Mike Brewer has fixed up and sold plenty of cars in his time as a professional car dealer before TV fame came knocking, and a heap more for his Wheeler Dealers show. But now he’s giving us a chance to buy a rare Porsche from his own personal collection.
The car is a 912E, an incredibly short-lived combination of a 911 body and four-cylinder engine offered in the mid 1970s to plug the hole left by the demise of the mid-engined 914 in 1976. The front-engined, water-cooled 924 was getting ready for launch, but it wouldn’t be in showrooms until 1977, so Porsche turned to an idea it had abandoned eight years earlier.
Related: Grab A Car From The Wheeler Dealer Himself, As Mike Brewer Prepares To Auction Personal Collection
Porsche had previously offered a four-cylinder 911 badged 912 between 1965 and 1969, stuffing the old 356’s 1.6-liter boxer four into the new six-cylinder 911’s shell. The 89 hp (90 PS) result wasn’t anything like as fast as a 911 (think zero to 60 mph/96 km/h in 11-12 seconds), but it was lighter, nicely balanced and more affordable.
The 1976-only 912E didn’t get a proper Porsche engine, though it was Porsche-tuned. It was a Type 4 Volkswagen flat four opened up from 1.7- to 2.0-liters and fitted with Bosh fuel injection, earning it the ‘E’ – einspritz being the German word for injection. Power output was almost identical to the original 912E at 86 hp (87 PS), and despite the weight of the bigger bumpers, so was the performance.
Brewer says he wasn’t looking for a 912E, and stumbled across the car while filming a show about buying a De Soto in North Carolina. Despite the hand-painted primrose yellow body, the price – $10,000 (£6,000) – made it a must-buy, and soon the 912E was being shipped back to the UK.
Once there it was stripped, found to be structurally excellent, repainted in its original Enamel Blue, and equipped with a set of black 16-inch Fuchs rims. More recently, its engine has been refreshed, and the combination of the work done and the jump in classic Porsche values over the last few years means it’s no longer in bargain territory.
Brewer, via Iconic Auctioneers, is hoping to net £40,000-50,000 ($50,000-63,000), which makes his 912E far more affordable than a visually identical 911 of a similar vintage and in similar condition, or a 1960s 912 (which are worth more in Europe than in the U.S.). And it’s certainly a rarity in the UK, where it was never available when new.
But it’s a fairly niche proposition – we imagine most people would rather take a slightly more worn six-cylinder, air-cooled 911 for the same money, or maybe go for a modern classic like a 996 Turbo. What would you buy?
