Ray Crawford's 1970 Porsche 911S
There are as many types of Porsche owners as there are Porsche cars. But they can be herded into some pretty broad categories. There's the concourse group, the track junkie group, the canyon bomber group, the valet at the martini bar group. And the R Gruppe.
R Gruppe was founded to celebrate cars built for what Porsche referred to as 'The Sports Purpose.' In the 1960s. Porsche realized that a large portion of its customers wanted to race, rally or hill-climb their vehicles, so the company released a document to help them out. It detailed factory race parts and easy modifications that could be done (and undone) to any car Porsche built. Ray Crawford is a member of the R Gruppe and has a perfect example of a 911 built for a sporting purpose.
Purpose Built
Crawford's creation started life as a 1970 911S. It was mostly the bodywork that drew him to the car originally, which he located on eBay. He wanted a car with SC flares but didn't want to go through the trouble and expense of flaring it himself. This car already had them-a big time-saver. The 911 had been listed several times, but always with a reserve price that kept it out of reach of potential buyers. The third listing was the charm, but not for Crawford. Apparently, the seller lowered the reserve in the middle of the night and he woke the next day to find some lucky insomniac had hit the 'Buy It Now' button in the wee hours. Crawford continued searching for his dream 911, until he received a call from said insomniac offering him the car. Not wanting to lose it a second time, he flew to the insomniac's locale, drove the car and snapped it up.
This is where things get interesting. Crawford isn't the kind of guy who can leave well enough alone. He developed a plan: his ideal 911 would be built around Porsche's own 'Sports Purpose' mantra. The car could be driven any distance to the track, run a two-day event, then be driven home again. No trailer queen here; not an all-out racecar, but a true enthusiast's dream.
Crawford knew he wanted more power. The options seemed to be either rebuilding the stock engine or finding a pre-built unit in order to save some money for other improvements. It didn't take long to find the 2.9-liter twin-plug currently in the car. The problem was that it came wrapped in a lot of sheet metal he didn't need. Crawford ended up buying another complete 911 just to get the engine. It did, however, turn out to be a worthwhile investment.