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Thanks for the page out of the RMR PCA HighGear newsletter. Bob Hagestad was a good IMSA competitor and challenging adversary. It was through Bob that I got to know Al Lager, so when Bob and Al decided to hang it up, I quickly called Al and put a deal together. That was the turning point for our team, since up till then we had a revolving crew door. I only wish Al had been with us right from the start in '73.

Regarding the photo from the RMR newsletter of our #30, that was taken at the 1977 Daytona 24hr. Not sure if Brad is getting out, or trying to get in. Because of the side impact bar, the car was very difficult to get into. For the RSR I'm building now, I insisted that the impact bar be positioned exactly the same. Then I tried it and couldn't get in at all, so we elected to drop the top bar (from the top arrow on the front halo), down a few inches. It seems that I was a lot more flexible when I was 28 years old. The second, horizontal side bar is not original and only added because of today's more stringent safety regs.

That '77 Daytona 24hr was going great early on. We were leading the eventual winner, the #43 Haywood-Graves-Helmick RSR by two laps at 3 a.m., when a chain tensioner failed and we had to stop. I didn't want to quit and asked Al to install our back up engine. The crew got us back out in 33minutes. We finished 4th overall and 2nd in Group 4 IMSA GTO, all thanks to Al Lager, Steve Davenport and the rest of our great crew from Denver.

OUAnesthesia

What are you doing for the front sway bars? Also why the coil conversion?

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While the new RSR will look like the car we had at Sebring in '77, the suspension (from Rebel Racing) will not. So much better than what we had available in the 70s. As far as "coil conversion", springs on all four corners were standard factory RSR in 1974, so my new car is original in that respect. Our '72 911R and '73 2.8 RSR used torsion bars.

OUAnesthesia

Looking awesome...consider me educated.

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Geneman

where did the pedal cluster come from? beautiful unit

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Pedal box is stock 911 with modifications done in our shop. Tilton masters and adjustable bias beam. Not a copy of the original where the cylinders were mounted through the cabin sheet metal forward of the pedal box. It provided a very stiff pedal, but was difficult to work on
Due to many factors, we have been working slow, but still making progress. We might get the engine running in the car this week. Been 4 hours on the dyno so far making runs at 345 hp. A true RSR slide valve engine is a year away.


I found this nice stock '74 911 steering wheel at Rothsport. Exactly what we used 43 years ago.


MSD boxes sit in the same place our Bosch CDI units did. I still can't remember why we installed all the sheet metal, but that's what the Sebring car had, so here it is again.


Our Sebring marker lights, so we wouldn't get hit out on the pitch black 5.2 mile circuit.


I opted for H4s and will copy the Sebring headlights later

Took 6 months of research and build time to replicate our 120 l ATL fuel cell. Now I have to turn the Rellumit dry breaks


I finally found a place for my original 1974 RSR speedometer, which has been on a shelf.

FIA front bumper. The special Sebring spoiler with driving lights is under construction.

I started laying out the yellow stripes and livery. I did the original in 1974 in the street outside my house since my garage was barely wide enough for the RSR.

A few more weeks of work left




Here are a few more photos...

My 911

Looks like it's coming along very well. It's a small detail but I really like the raised white lettering on the Goodyear tires.

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For now, we are using 16" dia "home made" rims and Goodyear's available tire sizes for those. Unfortunately, they don't come with white lettering like the Sebring car had . Stage 2 of the build, along with the slide valve engine, will be 15" dia center lock wheels, hubs-hats, plus 917 brake calipers. Finding the right tire might not be easy. For now, I just wanted to get back on track at a reasonable cost.
I finally did get a race license through SVRA, after getting turned down by PCA. I did two races in AZ in an old 944 so far and after 43 years out of racing, I am incredibly slow and rusty, but having fun driving again and looking forward to driving the "new" RSR for the first time at Road America in July.

Garydose

Wow fantastic work, it just looks incredible.

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I can't believe it's been two years since posting updates on my new RSR. I ran into many difficulties with the build, especially in the area of quality and adherence to my original car, so I stopped the program and moved to plan "B", which was to build an exact copy of our Sebring 12 winner. Plan "A" was simply build a car which looked like the original, but did not have all original parts, something that could get me back on a race track in a reasonable amount of time and expense. That plan did not work and the car had a long list of problems and never got on track.
In late 2020 I found a photo of my original car on JWE's web site and made an inquiry. Turns out Jerry Woods had rebuilt my original '74 RSR for its then owners, Bobby Rahal and Jim Farley and Jerry had taken loads of photos of the build, which provided the perfect road map for plan "B". Jerry picked up the car and took it to his shop, while I set about fabricating the Sebring front spoiler and headlights. We also started collecting parts for the RSR engine and searched for many had to find parts like an original BEHR cooler and suspension parts. I did get a chance to drive the car for the first time at UMC last Fall, but without the RSR engine and correct body work. After 40+ years, it was really fun to drive a Porsche with a manual transmission again.
The new RSR is getting very close to completion now and I recently had a chance to run it at a PCA HPDE, with the completed front spoiler and headlights, exactly how we ran the car at Sebring 12hr in 1977, except for the engine.
Were getting closer to finishing the project.

budge96

wow what a project that thing is a piece of art for sure , just wanted to mention there is a gentleman
on Pelican and Early S registry out of the UK that has perfect reproduction Behr oil coolers for the ‘74
RSR .His name is Darren ..
Another couple of friends have purchased from him and they are as advertised legitimate !
Good luck in getting your engine together looks like
the real deal !
thanks Bert

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Hi Bert,

Thanks for info, but I beat you to it and already have one of Mr. Tompkins BEHR coolers. They are almost exact except for the number of tubes. The BEHR had 15, the new one only has 11, but the big selling point are the cast end tanks, plus dimensions exactly like the original.
Thanks for contacting me.

Best regards,

George

budge96

Thanks George no problem glad to mention it a few buddies one with a ‘73 2.8 RSR and one with a ‘74
RSR tribute have also contacted Darrin so I’m glad you have already gotten one this beast deserves it .
please keep us posted looks like a fun car for sure !
Bert