Porsche's first customer RHD 911 & 356's ; race track images 46 and 60 years apart.

[1st]

Attended today the 60th anniversary of the opening of the hill climb track at the land my car's first owner, RF Angas & his family donated to the SCCSA for this purpose.



(From the opening event program.)




Recently a well known local Porsche (2.4 T, 930 3.3 and 356A Cab) owner & friend of mine Tim gave me a copy of a picture he took of my car at the Collingrove hillclimb track in Spring 1966, when this car was a year old and he was about 16;




Here is Tim's 1966 pic of the first RHD 911 in the Antipodies;



And here it is pictured at about the same spot today, around 46 years later:



In the original image the car has a (red) accessory fan that can be seen on the dash and now is in my box of "spares", and the car has gained a nudge bar, rubber bumper overlays and a rear vision mirror since, but apart from this today it is as it appears in the image from 46 years ago.

Today's historic occasion resonated with me in another way, too.

At the time of the opening of the track (15th March, 1952), my 901's first custodian RF Angas then owned the first Porsche built in RHD- here is this car, a ’51 Fish Silver 356 Cab at the start of the Collingrove hill climb on the opening day.



and my/his 901 at the same point today, 60 years later as I gave it an honorary squirt up the track.




"Cool Antipodean stuff."

[platas]

How cool and wonderful car...

[Fishcop]

Very cool stuff Stew!

[210bhp]

Great stuff

I hope you enjoyed your day. A little bit of history re- created. I love that.

Your car looks wonderful as usual.

Windscreen squirter nozzles are different too

Regards
Mike

[1st]

Mike, correct! Well spotted; these were a last minute scrutineering change I had to make for a road rally some years ago. Haven't got around to reinstating the originals yet, as these ones actually work. Cheers.

[gsjohnson]

Very kewl...

[1st]

Here's a pic of the Hamilton 906 at the start of the hill climb, in 1967, the year after he won the Australian Hillclimb Championship held at this track in his 904 Bergspyder.



Word is that Hamilton stayed at the Angas' Collingrove mansion/homestead just down the road when he raced at this track; I like to think he also serviced the 901 in the motorhome whist he was there.

This next image is my all time favourite image of an early Porsche in Australia- the same 906 at the same meet in the pits- note the pedestrian Chrysler, Toyota and Holden sedans in the background, making the 906 look like a bloody spaceship.



Here's the 901 yesterday in the pits in a similar spot- note the track in the distance.




Enjoy.

[Chuck Miller]

Fantastic !!!!!!!!!

[LongRanger]

. . . At the time of the opening of the track (15th March, 1952), my 901's first custodian RF Angas then owned the first Porsche built in RHD- here is this car, a ’51 Fish Silver 356 Cab at the start of the Collingrove hill climb on the opening day . . .

Great stuff!

What ever happened w/ that '51 Cab?

[1st]

Great stuff!

What ever happened w/ that '51 Cab?

The 356 Cab RHD #1 is very much alive and well with a long term owner in Melbourne.

He discovered the car in a Tasmanian paddock and had it restored to original specification. Its gorgeous.



Here is some info on the early 356's in Australia, with thanks to the author Michael Browning;

Early settler
The cream of Melbourne’s motoring society was clearly stunned by what they saw at the cocktail party thrown by pump manufacturer and Melbourne identity, Norman Hamilton.
Crouching inside the imposing ‘Second Empire-style’ South Melbourne Town Hall were two of the strangest cars the assembled guests had ever seen.
On November 1, 1951, few Australians had ever heard of Volkswagen, let alone Porsche. But here they were in the metal – a Maroon coupe and a Fish Silver Cabriolet – sleek, low, bulbous and almost devoid of any brightwork in an era when gleam was good. Forty months after the very first Porsche 356 received its road permit in Gmund, Austria, they were more like space invaders than the American and British cars we were accustomed to.
Just months earlier, Hamilton had been equally gob-smacked by the sight of his first Porsche. Backing and filling his barge-like rented Oldsmobile 88 up the serpentine Grossglockner Pass en route from Austria to Switzerland to look at the latest pump technology, his reverie was shattered by the snarl of the low silver sports car that flashed past.
A little later at an Inn, he caught up with the German driver, racer and Porsche tester Richard von Frankenberg, who showed him around the strange little car. Then, in a burst of unpremeditated enthusiasm he followed the German back to the Porsche factory where, on a handshake, he acquired the franchise for Australia. In doing so he became Porsche’s second agent outside Europe, following the US where automotive entrepreneur Max Hoffmann had introduced the brand the previous year.
The cars arrived in Melbourne in early October and after the South Melbourne launch, selected members of the motorsport community were invited to try out the cabriolet and coupe - registered WG 324 and WG 325 respectively - around nearby Albert Park Lake.
“They looked more like toys than real motor cars,” recalls Australian Motor Sports Club member and trials driver Ken Harper, who drove the cars at Albert Park, along with club president, the late Ken McConville. “We didn’t know anything about air-cooled, rear-engined cars then, so they even sounded funny. For most people then, a Porsche was simply a box of peculiar parts!”

Competition heats up
But Harper and McConville hadn’t counted on Hamilton’s bold plans to launch Porsche onto the Australian market and by the end of the day over drinks at his Burwood home, he had persuaded them both to help him promote the marque by driving those first two cars in various motor sport events in Victoria and South Australia.

However the honour of making Porsche’s Australian competition debut fell to family friend Ken Wylie, who drove the coupe up the dusty Hurstbridge Hillclimb, northeast of Melbourne, on January 28, 1952. Harper had to wait his turn until the Templestowe Hillclimb on June 9 that year, but after trailing a trio of MG TCs on its first run, the Porsche split its VW transmission casing on the line and, to the disappointment of spectators, left on the back of a tow truck.
Four months later on October 5, Harper and the Maroon coupe returned to competition in front of 50,000 people at Melbourne’s Fishermen’s Bend racing circuit, but gremlins struck again. After 11 laps in the 80 minute-long Production Car race, the Porsche was out with a broken throttle linkage.

The following week, both the early Porsches were off to South Australia, with Norman Hamilton and Ken Harper driving the coupe, with Ken McConville and his wife Margaret travelling in close company at the wheel of the Cabriolet.
“We set some extraordinary times - under seven hours from Melbourne to Adelaide,” Harper recalled. “But even driving flat out at 85 miles an hour (138km/h) on what were very ordinary roads, we still got more than 30 miles per gallon (9.4l/100km). The cars were also very quiet – like nothing we had driven before.”

This time the Porsches fared better, with the coupe winning the Production Touring Cars Class F at the Port Wakefield Speed Trials on October 13, with a standing quarter mile time of 20.9 seconds – very respectable for a 1.3 litre four cylinder vehicle weighing over 800kg.
While in South Australia, both Porsches returned to Adelaide to compete in the Sellicks Beach Races, but after the Coupe’s windscreen was shattered by a rock thrown up by another vehicle and the Cabriolet ripped the centre out of its clutch, both cars were withdrawn from the meeting. In any case the Cabriolet was already spoken for, with wealthy pastoralist Ron Angas becoming the first Australian Porsche owner.


It's interesting to note that Australia received the first two RHD 356's produced and three out of the first four RHD 911's produced. Both of the first Aussie 356's are accounted for, and of the 911's the third of the first three Australian cars is today unaccounted for.