Page 26 - Sample pages "Forty Six: The Birth of Porsche Motorsport"

CHAPTER 9
THE FORENSIC JOURNEY
the Porsche Museum is a repository of everything the Company currently knows about the cars they have built and their history. Unfortunately, the data Cameron sought was not readily accessible. Cameron returned with some archival images of various race-prepped SLs of the day, but nothing specific regarding timelines or other documentation that would help build a forensic “paper trail.”
The team decided to focus on the two works SLs that were currently in the US, chassis 356/2 055 (SL 055), at the Revs Institute (Revs) in Naples, Florida, and chassis 356/2 059 (SL 059), in private ownership in Colorado. We also identified some non-works cars that happened to reside in southern California.
Dirk Layer was instrumental in helping open the door to Revs, the collection of Miles Collier, which had the one “sister” car. Once we explained our objectives to Scott George, Vice President, Revs Institute and Miles, Revs opened its doors to us. Complete transparency was agreed, because, in the end, we would be helping establish their car’s history, too. On November 1, 2012, Dirk Layer, Art Thompson, John Wells, and myself arrived at Revs with a white light 3D scanner and cameras, hoping to learn how an SL was constructed and specifically how SL 055 might assist us in the restoration of SL 063 to its coupé form.
We focused our “capture devices” on the areas we wanted to understand. Areas included the cowl and how it transitions to the windshield, the split windshield, the roof skin, the rear window, and how the back of the roof section gives way to the lower body. In addition, research was needed on the rear deck lid, the deck lid hinges, the deck lid
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FORTY SIX The Birth of Porsche Motorsport
latch, the quarter windows, the dashboard, and a hundred other things that SL 063 was missing. With all the digital data captured, the historical document archive at Revs was examined.
The archive search yielded some general background about the Porsche works SLs in the early 1950s, similar to what Cameron had uncovered at the Porsche Corporate Archive – and there were some previously unseen images.
The team returned to base to process all of the data. My wife, Amy, and I were living and working in McMinnville, Oregon. Our two children had relocated to Los Angeles to build their careers in the entertainment industry. As I began to spend more time in California the family decided to move
Cameron Healy works with Tobias Mauler at the Porsche Corporate Archive, gathering whatever data and historical photographs would help establish SL 063’s provenance.
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