The Kraus 912: First Adventure
story and photos courtesy James Kraus

Back in 1996 I decided that I had to buy a car and participate in Europe historic events. Although I had been reading about them and considering such a course of action for some time, a first-hand article about competing in the Tour de France in the July issue of Thoroughbred & Classic Cars finally pushed me over the edge. That magazine has since cost me many times its cover price.

My search began with the investigation of a Lancia Fulvia Zagato that I discovered sitting in the back of an Italian car repair shop and went on to encompass various other Lancias, Alfas, Renaults, Fiats and several others. Then one day I saw in a classic car magazine an article on "overlooked classics" that included as an example the Porsche 912. Realizing quickly that the 912 could be made very competitive in the 1300-1600 class in International competition events I began searching for one. Before taking the plunge I wanted to re-familiarize myself with the car and its proper specifications and the optional and period competition equipment that would be proper and desirable for the events I wanted to enter. I dug up some of my own old Porsche literature, some of which I've owned since the late 1960's, picked up as many other books and old magazines as possible, and secured the FIA homologation papers from Jügen Barth, the Customer Racing Coordinator at Porsche AG.

Since most historic events cut-off at 1967 in Europe and 1968 in the UK, I narrowed my search to short-wheelbase pre-1969 cars in order to be eligible for the most events possible. I then decided that I would concentrate on a 1967 or earlier vehicle as I found that I preferred the "classic" look of these cars with their silver wipers, green-lettered and chrome-rimmed gauges, and non-blacked-out Fuchs.

I placed ads in Hemmings and PML looking for an appropriate model but I ended up hearing through word-of-mouth that there was a good original 912 at Francis Tuthill's Workshop in England. Tuthill's shop is well known for rally-prepping Porsches for international championship and historic events since the 1970's. This car had the optional 5-speed transmission, a black interior which I prefer, and in its original color of Bahama Yellow. Plus, it was an original San Diego car, still on its original California black license plates. I sent my British friend Colin Weekley over to look at the car and he gave it a thumbs-up. In 1999, Colin and I ran the 10^th Monte-Carlo Challenge in his Volvo 122S where we drove 36 hours (there was no night halt the first day) with zero penalty points, then lost 30 minutes having to replace the rear brake shoes leaving us 19^th in class.

I bought the car and set Francis to work on prepping the car on a low a budget as possible. Francis upgraded the front sway bar to 15 mm and installed Bilstein "Sport" shocks and struts. In addition, the consoles and mounts for the factory rear sway bar were welded on in case I want to install one later on and the lower rear shock mounts were beefed-up. The original steel wheels were replaced with 5 1/2 x 15" Fuchs alloys, the size that Porsche homologated for the 911 & 912 in 1967. When I get the car back to the states some day these will be refinished 1967-style. The tires were replaced with Avon 185/70-15 competition tires, again the proper homologated size.

All the rubber bushings in the suspension were replaced as well as the tie-rod ends, ball joints, wheel bearings and seals. Brakes were converted to a 1968 split master cylinder and the rear calipers were replaced with a slightly larger size to give more rear-wheel braking in order to help set-up the car going deep into corners.

The pedal box was rebuilt with all bronze bushings and the shift rod bushings and coupling were replaced. 6-point belts and racing seats were installed in the interior. Under the hood, we upgraded the generator to the later 1968-1969 420-watt model and replaced the regulator and battery, and installed a re-built starter.

Due to a limited supply of funds, the engine itself was given a through inspection, pronounced fit, and left completely original for the time being.

As a try-out for the completed car I entered it in the Rallye de Paris on March 4-5 with myself as driver and my British friend Colin as navigator

The Rallye de Paris, an all-tarmac event incorporating road and circuit stages is unique in that in addition to historic vehicles, GT class entries are accepted for any year car. As a result the 2000 entry list of 140 vehicles included a 911 GT3, a Ferrari F50, and two brand-new Maserati 3200GT's. Other interesting cars entered were a Matra 530, a mid-engine Peugeot 205T16, three Ferrari Daytona's, an F40 and no fewer than five Carrera 2.7RS's.

I flew to England on Saturday, February 26 and the following Monday got my first look at the car. I drove it to Colin's house and spent the next few days in his garage making last minute adjustments and modifications. Finally on Friday morning, March 3^rd, we took off from London bound for Paris. We encountered heavy rain almost immediately and throughout our 5+ hour journey it never let up. Despite having the heat on full, the fresh air vent wide open and the vent windows cracked, we were suffering quite a bit from window fogging. It wasn't till much later that Colin noticed that the cockpit floor was wet - very wet! We looked around and discovered that the windshield seal was leaking rather profusely and dripping behind the dash onto the floor. There was nothing we could do but press on.

