Koenig C62: 1 Of 3 Road-Legal Porsche-Based Group C Race Cars

The Koenig C62 is the kind of road-legal race car that could only have been conceived by someone with the imagination, engineering ability, and inherent madness of Germany’s Willy Koenig.

Just three C62s were ever made, each started out as a Porsche 962 Group C Le Mans race car chassis, which then had a custom composite Kevlar body added, and a highly-tuned Porsche 930 turbo engine fitted that produces 550+ bhp.

Fast Facts – The Mighty Koenig C62

• The Koenig C62 is one of the more extreme creations from the mind of Willy Koenig, the founder of Koenig Specials GmbH – a company that became famous for building some of the wildest modified supercars in the world in the 1980s and 1990s.
• Willy Koenig started out in the printing business, he became wealthy and spent some of his money on his true passion – racing. He became the German Hillclimb Champion in 1962 driving a Ferrari 250 GT SWB.
• In the 1970s Willy Koenig started modifying high-end cars in the 1970s, by the 1980s his company was one of the most famous, and most outlandish, in the world.
• The Koenig C62 has a Porsche 962 chassis, a 550 bhp Porsche 930 engine, and a new composite Kevlar body that was designed specifically to ensure that the car could be road registered and used on regular public streets – unlike the Porsche 962 on which it’s based.

Willy Koenig + Koenig Specials GmbH

Willy Koenig made his fortune in the printing industry, but his true passion was racing and high-end sports cars.

Although it looks a lot like the Porsche 962 the Koenig C62 shares no common panels with it, it has a new Kevlar composite body that slightly increased the height of the headlights and fenders to allow the car to be legally road registered.

In 1961 Willy bought an open-wheeled Formula Junior Cooper from the Formula 1 driver Wolfgang von Trips, and a year later in 1962 he won the Deutsche Bergmeisterschaft (German Hillclimbing Championship) driving a Ferrari 250 GT SWB.

This victory would get him invited to visit Ferrari in Maranello where he met Enzo Ferrari, and a special event was held in his honor.

The cordiality of this relationship wouldn’t last however, and within 20 years Ferrari would be threatening Koenig with lawsuits, and demanding that any Ferrari he had modified had all of its original Ferrari badging removed – as it could no longer be considered a true Ferrari.

There are many cars you could point to as the peak of Koenig Specials GmbH achievements, the highly-modified 850 bhp Ferrari F50, the 1,000 bhp twin-turbo Ferrari Testarossa, or perhaps the car shown here – the Koenig C62.

The Koenig C62 – Specifications

Just three examples of the Koenig C62 were ever made. The car is closely based on the Porsche 962, a Le Mans-style sports racing car that was never intended for use on public roads.

Above Video: This is racing driver Billy Johnson at there wheel of a Koenig C62 at Buttonwillow Raceway Park. Be sure to turn your sound on.

The team at Koenig Specials had ample experience working on the Porsche 911, but the Porsche 962 was an entirely new beast. They bought improved 962 chassis from a company called Thompson, that specialized in building safer, more rigid chassis for racing teams.

Koenig C62 Specifications

Though the C62 looks exceedingly similar to the 962 the cars actually share no body panels at all, an entirely new composite Kevlar body was designed that increased the height of both the fenders and headlights in order to meet German requirements for road legal cars.

The engine is a twin-turbocharged Porsche 930 3.4 liter flat-six with a series of modifications bringing power up to 550 hp and 553 lb ft of torque at the rear wheels via a 5-speed manual gearbox. The suspension was modified for street use, the original set up was stiff for racing use, so Koenig added slightly softer springs and shock absorbers.

Original Porsche 962 brakes were used however they were fitted with more street-focussed brake pads, both for usability and legal reasons.

The interior of the Koenig C62 makes very little attempt to be comfortable, exposed composite panels are visible and there is no carpet, climate control, stereo, or cruise control – it was designed to be as close to a street legal Porsche 962 race car as was practicably possible.

Very few allowances for comfort were made when developing the Koenig C62, it was intended to be as close to a road legal Porsche 962 as possible.

Koenig Specials had originally planned to build 30 examples of the C62, however just three were ultimately made – possibly because of the $1,030,000 USD price tag (in 1991 dollars).

