1972 Tour de corsa RSR photos and info

[KS Carrera]

Keith

Please review this entire thread at your leasure-you can start at post 497 Hugh hodges for the above answer.

raj

http://www.early911sregistry.org/for...=4hr+mans+test

Ah yes, of course! Thanks Raj…

[HughH]

Peekaboo asked in post #63 if the photo Keith posted at Paul Ricard and the the Le Mans 4 hour car #61 were the same car. Yes they are: it is R2 911 360 0020.

This is my understanding of the history of R2. I am sure there will be more gaps in its history to fill in, such as these wonderful photos of Keith's, however this is what i currently have recorded.

Built 10/1972, 911 360 0020 R2 was built with an oil door like on a 72 model year car from new. It was registered LEO ZA 69 and while initially light ivory was painted in red and white Malboro colors as was its sister car 911 360 0019 R1.

Both cars were entered in the 1972 Tour de Corse in early November 1972. R2 was the #2 car for Larousse and can easily be distinguished by the white triangle ending short of the fuel filler. R1, car #6 in the event, had the white triangle extending over the fuel filler. Photos of both cars are in post #61.

late November / December 1972
used as a test car at Paul Ricard to develop the RSR for track use. Keith has posted some great photos and I have some more at post #58.

January 1973: used for wind tunnel testing at Stuttgart university testing the Mary Stuart tail, chin spoiler, and aero packages for Daytona and Monza. appearance as at Paul Ricard and still with LEO ZA 69 plates.

April 1 1973 entered in Le Mans test and 4 hour race for Schurti/ Koinigg as car #61. see photo in post #63 above. By this time the livery had been changed to reflect the Martini sponsorship and the car was silver but still had the distinctive flared rear guards first constructed on it at Paul Ricard (and a chin Spoiler) - see photo.




on 13 may 1973 it was the Targa Florio car #9 for Kinnunen and Haldi and came third overall. It was still silver but got a distinctive red and blue roof, painted on at a garage / workshop at that event. It still had the distinctive rear flares from Paul Ricard and the 1972 style oil door. For the race it acquired a Mary Stuart tail.


following the Targa it went back to the factory to repair a damaged right rear side before being prepared for Le Mans as the Sonauto entered but effectively third factory car #48 for Gregg and Chasseuil where it came 14th overall and 7th in GTS. During that time at the factory not only was the damage repaired and the livery changed to yellow and green to go with Sonauto's BP sponsorship for the car, but the 1972 oil door and oil system was changed for an up to date one that also included external oil lines that had not been seen on this car before. The next photo show no oil door and external oil lines.

following Le Mans the car was once again used as a test bed - this time at the factory test track testing very wide wheels and aero (maybe for the following years turbo RSR's ??). It was still in the Le Mans livery as this photo shows.

Soon after these tests R2 was "restored" by the factory back as a "representative" example of the hugely successful Martini team cars that year for the museum. It should be noted that the final appearance of the car after the "restoration" was unlike anything the car had looked like in its career to date and indeed was also different in detail to any other martini team car that year. The restoration approach of creating a "representative" car has taken different details from the livery of different cars and the number from the race winner of the Targa Florio (although that number was used in a couple of different races - but by different cars)

After it was restored, and before it was put in the museum, it was "road tested" by Paul Frere for a magazine article. a picture taken during that test is below.


It has remained in the Museum ever since (although has been on visits to other places over time, notably in the late 1970s to Japan with a 917-30) and is broadly unchanged in appearance from the 1973 "restoration". It has been further restored at least once and in the process has acquired some extra decals (to offset some of the costs of the repaint?) that were not on it originally. This is not unusual for factory museum cars and more than one of them now have sponsorship showing that they never had when they were racing.

[KS Carrera]

Great synopsis, Hugh. Very useful. Thanks!

[HughH]

Hi Raj

Yes ........
that is what we thought and we have discussed on this board to date.

However i have come into other information recently that the initial Mary Stuart aero work was done much earlier- in fact at the wind tunnel in Stuttgart in January 1973 using R2 straight after the Paul Ricard test. This was almost immediately after the Paul Ricard test and i would not be surprised to find out that the initial work on the Mary Stuart tail was done in December at Paul Ricard at the same time as Keith's photos.

The first time the Mary Stuart was seen in public was at Monza on R8 car #82 and R6 car #81 photos below.


