Porsche 906 8 Kangaroo Norisring 1965 n° 2 1/43 Provence MAP02015708

Porsche 906 8 Kangaroo n° 2

Winner Norisring 1965

Driver: Gerhard Mitter

Scale: 1/43

Manufacturer: Provence Moulage

Article ID: MAP02015708

Resin model

The 904 based ‘Bergspyders’ played an important test role in the evolution of the 904 to 906, the first appearance of these cars was at the Targa Florio on May 9 1965.

All 904’s came from the factory with 2 litre engines; 4, 8 and 6 cylinders. Generally the ‘4 potters’ had ‘904’ chassis numbers, 6 cylinder cars ‘906’ chassis numbers. It was no rule though, the first prototype chassis ‘904-001’ had a 6 cylinder engine, the 8 cylinder coupes had ‘904’ chassis numbers whilst the 8 cylinder Spyders had ‘906’ chassis numbers. Easy really.

Porsche built 5 ‘904/8’ cars for factory use; chassis ‘906-003’, ‘004’, ‘007’, ‘008’ and ‘009’. To be clear, whilst the chassis had ‘906’ descriptor numbers the cars used 904 ladder frames, not the 906 spaceframe chassis.

All 904/8’s had 2 litre flat 8 engines; the Type 771 1962cc engine was derived from the 1962 804 F1 car and produced about 225bhp, fed by Weber carbs.

The cars were made in two body variants. Chassis ‘003’, ‘004’ and ‘009’ had the ‘normal’ Spyder look of a Porsche of the period, the other two cars ‘007’ and ‘008’ were more ‘visually challenging’, that is ugly! The overhangs were shortened a lot for hillclimbing purposes.

‘Bergspyder’ as a name was a misnomer as the cars were raced as well as ‘climbed, they were nicknamed ‘Kanguruh’ (kangaroo) because of the nature of the cars roadholding, the lightweight cars with their firm suspension jumped about on poor roads.