The Koenig C62 Shown Here

The car you see here is the second of the three cars made, it was built between 1990 and 1991, then delivered to its first owner in Japan.

It would remain in Japan for most of its life, passing through a small number of exclusive private collections before being imported into the United States in 2019.

In the three years that the car has been with its current owner it’s been used sparingly, it has just 2,502 kilometers on the odometer from new.

It’s been fitted with new tires, GPS sender for the speedometer was installed, an inoperative fuel gauge was repaired, and it had a servicing by the technicians at R3 Motorsports in Van Nuys, California.

The car is now being auctioned live online by Collecting Cars, at the time of writing there are still a few days left to bid and you can click here if you’d like to visit the listing.

Images courtesy of Collecting Cars

 

 

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A Rideable 727 BHP Barstool – The Hoss Fly “Big Block” Barstool

This is the “Big Block” version of the Hoss Fly Barstool – as the name suggests it’s a motorized barstool powered by a 572 cubic inch V8, it produces 727 bhp at 6,300 rpm and 680 lb ft of torque at 4,900 rpm.

Exactly why anyone would want a barstool with similar power output figures as a 1980s-era Formula 1 car is unclear, but the fact that it has open headers means you won’t be able to hear the owner explain their reasoning anyway.

The Hoss Fly V8 Barstool

• Motorized barstools are nothing new of course, they’ve been around for decades in one form or another, though most of them are powered by small ~3 bhp Briggs & Stratton motors, not fire-breathing V8s.
• Hoss Fly is based in the small town of Friedens, Pennsylvania. They sell the Hoss Fly V8 Barstool in kit form, providing everything you need to build one with the exception of the engine.
• The prices of the kits start at $8,900 USD for the least expensive, on up to $10,900 USD for the Big Block Deluxe kit which is the most expensive option.
• The kits include the go kart-like tubular steel frame, all four wheels, the steering assembly and steering wheel, the seat that attaches to the top of the air cleaner, a fuel tank, and the automatic transmission.

Barstools + Big Blocks + Madness

No one knows who it was that invented the barstool, it’s an innovation who’s creator has long been lost to the annals of history.

The fuel tank and radiator are mounted at the back, the driver sits on a padded stool atop the carburetor, with their feet at the front on either side of the steering column.

What we do know with reasonable certainty is that the Hoss Fly is the most powerful kit-built barstool in the world – with a power-to-weight ratio higher than any Formula 1 car in history.

Hoss Fly was founded in 2007 in the small town of Friedens in Pennsylvania, the town has a population of just over 1,500 people, some of whom spend their days building kits to turn American V8s into self-propelled barstools.

The company offers three kits, the east expensive is the Hoss Fly Raw Kit at $8,900 USD. This is followed by the Small Block Deluxe Kit at $9,900 USD and the Big Block Deluxe Kit at $10,900 USD. The example you see pictured here is the big block version.

It’s not publicly known how many Hoss Fly barstool kits have been sold or how many have been completed, we only see them come up for sale infrequently and this is the first time we’ve seen one appear for sale with a big block engine fitted.

The Hoss Fly Big Block V8 Barstool Shown Here

The Hoss Fly barstool you see here is powered by a 572 cubic inch (9.37 liter) Chevrolet crate engine capable of 727 bhp at 6,300 rpm and 680 lb ft of torque at 4,900 rpm.

The ZZ572 Big Block V8 weighs approximately 580 lbs depending on final specification, combined with the Hoss Fly kit weight of ~200 lbs the total weight is ~780 lbs giving it a power-to-weight ratio of over 2,050 bhp per tonne.

Exactly how this much power can be made to work effectively in such a tiny, lightweight vehicle isn’t clear, though we do know that it has a top speed of 25 mph at 5,000 rpm.

The padded stool seat is mounted directly to the top of the carburetor just behind a small steering wheel, the driver then essentially sits on the engine with their feet on either side of the steering column.

At the back of the engine you’ll find the fuel tank, transmission, and radiator. The exhaust system is made up of individual open headers pointed up and back in a similar style to many drag racers, it’s clear that anyone within 100 yards would need to be wearing industrial ear protection to keep from going deaf.

But that’s probably half the fun.

