77 R.o.W. India Red 5 speed
 

I recently acquired this eggplant from an RL brother, very early VIN 9288100034 built in the spring of 77. Judging from the VIN and what I've heard about the production rate at that time I think this car was built on day 2 or 3 of production. It's a non sunroof and non AC car, not sure when they started in on the AC installations but I've seen a number of these early cars without it. It started life as India Red with black vinyl, black carpets, and black/blue pasha...funky! It was discussed a few times on RL years ago:

https://rennlist.com/forums/928-foru...the-block.html

https://rennlist.com/forums/928-foru...g-on-wood.html

https://rennlist.com/forums/928-foru...ks-thanks.html

https://rennlist.com/forums/928-foru...gs-needed.html

https://rennlist.com/forums/928-foru...te-w-pics.html

https://rennlist.com/forums/928-foru...ling-34-a.html

Currently running and driving but needs some restoration. Left quarter panel is walloped and muddy, otherwise quite straight and solid. Festooned with S spoilers and drill holes as required :banghead: and interior is mostly missing. It comes with rumors of an interesting history, but that's all they are; rumors. Being one of the first 50 cars it was most likely a company car designation for a while, and they all led interesting lives in the beginning. I wish it could talk. A special car worth saving I think.

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/rennlis...b00e864994.jpg

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/rennlis...8e1ec8bd3a.jpg

https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/rennlis...43ffc60d49.jpg

Thanks to Jim D for finding a pic of the unusual color combo:

https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/rennlis...430f87b790.jpg

Congratulations. That is in incredible find!

Wow!! Now this is exciting, looking forward to progress on this one.

Awesome find:cheers:

I'll take it!

Oh, it's not for sale...Good luck with the restoration!

Beautiful car. Congratulations.

Wow, Andrew, you are on a roll! Nice catch.

My leads on the history so far:

From Rixter in 2006: "77 given by Ferry to CEO of VDO then to a US Colonel who brought it to the states "
I spoke with Rixster about this car recently and he reiterated this concept to the letter. If there is legitimacy to this story I have found three possible persons that may have received the car in 1977 or 1978:

Liselott Linsenhoff (1927-1999) - Daughter of Adolf Schindling (1887-1963) Founder of VDO. Upon his death Schindling left his entire interest in VDO to Liselott , This made her the "chairman" of VDO during 1977 and 1978
http://wikivisually.com/lang-de/wiki...ott_Linsenhoff

Albert Keck, CEO of VDO in 1977 and 1978. Keck was running VDO under Linsenhoff.
http://magazin.spiegel.de/EpubDelive...l/pdf/40350593

Gunter Blumlein, (1943-2001) IWC (International Watch Company) Which at the time was owned by VDO.

Mr Blumlein had a relationship with Porsche Design company and later went on make watches for PD for IWC under VDO:

" ...From 1978 to 1997, IWC was working with the designer Ferdinand A Porsche. Porsche had discovered titanium as a material for watch cases, and started to manufacture their Chronograph I in 1972. But commercial success only came to being when Blümlein harnessed IWC’s R&D department to develop the technology for processing titanium to make the cases profitable. The “IWC Porsche Design” watches became a tremendous success."

If this is the trail, Blumlein is my bet. He was working at IWC, owned by VDO, and working with Ferry in the late 70s on the Porsche Design watches.
https://www.deployant.com/in-memorium-gunter-blumlein/

Another great color combo. You are a guy chasing cars close to my heart. Another one that hopefully will tell a great story. Too bad that Porsche chooses to keep so much of the early owner history a secret.

Porsche Design is Butzi's company, not Ferry's one, so no direct connection.

I'd say there is a pretty solid connection between PD and Porsche, either way its nothing but a working theory at this point. Since most if not all of the characters are deceased, I'm left with trying to contact heirs.

A former owner's license plate from years ago, it was not common knowledge that the numbers started with 11. Actually the 24th car.

https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/rennlis...014bc3bcea.jpg

Are you going to save that license plate for Alex? :)

I would try to get a contract in Germany and see if the German Transportation Agency (whatever they actually call it) can release the owner history on this car. Up here, for $20 we can get a document that states all previous owners for any car as long as they were registered in our province. Maybe something like this exists in Germany too. Then you have solid proof who owned the car and can add real value to it. If there is no credible paperwork or physical proof then there is no point guessing what happened to it since it doesn’t have any credibility.

I don't think I've ever seen that colour scheme before - very unusual!

#24 gets a Christmas gift from an organ donor... a beautiful un-federalized driver quarter panel!


https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/rennlis...d9686924c6.jpg

Nice , some surgery,
thats a big project