We checked in the early evening for scrutineering at the base of the Eiffel Tower where the Rally Office was headquartered. Fortunately the rain had finally slowed to a misty drizzle and we used napkins and paper towels to soak up as much water as we could from the floor.

Fortunately it was a bright sunny day for our Parisian sendoff and we began our 25 mile road section to the circuit at Montlhéry.

The Autodrome de Montlhéry is a circuit steeped in racing history whose high banking dates back to its original construction in 1924. I was a bit apprehensive as I sat in my new un-battle-tested 912 with my helmet on in a pack of 40 wildly diverse 1952-1970 group-A vehicles (ranging from a 1300 Fiat Abarth to a 427 Cobra) waiting for the pace car as I hadn't been a race track for thirteen years. Luckily it turned out to be like riding a bicycle and I quickly picked up the pace. The course is fairly easy to learn and within a few laps I was going all out. I had intended to keep the engine well below the 6000 rpm redline due to its age but on two occasions in the heat of battle I looked down and saw that I was hitting 7000! I now have a Bosch 6100 rev-limiting distributor rotor on order. The car ran great and I soon learned our ace-in-the-hole was that with our fairly light weight, good-size 4-wheel discs and rearward weight-bias, we could out-brake virtually everyone in our group. I was also very happy with the rear calipers. I was a bit apprehensive about them even to the extent of having the stock rear calipers rebuilt and ready to go, but the larger calipers worked brilliantly. The car could be trail braked into a tight turn and the rear would come around just enough to help set the car up as opposed to having the fronts start pushing wide.

After 12 practice laps to select our lap time, our group was off again for eight more laps. Three of these laps at random would be timed and the "winner" would be the team that turned these timed laps closed to their declared time. We came in 5 seconds too fast, turning in an average 2:17 as opposed to our posted time of 2:22.

After the track section there was another 25 mile road section to the Chateau de Dampierre in the Rambouillet forest where we enjoyed a 2 1/2 hour 4-course lunch featuring leg of lamb with a fine red Bordeaux. After lunch was the longest (111 mile) road section to the Loire where we were directed to the river bank where a portable kitchen was set up serving Grand Mariner crepes and apple cider. After this short respite it was back in the car for the final road section of the day to our night halt where we enjoyed a splendid 3-course meal of duck with red Burgundy.

In the morning we awoke to another beautiful day but the night cold had left behind a heavy frost. To continue to dry out the interior of the car as much as possible, I had left the rear windows open all night not knowing what this would do in the event of an over-night freeze. As a result a deep coating of frost covered the 912's windows inside as well as out. While the engine warmed up we cleared the windows as best we could using what we had available; two credit cards. Then we were off on the 99 mile road section to Nevers for the second track session at Nevers Magny-Cours, the current French Formula 1 Grand Prix circuit. This course has a long curving straight where we were hitting over 90 mph, a long flat 220 degree left and a 180 degree right sweeper that will let you know immediately if your car has any oil starvation problems; two sharp second-gear turns and everything in between. Due to the length of the track and time necessary for familiarization, my times were more varied then at Montlhéry and we turned in a best "guestimate" time of 2:40. This proved to be a bit optimistic as we ended up with a 2:46. This gave us a total of 11 seconds or eleven penalty points, putting us in 16^th place out of the 33 cars in Class 3.

After the track session there was the award ceremony where I was brought up to the podium and feted for being the sole American and awarded the interesting combination of two bottles of cologne and six liters of synthetic 10W-50 from event sponsors Versace and Motul. This was followed by a glorious luncheon buffet and then our 9-hour drive back to London via the ferry.

It was a wonderful event and I met some fantastic people, in particular the crews of a 1974 911, a 1970 Morgan Plus 8 and a 1972 TVR 2500M. I have left the car at Francis's shop in England and look forward to returning later this year for another event. In the meantime, the window rubber will all be replaced.

The people who I have come across in the Porsche fraternity have been extremely helpful and tremendously supportive in my endeavors and I'd like to give special mention to Micheal Lederman of Lunar Lighting, Jay and Kathy at Part Werks, Gary at Parts Obsolete, Phil at PML and many many others how shared there knowledge and expertise and helped me track down those rare bits and pieces.

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