If you’d like to read more about this Hoss Fly or register to bid you can click here to visit the listing on Mecum. It’s due to cross the auction block in late March and it’s being offered with no reserve.

Images courtesy of Mecum

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For Sale: A BMW 507 Front End Mounted To A Display Base

This is the front end bodywork from a BMW 507, widely considered to be one of the most beautiful BMWs of all time. Elvis Presley was a fan, he bought himself a 507 and used it as his daily driver during his time stationed in Germany while serving in the US Army.

Though it’s undeniably beautiful, the BMW 507 very nearly caused the bankruptcy of BMW. The original plan had been to sell thousands of them a year to the Americans but by the end of production just 252 had been made.

The idea behind the 507 was solid, it had been conceived by influential New York automobile importer Max Hoffman who wanted a car that was priced halfway between the expensive Mercedes-Benz 300SL and the smaller, cheaper sports cars from Triumph and MG.

The design of the BMW 507 was penned by Albrecht von Goertz, a famed German industrial designer who also designed the BMW 503, and who contributed influential first design sketches for the Toyota 2000GT.

Hoffman insisted that BMW hired the designer Albrecht von Goertz for the job and he excelled himself, creating a design that incorporated all the best elements of the Jet Age and none of its excesses.

The alloy body was fitted to a shortened BMW 503 sedan chassis and it was powered by the 3,168cc BMW M507/1 V8 engine producing 150 bhp at 5,000 rpm.

Hoffman had specified that the car should be sold at $5,000 USD ($53,000 in 2022 dollars) however cost overruns on production drove the price up to $9,000 USD ($95,300 in 2022 dollars), then finally to $10,500 USD ($111,200 in 2022 dollars).

Though the public loved the car the price was untenable for all but the wealthiest of buyers, one of whom was Elvis Presley who bought a white BMW 507 when in Germany serving in the US Army.

As the story goes, the local German girls quickly realized it was Elvis’ car and every time he left it parked anywhere he would return to find it covered in phone numbers and love notes all written in red lipstick.

This front end is said to be from a 507 that was damaged, it’s been mounted to a display base and it still has al its original lighting and brightwork fitted.

Every time he drove onto the base he would be teased about the lipstick messages all over his car so he solved it, quite cleverly, by painting the whole car in the same shade of red as the lipstick.

The BMW 507 front end you see here is said to be from an original car that was damaged at some point in the past, the aluminum front bodywork was removed and placed on this stand as a display piece.

It’s now due to be auctioned by Artcurial on the 20th of March with a price guide of $19,800 – $27,500 USD. If you’d like to read more about it or register to bid you can click here to visit the listing.

Images courtesy of Artcurial

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1963 Gillig Model 590 Porsche Race Car Hauler

This 1963 Gillig Model 590 has been restored and rebuilt into the ideal hauler for vintage Porsches, it’s been reskinned with a new aluminum-alloy body finished in red and gray Porsche livery, and it’s powered by a 7.0 liter Detroit Diesel 6-71 turbodiesel inline-six.

Ever since the earliest days of motor racing people have needed race car haulers, many of which crisscross the content during the racing season going from circuit to circuit, and they often become impromptu party venues after successful races.

Fast Facts – The Gillig Model 590

• Gillig was originally founded in 1890 as a coachbuilder, creating bodies for chassis supplied by automobile manufacturers.
• By the 1930s they had diversified into building transit-style school busses, they would soon cease all automotive work and focus solely on bus building.
• During WWII Gillig built a vast number of “Victory Trailer” trailer buses for the US armed forces, they were used for troop transport at military bases.
• The Gillig Model 590 you see here has been rebuilt into a classic Porsche race car hauler, it’s been reskinned in alloy, given a period-correct Porsche livery, and fully restored throughout.

The Gillig Brothers

The Gillig Brothers founded their carriage and wagon shop in San Francisco in 1890. They gradually shifted into automotive coachbuilding to meet the demand of the the early days of the automobile, when many manufacturers would sell a rolling chassis that still needed to have a body built and fitted.

This transporter is ideally suited for either race car hauling or show car hauling, with enough room in the back for two cars.

By the 1930s the company had started to diversify, using their skilled workers to build school busses, this soon became so lucrative that the company ceased their coachbuilding business and focussed on building busses full time.

