20 Oct 04
The idea of a cheap out-of-fashion Porsche is nothing new. The 914 and 924 will probably never shake off their entry-level image - nobody really aspires to a Porsche with a VW engine - and as the myth of the 911 grows stronger they are destined probably never to have their moment of glory. But what will become, I wonder, of the 928? This V8-engined GT, far from being a subservient weakling to the older rear-engined car, was the Stuttgart flagship of the late '70s. A fashionable hatchback, it was a real Porsche groomed to be the 911's successor.
Yet, despite its excellence it somehow never captured imaginations to the same extent. It was developed only in a limited way - it gained 50 horsepower over an 18-year lifespan - and ended up playing to a different constituency of buyers looking for a supercar that was a little less edgy. 4000 928s were imported into the UK out 40,000 built in total. America got most of them but funnily enough they are worth more in the States than they are here, and even more in Australia, where a 928 will command up to six times the UK price
2005 will be the 10th anniversary of its demise. Although there is talk of a 'new four-door 928', the focus of enthusiasm for all things Porsche remains with the classic air-cooled rear-engined models. Prices of 928s have bottomed out now at around the £3000 mark for a tidy, running example, making these 160mph coupes some of the great bargains of the classic supercar world.
Supercar? Specialist Paul Anderson of www.928Spares.com, based in Stroud, Gloucestershire, struggles to think of them in such terms: "When I think of a supercar I think of something temperamental and Italian that goes wrong all the time... 928s just aren't like that."
Paul, a former toolmaker in his early thirties, drives his 928 to work every day. His interest began only three years ago, with an inauspicious start: "I swapped an Audi Quattro for an automatic 928 and blew it up on the way home." But the Porsche was Paul's only transport at the time, so he bought another one, a manual, and used it to convert the original auto to a manual. "I broke the rest up for spares and that helped pay for all the work. That did quite well so I bought another one, and the spares business has slowly built up like that."
