A lot of these restomod companies, like Singer, use old cars as their basis because they then don't have to meet new car safety and emissions standards.
How the heck is Ruf able to build a new car with an air-cooled engine and thin a-pillars?
Absolutely no idea but they have confirmed that engine completely passes both american and european emissions regs, and those a-pillers hide a full roll cage (at least they did on the new SCR, no idea about this one)
to my knowledge, their previous ground up original engine the 4.5L V8 for the rgt8 did not meet US admissions standards. which is sorta sad because it was a very cool engine.
Low volume cars have less stringent regulations in the EU and don't need crash testing afaik. Given it's similarity in dimensions to the old 911s, I wonder if it falls under the relatively new US regulation that allows for a few hundred replica cars to be built without having to be crash tested
People have big misconceptions of US vehicle safety standards. The federally mandated crash testing in particular has not been updated in years and is, if I recall correctly, just a basic front collision and roof strength test (simulates a rollover)
If not for the NHTSA optional 5 star rating and third party IIHS testing pushing modern safety standards for normal mass market cars the public would riot over how outdated our federal standards are.
So ultimately these cars probably are taking advantage of our outdated standards.
Ah. I recall a few cars being beefed up for their US release - the Alfa 4c at the top of my mind. So would that have passed even otherwise and was only reinforced to get the "good" rating
Usually the "beefed up" that foreign cars get is to the roof structure, again our standards are outdated so our rollover simulation test is just a pure force crush test from above. In Europe I believe they simulate a rollover with multiple smaller roof impacts.
Kind of similar to the difference between US/EU helmet standards. EU tests with multiple impacts, US (snell) tests with a single harder impact. Building to one standard usually makes you fail the other.
EU yes, but the US replica regs exempt crash testing, still need to meet current emissions regulations, and as such, can skip this stage by using a compliant crate engine, which ruf doesn't do, as far as I know there isn't a way in the US to skip emissions regs for passenger cars apart from kit cars
Note unlike singer, gunther, tuthill etc. these cars are entirely designed, engineered, and built by RUF, have a carbon tub and entirely new engine, come with a RUF VIN, and simply resemble a 911
The engine in this vehicle is designed by RUF, not a copy. It has a modern design but retains air cooling, 3 valves per cyl (2 intake, 1 exhaust), and other neat stuff. It's in the article.
henry catchpole did a short series with them I recommend if you want to know more, but the gist of it is they started off as a porsche service shop and gained a reputation for bodywork
after the father passed away his som took over and added tuning to their services, eventually making full models out of them, like the SCR, which matched the factory 930 turbo of the time. with these, they were still buying full porsche cars and modifying those
but with their next car, the BTR, built for group b, porsche started to give them raw chassis to finish up, before the vin was applied, hence they were now their own manufacturer. Next came the CTR, otherwise known as the yellowbird, which broke the speed record and put them on the map
They kept doing these sorts of cars, but over time they started to develop their own powerplants (e.g. RGT-8) and their own chassis (e.g. ctr3)
and so now you have a lineup of tuning products, tuned porsches from body-in-white chassis, and their own products
Externally beautiful, but there is something off putting about the interior. Most obviously, the handbrake and gear shift just look wildly out of place. But something about the steering wheel, dash, and center console just don't seem to work together very well to me.
Amen. Look, I love Ruf as much as the next person who played Gran Turismo or Forza Motorsport, but at this point I just don't give a shit anymore. If this came out when I was younger I'd be drooling over it, but with so many restomod/re imagining of old Porches it's just another couple million dollar thing nobody will see or drive outside of California.
This is the truth. Gordon Murray tried to get an affordable car that he designed himself into production but that never happened but he seems quite successful with his million dollar supercars.
murray and yamaha, cancelled because it had no chance of being profitable, the TVR gryffith was also supposed to be on their istream process.
turns out that the composite architecture comparable with the cost of conventional technologies not comparable in cost
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