of go all out and go to the next level with a Porsche 911.” So what you see here is the fruits of many countless hours of labor. The result? This is the custom Baja 911.
Believe it or not, this build started its life as a cabriolet, but now features a composite hardtop. You might be thinking, an off-road convertible, what the hell? Well, Russell has an explanation. “Why would you build an off-road car out of a cabriolet? That’s pretty crazy. We did this for a few reasons. One was we were able to build the whole cage outside the car…another reason, the cabriolets are a little cheaper than the coupes…and I think it makes a pretty cool story that we build this robust of an off-road monster out of a cabriolet.”
As you might quickly come to understand, this man isn’t one to settle for the norm. Uniqueness is definitely the name of the game here. All of the light pods are hand-crafted on the front end, some even of carbon fiber. Obviously, the custom work doesn’t stop there. One of the most obvious features of this 911 is how cazy wide it is. 7 extra inches of width in the front and 6 inches extra in the rear, for those who wonder. How was this accomplished? “I had modeled this entire passenger side out of foam during the build process…I spend about 6 months just going through and carving [away at the foam]. The front came out pretty cool the first time, the rear I needed to do a couple of times.”
Yes, a lot of work has gone into making this chassis as perfect as possible for the job. However, never think this work didn’t pay off. All body panels other than the original shell are now fiberglass. “We were able to take off 400 pounds from the car we started with. Factory C4 is 3,200 pounds and we brought it down to about 2,800.” That’s impressive considering the full-sized spare in the front trunk sitting next to the 17 gallon fuel cell. However, Russell does admit that “the biggest hurdle with this car was making everything fit.” A 90’s 911 isn’t exactly a large vehicle. Packaging in a build like this is definitely key.
However, the custom work is far from done for this 911. The car was sand-blasted and brought to raw metal so it could be coated in Steel-It, a protective, non-corrosive paint. The cage within the car was also polished and buffed with a Steel-It finish. The car has no strut towers, rather a bespoke dual A-arm shock tower for the front suspension. According to Russell, “a strut front suspension isn’t ideal for desert elements. It’s okay for rally cars, but I kind of wanted to go to the next level with this.” With this design a full corner of the suspension can be replaced instantly, as it bolts in directly into the cross-member. This allows for around 12 inches of travel in the front and 13 inches in the rear. That is a healthy amount for any off-road vehicle, but amazing for a 911.
Not to mention, there is an insane custom rear windshield that is molded into all of the coolers. “Being an off-road car, I wanted to get all the coolers up and out of harm’s way. From the factory, the AC condensers and oil coolers are all up in the front wheel wells. That wasn’t an option on this car.” The packaging of this build is where it really shines.
However, the interior is just as impressive as the exterior. There are custom Sparco carbon seats finished in olive green leather and contrasting alcantara. There’s even some storage behind the seats even with the cage in place. Supposedly, Russell still considers this a “daily driven street car and something that we could go racing in if we wanted to.” While it does maintains the stock engine, it has been stroked from its original 3.6L to a 3.8L.”Aside from throwing on turbochargers this is about as robust of a motor we could put in this thing. Puts out about 365 HP and 310 ft/lbs of torque. It does pretty good for an AWD 911 that weighs 2800 pounds.” We are blown away by the detail and functionality of this 911. We hope you guys do appreciate it just as much.
Photos: Baja_911/Instagram