During WWII production was switched over for the war effort, Gillig built countless examples of “Victory Trailer” trailer buses for the US armed forces, used for transporting troops on and off military bases.

After the war Gillig grew to become one of the biggest bus manufacturers in the United States, they remained a market leader in school bus manufacturing until the 1970s when the market began to dry up.

Gillig began to pivot to transit bus manufacturing and by the 1980s they had ceased school bus manufacturing to focus on transit busses. Today Gillig remains one of the biggest transit bus manufacturers in the USA.

Thanks to the 7.0 liter Detroit Diesel 6-71 turbodiesel engine and the Allison automatic transmission, this Gillig is both more powerful and a little easier to drive than it would have been with the original powertrain from 1963.

The Gillig Model 590 Porsche Hauler Shown Here

The 1963 Gillig Model 590 you see here has been completely rebuilt into a period Porsche hauler, ideally suited to hauling race cars but also perfect for transporting rare classic Porsches to shows and concours events.

The full nut and bolt rebuild of this Model 590 was extensive, it was given new aluminum alloy bodywork, custom aluminum Budd wheels, and it’s powered by a rebuilt 7.0 liter Detroit Diesel 6-71 turbodiesel straight-six paired with an Allison automatic transmission.

The red, white, and gray livery features large “Porsche” text down either side accompanied by a Porsche logo, with additional Porsche logos on the front and rear.

Though it looks like a period-correct 1960s-era race car hauler there have been a number of more modern additions including air conditioning systems, Cummins Onan diesel generators, side and rear-view cameras, black walnut flooring, and aluminum rear ramps for getting the cars in and out.

If you’d like to read more about this transporter or register to bid you can click here to visit the listing on Bring A Trailer. It’s currently being auctioned live online out of Atlanta, Georgia.

Images courtesy of Kenneth Midgett via Bring A Trailer

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For Sale: A Rare 1969 Chevrolet Corvette Sportwagon

The Chevrolet Corvette Sportwagon was never actually built by Chevrolet, it was an aftermarket kit developed for the C3 Corvette that solved its single biggest problem – the total lack of useable trunk space.

When the third generation Corvette was released in 1967 it proved popular thanks to its shark-inspired styling. The one key drawback was the fact that there was no trunk lid, and the small trunk area was only accessible through the interior of the car behind the seats.

Fast Facts – The Chevrolet Corvette Sportwagon

• The Chevrolet Corvette Sportwagon was built using a kit supplied by a small number of manufacturers in the United States, primarily supplied by Chuck Miller, then by John Greenwood in redesigned form.
• The Sportwagon kit included a new fiberglass rear roof section that turned the C3 Corvette into a shooting brake (two-door station wagon), vastly increasing the rear cargo area.
• It’s said that the first Sportwagon design was created for a drummer in a rock ‘n roll band who had a Corvette and wanted to be able to fit his drums in the back.
• It’s not known exactly how many Sportwagons were built as they were sold as kits for homebuilders, most estimate that just a few dozen were completed.

The Sportwagon – An American Shooting Brake

The “Shooting Brake” automotive body style that can be best described as a two-door coupe station wagon. It is believed to have been invented by the Brits, with the long rear cargo area being used for laying out guns and other equipment while on a hunt – hence the name shooting brake.

These two images show the cutting requited to fit a (Greenwood) Sportwagon roof to a standard C3 Corvette, the finished car is shown on the right.

Relatively few shooting brakes have been made by major manufacturers, the exceptions being cars like the Volvo 1800ES, Reliant Scimitar GTE, Chevrolet Nomad, BMW Z3 Coupé, Ferrari GTC4 Lusso, and the rare Aston Martin DB5 Shooting Brake.

Many shooting brakes were build by coachbuilders, dating back to the early days of the 20th century. More recently companies like Greenwood developed their own kits for cars like the C3 Corvette specifically to add practicality to the model by increasing cargo space.

The Chevrolet Corvette Sportwagon

The Chevrolet Corvette Sportwagon conversion kit was developed in two stages by two individuals, the idea was conceived by Chuck Miller when he was approached by a drummer in a rock band who wanted to be able to fit his drum kit into his C3 Corvette.

