Continental script

[James Davies]

And here's another one. Again, gold "Porsche" script at the front.

Note both these cars have a pointed hood handles, so are not the earliest 1955 model year cars.

[Jim Wayman]

Jim

There were several Continentals ordered thru Hoffman, but delivered to England and Australia with RHD. There was also a LHD car in Australia that was converted to RHD, now, I believe, in England.

[James Davies]

Jim, I don't think the 1955 "Continental" cars in Australia and New Zealand had anything to do with Hoffman. The handler in Australia and New Zealand was Norman Hamilton in Melbourne, and he started importing RHD Porsches (the first Porsche produced) in mid-1951. Some background:

https://newsroom.porsche.com/en_AU/2020 ... 23091.html

In 1955 he imported 15 cars from Porsche, the coupes and cabs likely all Continentals. Certainly this is, and also one that ended up in NZ as well, of which we have period photos. I suspect like Hoffman, he would have had all the cars similarly badged.

Btw, this red one in the photo was owned by John Youl (seen in the photo) and was in Tasmania. This is the old F1 circuit there.

https://primotipo.com/2018/09/02/john-youl/

[Mike Smith]

Jim Wayman
There were several Continentals ordered thru Hoffman, but delivered to England and Australia with RHD.
There was also a LHD car in Australia that was converted to RHD, now, I believe, in England.

Jim,
The 3 x cars listed below are the only RHD cars that I am aware that went `Directly` to The States - You will note that there are no Continentals - However, please correct me, if you know better or can add `ANY` information.

I have the records for what I believe to be the total numbers of RHD Cars built by Porsche (of course I probably missed a couple)

I only have a record of 3 x Cars that went directly to the USA but NO records of Hoffman being involved (please correct me if I am wrong)
I rather suspect that these 3 cars were for US servicemen who had a contact in Stuttgart or were Brits who intended to import it back to the UK at a later date -
interestingly – they were all Ruby Red

108 630 - Carrera to Volkswagen Hawaii, Honolulu - supplied to Ronald T. Butler
120 142 - Supplied to Porsche Car Import, Northbrook – 1st Owner Un-known
131 116 - Supplied to Mac-Han Waltham – Supplied to Kenneth Hingcheung-Fuy, Cambridge, Mass

None of these cars are on my records as having appeared back in England

There were also some RHD cars that travelled to the US after having a previous life in the UK and one New Car that was rejected at the New York Docks by the new owner when he decided that it was ”too small”` – It was shipped back to the UK on the next boat

@@@@

As for Left to Right Conversions - there have been many of these carried out in Australia and the UK over the years

@@@@

There was in excess of a 300 LHD 356`s supplied to US service-personal through the UK Importer - AFN

[Brett Johnson]

The little Porsche script on the radio delete area in 1954-1955 is listed as either chrome or gold, but the other uses of chrome for body mounted scripts in the 1955 parts catalog are incorrect as others have stated. It is conceivable that the gold-plated body scripts were installed at or after they were first used on Speedsters, but this is not to imply a chronological change. My 54205 coupe had original aluminum rear scripts when purchased in 1978.

A friend of mine in Muncie, IN had a very authentic 1955 Speedster with chrome-plated front and rear scripts. The original owner told him they were originally gold, but he thought they were gaudy.

[Tom Kaiser]

Brett ,
Nice to read that the Pre A Corner has interesting detail discussions again after a while .

Here is a difficult one , at least so far for me :

Little script radio delete plate , when exactly ( VIN ) did it change from dummy to script ?
Any document about this issue ?

[Brett Johnson]

I believe it is at or around the 1954 model year (short hood handle with horn grilles).

[Victor Ingram]

Many years ago I had an unfortunate incident of having one of my scripts break in half, Ugh!

I took it to the experts, John & Ray Paterak. A menial request for their expertise, but I got lucky
and their dad took it on. He was a very, very skilled man in his own right.

I remember him saying to me one day "I don't know where my boys get all of this talent"?
He was a real gentleman and also very humble.

Anyway he explained to me that the script was brass and gold plated, he would make sure it looked correct.
And that he did, I could not see where he put it back together, it was that good.