USA Delivered 1973 911 Carrera RS M471 / M472

[Carl Bauer]

Last weekend I was reading through the 2015 Konradsheim / Gruber RS book. Each RS and RSR chassis number has a delivery country code and according to the book 19 of these were USA delivered. Scanning the list, it turns out that 16 of these were RSR and 3 are RS.

I was unaware that 3 '73 RSs were delivered new to US dealerships! I looked for a thread here for these cars, didn't see one and thought I'd compile the info I could find here.

1 of these RSs, (1182 - M472) went through dealer 'UL' which the book decodes as 'St. Louis'. What dealer was this?

9113601182

http://www.finecars.cc/en/detail/car/306043/index.html
https://www.crankyape.com/default.as...emNumber=73383





The remaining 2 RSs (1309 - M472 and 1406 - M471) went through 'UD' which the book decodes as 'Philadelphia, (King of Prussia, PA)'. This is clearly Holbert's Porsche / Audi.

9113601309

http://www.early911sregistry.org/for...ra-RS-for-Sale

https://www.flickr.com/photos/151063...7629107661513/



9113601406

http://www.christies.com/lotfinder/l...a-f80031932bcf

http://www.early911sregistry.org/for...l=1#post375178

NO PIC?

What was the rationale keeping these from being sold new in the US? Did these dealerships sneak them in as racecars with RSR orders? Holbert also ordered an RSR and the St. Louis dealer ordered 2 RSRs.

It's interesting that these are all 3rd series cars as well.

[911T1971]

Of what I learned, those cars had no emmission control and no system to lower emmission/pollution (which was achieved with a lower engine compression in its sister models 2.4l, vs 2.2l cars.)
The RS were euro GT4 group homoligation race cars needed to be made legal if at least 500 were sold for street use.
The US DOT however did not accept cars not complying to new emmission laws, since by Jan 1973 even stricter safety and emmission rules were adopted, announced to car producers months before.

Im not an RS expert but I have heard before some RS were -however- imported to the US.
But these were never from the first homoligation batch of 500 cars, they were always from the final 1000-1500 batch, which then Porsche produced simply to high demand of clients, initially not planned and not needed for homologation purposes.

The US DOT relaxed the policy by spring 1973, making it possible to then get hold of an RS, probably due to its low production number and announced being outphased for 1974.
The 1974 911Carrera, equipped with the same 2.7l powerplant as the 1973RS, equipped with 5mph bumpers, door side beams, padded steering wheel and knobs, had no problem with emmission laws and could legally be imported.

Im shure many know things better and chime in.

Here an article in Porsche Sport 72, printed in January 1973.
'What you see is what you can't get."

[davep]

1 of these RSs, (1182 - M472) went through dealer 'UL' which the book decodes as 'St. Louis'. What dealer was this?

I have UL as Art Bunker Porsche Audi from Overland Park, KS

Can someone send me a list of these two letter dealer codes and the info to go with them please.

[Carl Bauer]

I have UL as Art Bunker Porsche Audi from Overland Park, KS

Cool. Thanks Dave. So maybe the US codes are Porsche + Audi import regions?