1972 EBS Porsche Spyder set to debut at Lotus Sydney Tasman Revival

The EBS Porsche Spyder was built in 1972 as a one-off by the engineers at the Porsche Weissach works for the Interserie-European Can Am series (Under 3 litre small block division). Several engineers were asked to build an off-budget, “skunk-works” car using “spare” items from the works and is not recognised as an official Porsche model. Eberhard Braun designed and built the car which has a remarkable resemblance to the 917/10 series, just on a smaller scale. There is speculation that the car was completed or rebuilt in 1976 by prominent sports car makers URD who built it as a Group 6 Prototype sports car and gave it the serial number URD 676 #005. It is built on a tube frame chassis, has a fibreglass body, weighs around 700kg and is powered by a genuine factory 2.8RSR engine coupled to a Hewland FG400 5 speed gearbox.

The car was raced by prominent European racer Max Moritz and driven by Hubert Schmidt at the famous Nurburgring in 1976 as well as Zolder, Salzburgring and Hockenheim. It was then sold in 1980 and went to the US where it raced in Historic Can Am races, SCCA, SVRA and HSR meetings. It was owned by a few other Americans until an Australian, Warwick Miller purchased it and bought it back to Australia where he began a partial restoration.

In 2008 it was purchased by Terry Lawlor who has since completed a more extensive restoration and rebuild. It is anticipated that its first event in Australia will be the Lotus Sydney Tasman Revival at Eastern Creek,  November 26-28, 2010.

Terry won the HSRCA Group Sc Championship in 2008 and was runner up in 2007 and 2009 in a Porsche 911. Terry will campaign the EBS Porsche Spyder in HSRCA Group Q in 2011.

Images: Terry Lawlor and John Shingleton

Visit the Lotus Sydney Tasman Revival website here