Miller developed a new fiberglas rear roof section that would turn the car into a station wagon, or shooting brake as the body style is classically known.

The Corvette has had a fiberglass body since the C1 was first introduced in 1953, this made the fabrication process far easier as it was just a matter of cutting out the rear trunk top section of the body and bonding the new fiberglass roof section.

The design of the Sportwagon roof was well done, it blends in very well with the lines of the original car and looks like it could have been factory made.

The original design by Miller was undeniably attractive, but it lacked a little in the practicality department as the rear window was fixed in place and not openable, this required all the cargo to be loaded through the interior over the folded down seat backs.

A second design was developed later in the 1970s by John Greenwood, Greenwood’s design included an opening rear window and a number of other refinements, significantly improving the overall practicality of the concept.

The Greenwood Sportwagon was first shown at SEMA in 1976 where many orders were taken, it was then produced by Greenwood for a number of years as a kit for homebuilders to fit to their own C3 Corvettes.

There are relatively few surviving examples of the Chevrolet Corvette Sportwagon in existence, no one knows exactly how many where made, so they’re highly sought after by collectors.

The 1969 Chevrolet Corvette Sportwagon Shown Here

The car you see here is a 1969 Chevrolet Corvette Sportwagon that uses one of the rare original kits developed by Chuck Miller. Unlike many of the later Sportwagon conversions this one has no side windows, it was called the “Panelwagon,” and the rear window doesn’t open.

The space in the rear of the Sportwagon is vastly increased, making the car much more practical than the original C3 Corvette if you need to carry luggage or other cargo.

The cargo space is accessed through the interior of the car, you open the door and then lean the seat forwards to put things in and take them out.

This car has a number of other custom touches, the pop-up headlights have been removed to give the front of the car a smoother finish, new headlights were then installed behind the black grille up front.

The car is fitted with 15” turbine-style wheels fitted with BFGoodrich Radial T/A white-letter tires, and it has power-assisted four-wheel disc brakes. The interior was reupholstered in black vinyl sourced from Al Knoch Interiors in 2021.

Power is provided by a 350 cubic inch V8 crate engine featuring a single Edelbrock carburetor mounted to a Torker II intake manifold and an HEI distributor.

The car is currently being offered in a live online auction on Bring A Trailer out of West Harrison, Indiana. At the time of writing there are still a few days left to bid and you can click here to visit the listing.

Images courtesy of Bring A Trailer

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Engine Swap Potential: You Can Buy This Ferrari 612 Scaglietti V12

This is a 65º V12 engine from a Ferrari 612 Scaglietti, once fitted into a car it produces 533 bhp at 7,250 rpm and 434 lb ft of torque at 5,250 rpm.

As with all Ferrari engines, the V12 from the 612 Scaglietti is a work of art. It has double overhead cams operating four valves per cylinder and a displacement of 5,748cc (351 cubic inches).

The compression ratio is 11.2:1, it has a bore x stroke of 3.50″ x 3.03″, and the engine makes use of an aluminum alloy block and heads to help reduce weight.

Ferrari engineers developed the 612 Scaglietti as the company’s second all-aluminum vehicle after the 360 Modena. It has an alloy spaceframe that was developed in conjunction with Alcoa, the body was then welded into place over the top for increased rigidity.

The front and rear views of the Ferrari 612 Scaglietti. Image courtesy of Ferrari.

From the outset the 612 Scaglietti was designed to comfortably accommodate four adults in a 2+2 seating configuration, with enough head and leg room for the rear passengers.

The car also has a trunk with more room than you might be used to in a Ferrari, though despite all of this extra room the car is still capable of almost touching 200 mph.

The engine you see here is due to be sold by Artcurial on the 20th of March with a price guide of $5,500 – $8,800 USD. The listing is a little light on details but we do know it comes on a red display pedestal and it looks to be largely complete.

It will probably end up on display in a Ferrari collection somewhere, however there’s also a possibility that it’ll end up being dropped into a 612 Scaglietti that needs a new engine, it might be pulled apart for parts, or it might (hopefully) get installed into something ridiculous like an AMC Gremlin.

If you’d like to read more about it or register to bid you can click here to visit the listing.

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