Tuthill Adds to the Porsche Restomod Craze With the Porsche 911K

It seems to me the craze for all things retro is as strong as it ever was, just evolving. Currently, we seem to be enjoying more and more really high-quality restomod no- external thrills classic cars, which is no bad thing. Here we have the excellent Tuthill Porsche 911K.

The Oxfordshire based company has garnered a fine reputation for all its Porsche mods, and with all that experience it was no surprise that this new creation is a confident, high-quality retro beast. Tuthill has created a Porsche 911 that looks pretty much faithful to a period original, but with the additional expertise of Tuthill’s background in rally and motorsport.

The base of the Tuthill 911K is the Porsche RS series from the 1970s, not necessarily a time period that we have traditionally held to our hearts with much nostalgia, though as time moves on, the 1970s becomes more easily viewed through rose-tinted glasses. Not that Porsche created anything horrendous in the seventies mind, so Tuthill hasn’t got its work cut out too much here.

Much weight saving has been built in via lightweight carbon-fibre panels for the front wings, bonnet, both front and rear bumpers, as well as the doors, deck lid and roof. That’s a lot of heavy metal removed. Oh, and the window glass is made to be lightweight too.

Power comes from a 3.1-litre engine operated via a 6-speed gearbox that will surely perform exciting things – especially when you consider that it sits in a car weighing in at 850kg! So far, we have no performance data from Tuthill, but the heavy use of carbon-fibre (also used for the gearbox cross-member and rear bulkhead) giving that amazing weight is sure to give an excellent performance to weight ratio with some no doubt impressive results.

As is the current trend for such restomod vehicles, inside is relatively sparse, emphasising performance over luxury. I can’t imagine anyone being disappointed. What you do get is lightweight carbon-fibre seats with 3-way harnesses and a Tuthill designed Porsche Competition pedal box. Of course, the dashboard is also carbon-fibre and so are the door panels and RS steering wheel. Nice touches are the hand-painted Porsche crest, titanium engine lid badging and titanium torsion and anti-roll bars. Alloys are Fuchs-style 15×7 and 15x9s, stopped with carbon ceramic discs.

While Richard Tuthill might admit to the prospect of building a restomod Porsche among the current plethora of competition as daunting, I think he’s being slightly too modest. This is a fine-looking car, designed to have the ‘capability to take on anything that is currently out there’.

Tuthill has plans to build its bespoke Porsche 911K models tailored to the whims of each customer. Hopefully they will also insist on providing each car in this lovely retro bronze-gold colour which is dripping in 1970s late summer nostalgia.

Images: tuthillporsche.com