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Name: Jan-Willem Hubbers Age: 31 Location: Netherlands Profession: IT Consultant 1991 C2 Coupe

The Owner

My name is Jan-Willem Hubbers. As my first name is a bit on the long side, and nearly useless in an international context, most people tend to call me JW. I respond to the English pronunciation of Jay Double-you, as well as to the Dutch form, which (in English) sounds a bit like Jay Way.

Previous Cars

The next car was an Alfa 156 2.0 Selespeed (only marginally quicker than the 146 in a straight line, but great road holding and a brilliant gearbox. The only serious point of criticism is that it only had 5 gears.) which I crashed in a parking garage because of the combination of a stuck throttle and no clutch pedal.

Thanks to the Dutch tax climate which makes car leasing rather expensive (in my case, 25% of the original value of the car is added to my taxable income every year)

I went to Plan B: drive a cost-effective lease car used solely for company trips and get a real car for my private mileage. This means no extra taxes, which should pay for the gas of the real car quite nicely.

First-hand introduction to the 911

Selecting a model

Finding a suitable type wasn't much of a challenge: given the money I could realistically spend, it would either be a 911 with the G50 gearbox, or an early 964.

Colour: preferably something dark. Model: coupe. A targa is great fun on sunny Sunday afternoons, but not so great if you want to travel from the Netherlands to Vienna in one night. Fitting into a 3.2 Carrera proved cumbersome, whereas I fit quite comfortably in a 964.

Finding the car

As a professional Porsche importer put it: 'Germany is almost empty with regard to decent 911s'. A close watch on the relevant websites and regular calls to the independents and to the Porsche dealers gave me a good idea of prices. The final issue was: C2 or C4? I decided to go for the lower weight and somewhat more entertaining ride of the C2.

At one of the official Dutch Porsche dealers I found a 964 C2 from 1991 in Amazon green. 161000 km on the clock, which was a bit on the high side. Decided to go for a test drive anyway, as the price was (just) within my budget, and the car was in good shape: accident-free, no rust, no apparent oil-leakage, Porsche service history. Not surprisingly, the car drove great. Some fading to the right under heavy braking, and some minor points such as a burnt-out bulb in the dashboard, and a rubber strip in the right-side skirt coming loose.

Negotiations resulted in a price within my budget, which included fixing of the cosmetic defects, fitting of an immobilizer, and, more importantly, a new clutch. An offer I couldn't refuse.

The Car

Details of the car can be found in the 964-group on www.smartgroups.com. It's a left hand drive Amazon green Carrera 2 with a black interior and manual transmission.

The mirrors are the original rectangular ones. The wheels are 17" cup wheels with 205/50 tyres in front and 255/40 tyres in the back. Apart from the wheels, the car is basic: no sunroof, no cruise control, no onboard computer, no sport seats, no full leather interior. It does have aircon and a comfort seat on the driver's side. The suspension hasn't been modified.

First Impressions

Acceleration is awesome when using the right rev range, there's loads of grip when cornering or accelerating, very good feedback from the steering, the brake pedal is very high and firm, clutch is smooth and not too heavy, gearshift is rather heavy when compared to your average family saloon. The steering position is not great: the steering wheel is offset to the right, and there is little room between steering wheel and pedals. I haven't found a way to heel-and-toe yet, whereas most cars allow simultaneous operation of brake and accelerator pedal quite easily. The car is surprisingly quiet when cruising on roads with a decent surface. As soon as the surface gets rougher, the tires make lots of noise.

Things to get used to:

• The high brake pedal
• Gearshift. It's pretty precise, but doesn't always return to the 3rd-4th gear plane of its own accord. Also, when selecting first gear, it feels like you're moving through one plane too many: there's a point of resistance between the 1st-2nd plane and the 3rd-4th plane.
• Checking the oil with the engine running and at normal operating temperature, as opposed to checking the oil on a stopped and cold engine.

Things to be done in the near future:

• Replace little light bulb of central locking switch in centre console: it's burnt out.
• Fix the strip that contains the read fog lights and reversing lights: all thee plastic mounts have disappeared, causing the strip to be connected to the car only on top. The strip is therefore not aligned with the rear light units.
• Fix the rubber seal on the right side skirt. It keeps coming loose.
• Fix the fading to the right under breaking. It's much better now, but still quite noticeable (especially at German autobahn speeds).
• The radio speakers are connected to the wrong outputs: the fader is now acting as balance, and balance as fader.
• Radio reception is very poor.
• Figure out where to buy 0W-40 Mobil 1 motor oil. It's a good thing I don't drink. That stuff is almost as expensive as good whisky.
• Fasten the plastic strip on the driver's side that acts as a door sill.
• Check wheel alignment
• Play around with tyre pressures
• Wash it
• Drive it!

Things to be done in the not-so-near future:

• Replace the original speakers with something a bit better. Shouldn't be too hard, as the original stuff is the worst I've ever heard in a car.
• Maybe replace the original mirrors for teardrop shaped mirrors
• Do an anti-skid course with it. I've done one of those before. Great fun, and very useful in everyday driving.