That was on 25 April 1973 and it was after then that they used them at the targa. Note the shot of R6 also shows the chin spoiler needed to balance out the aero at high speed when using the Mary Stuart,

Knowing how they work I found it surprising for this aero device to occur literally overnight. My (very good) information now is that the testing went back to the start of the year at least and the photos we have seen to date, and you have posted tonight are indeed after the targa and of RS 0002 in the wind tunnel but were not the original tests.

it is surprising how much new information and photos seems to be still coming out about this amazing test bed of cars in 1972 and 1973. I am sure there is still a lot to come out - just like Keiths photos showing a rear wing that you picked up as being almost the same as tested on the Strahle car over 6 months earlier.

[Jim Calzia]

KSCarrera (or Keith Seume) I sent you a PM

[letsrollbabe]

It is interesting that Porsche didn't use the winglets at the Daytona 24 in early Feb. 73, where the factory prepared RSRs ran under Penske and Brumos colors. They were entered in the prototype class and could have used any configuration aero devices. Maybe the factory was not yet convinced that the additional winglets added enough performance, although the front lip spoiler was added to both cars. Or maybe they felt the additional drag would not be useful at Daytona where much high speed time was on the oval part of the track where rear down force was not as useful.

Edit: Another possibility: Maybe there was not enough time before these 2 cars shipped to the US for adding the winglets.

[peekaboo]

Any photos around of R1's or R2's rear suspension ?

[peekaboo]

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Thomas

posted this photo i think it is from the tdc

raj

Thx MUCH v123 ,

I was just looking for another previous thread to post something (will get to that later) , and I noticed this one and checked the semi recent posts . I'm certainly glad I did as I never caught this photo when you posted , nor have seen it before (photo in post #78).

Wouldn't this more likely actually be a pre-session for Monte Carlo 72 ? , SEB colors and Larrousse-Perramond (No. 4) was S-AX 1336 there. If not , was it some super early TdC 72 test session in another car than eventually ran ? (or this car was repainted & became either no. 2 / LEO-ZA 69 , or no. 6 / LEO-ZA 68 ??) .

I have this photo of an SEB car at Monte Carlo 72 ..... was S-AJ 5694 no. 15 / Waldegard ? Is this photo I'm just posting the race or practice (with roof rack & Alpine in snow) ? I believe it has to be practice as I do not see numbers , and normally there are some on the rear of every Monte C. entry.

Hope my questions are not too confusing.


**Thx again v123 , I see 917 calipers in the Post #78 photo. Unfortunately it's not clear or close enough to see if the reinforcement metal is on the trailing arms also. Anyone have any Focus software for a zoom-in & re-focus.

[HughH]

Hi Peekaboo
Let me try to answer these questions
the photo Raj posted in post #78 is almost certainly taken at the recce for the 1972 Tour de course in late September / early October 1972.
Here is another photo of both 1972 Monte Carlo cars, 9112300047 (S-AK 1337) and 9112300041 (S-AK1336) at that recce. These 2 cars must have been about the first cars to use the ducktail in anger, as it was still being developed as late as August 1972 and the two cars that actually competed in this event were not completed until October 1972.

Here is another photo of, i think 9112300047, as a support car at the event. You can see one of the actual cars that competed in the background.


The LEO-ZA cars were totally separate cars - actually either both were RS's (R1 0019 and R2 0020 as i think they were) or one was R2 and the other was a converted ST as the RS book and others say (however that information about one being an ex Waldegaard ST is now over 20 years old and much has been learned about these cars in that time). The S-AK cars are both still with us and the history through that year is relatively well established for both cars.

I have wondered about the car S-AJ 5694 that you have posted a picture of. The photo was taken at a recce or practice for the 1972 Monte Carlo and i have pictures of the magazine article by Lother Boschan that it was published in. I think that it may be a werks rally car from earlier years, probably a 1970 911S 2.2 rally. However i have been unable to identify it.
here is another photo of it at that recce, this time without the roof rack.



At the time Porsche was hard up for cash and had virtually abandoned the rally program in favor of the expensive 917 and prototype program and supporting customer 911's in track events. (they had just started working on the RSR program as well.) Therefore in a very unusual move for them they relied on an external sponsor, SEB, to fund the Monte Carlo effort.

The license plate it is wearing was also on a car at the Stuttgart university wind tunnel testing shown here testing lift with various versions of the new "S" front spoiler in March 1972 as a part of the RS development program. That would be some months after the Monte Carlo recce and i think it is the same car as you can see flared rear guards as well as the stickers over the holes where the rally lights had been.



Typically the factory was very "tight" in those days, recycling competition cars to recce duty, testing and then finally selling them off for whatever they could get for them. They did not risk a new car practicing or on a recce before an event so the photo Raj posted would not have been one of the cars that actually competed.

[peekaboo]

Thank you HughH for the very thorough info. (as normal). And the photo on the Sarthe thread also.


Don't I see an oil tank door on S-AJ 5964 in your Monte 72 (practice) photo with the escort ?