Original partners Gates and Lauren have taken delivery of their cars. Ironically, when Allen moved to Europe he took his nonfederalized car with him. Meanwhile, Canepa is canvassing the globe looking for unmolested, low-mileage 959s. "The average car We buy has less than 1000 miles on it, has gone through no winters and costs between $275,000 and $300,000. We charge $85,000 for the work we do, so the finished product goes out of here for $400,000 to $425,000." Yes, there is some profit in those numbers...
For four hundred large you want your money's worth. Canepa has undertaken back-to-back tests with his modified 959 and a new RUF GT2. The RUF turned 0 to 60 mph in 3.7 seconds and took 11.9 seconds to reach 100 mph. The 959 goes from a standstill to 60 mph in 3.3 seconds and reaches 100 mph in 11.4 seconds. Top speed of the 959 is 215.
"We're maintaining a McLaren FI GTR," says Canepa. "And after driving both cars, there's just no comparison. The McLaren skips and jumps all over the place. The 959 just squats and goes."
And finally, after all these years, it can do it on these shores.
for about the same $$$ you can do the same & far better now, with a car originally designed to take on the best in 2000, which would have been porsche's effort for the 24 hours of lemans. the fia got in the way and favored turbo engines instead of the F-1 based beautiful V-10. rather than re-designing the car, porsche decided to build it to become street-legal including in the USA... (no need for all of the above conversions and paperwork....
it is the new porsche carrera GT. |
