So many are settling for a modern day replica. They are an incredibly rare car, should you be able to find one for sale it will probably cost more than your house value (timesed by ten). In 2018, it is much harder to get your hands on a Porsche 550, you definitely can’t trade in your old Porsche at a local dealer for one. Later on, Dean was banned from racing sports cars during the filming of Warner Brothers movies, as a way of getting his own back Dean adopted ‘Little Bastard’ as a middle finger to his boss during his downtime. Warner once referred to Dean as ‘little Bastard’ after he had refused to vacate his temporary ‘House of Eden’ trailer on the studio’s lot. Purportedly, James the origin of the name came from Jack L. Dean then asked a customer car painter to paint the moniker ‘Little Bastard’ on the car. In 1955 Dean decided to trade in his 356 Porsche Super Speedster at competition motors, for a new 1955 Porsche 550 Spyder. The stand out feature of the 550 was its seamless transition from race dominator to road car, and both could be achieved on the same day! Who needs a truck to get you to the track when you could cruise there in style.Īrguably, the most famous owner of a Porsche 550 was the legendary James Dean. With these cars, Porsche was the first car manufacturer to capture a race sponsorship!įor such a limited number of prototype and customer builds, the 550 Spyder achieved a disproportionate success percentage, usually finishing in the top three on a bad day. Over the next few years, the Werks Porsche team evolved and raced the 550 with outstanding results, the car was instantly recognized wherever it appeared. The first time a 550 raced was in roadster format at the Nurburgring Eifel race in May 1953, winning in its first race. The oil is said to have been changed in spring 2020.Īdditional photos of the underside are provided in the gallery below along with stampings on the chassis, engine, and transmission.Inspired by the Porsche 356, Porsche decided to build a car, which was widely designed for auto-racing. Power is sent to the rear wheels via a four-speed manual transaxle. Under the rear clamshell is a mid-mounted AH-code Volkswagen flat-four equipped with twin 44IDF Weber carburetors. The five-digit mechanical odometer displays just under 18k kilometers (~11k miles), approximately 3k kilometers of which have been added by the current owner. An Alpine stereo in the dashboard plays through speakers installed below the doors.Ī Nardi wood-rimmed steering wheel with a Porsche center frames a trio of VDO gauges including a 200-km/h speedometer and a 6k-rpm tachometer. The interior features low-back bucket seats with black leather upholstery and red lap belts, and a fire extinguisher is mounted beside the passenger seat. The car has disc brakes at all four corners and is said to have a curb weight of approximately 1,300 pounds. The seller notes blend areas behind both passenger-side wheel arches, and close-up photos showing scratches and scuffs are provided in the gallery below.Ĭhrome-finished 15×4.5″ front and 15×5.5″ rear wheels with Mangels center caps are wrapped in 175/70 Vredestein Sprint Classic tires, including the full-size spare. The fiberglass body is finished in Silver-Blue with gold Porsche badging in the rear and Spyder badges on the sides. This Beck Spyder is now offered by the selling dealer on behalf of the owner with service records since 2018, a black tonneau cover, a black soft top with side curtains, and a clean New Hampshire title listing the car as a 1955 Porsche 550 Spyder. The fiberglass body is finished in Silver-Blue over black, and the owner has added approximately 3k of its 18k indicated kilometers (~11k miles). It is powered by an AH-code air-cooled Volkswagen flat-four mated to a four-speed manual transaxle. This Beck 550 Spyder was built in 1999 and was acquired by the current owner two years ago.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |