Co ee with CAR: Singer Vehicle Design’s Maz Fawaz
Out for a blast in Singer’s latest restored 911 – with the man who helps make their cars special ($1.8m special…)
It didn’t start like this,’ remembers Mazen ‘Maz’ Fawaz as he flicks the ignition key and 4.0 litres of very special Porsche flat-six erupts like a Doberman catching a sudden whiff of postie. ‘It started as a simple Club Sport-type project. The classic Singer coupe is a fairly luxurious gentleman’s car so we thought it would be cool if we dialled it up, took a bunch of weight out.’ So far, so sensible.
‘But then things kind of went crazy.’ He slots second gear, pins the right pedal and the revcounter needle makes like a pinball flipper, firing upwards almost instantly. ‘We had no idea back then that we’d end up where we are now.’
Where we are now is inside the orange wrapper of an early-’90s 911 re-engineered by an F1 team and costing some $1.8m (£1.4m). That’s getting on for Bugatti Chiron money, and is six times as expensive as a 911 GT2 RS, the priciest roadgoing 911 you can currently buy from Stuttgart. Yet again, Singer is setting the agenda when it comes to old Porsches.
For the best part of the last decade Singer Vehicle Design, founded by expat Brit and one-time rock singer Rob Dickinson, has been crafting exquisite fusions of old and very old 911 from its base in southern California. Over 100 cars have been finished so far, each based on the 964-generation 911s that Porsche originally built between 1989 and 1994 – and most costing their owners over $600,000 by the time they’ve had the car detailed to their requirements. But the cars developed as part of Singer’s DLS project are a whole new level of insanity.
And not just because of that $1.8m price. DLS stands for Dynamic and Lightweight Study and the resulting cars are co-developed and constructed by Williams Advanced Engineering, the UK-based road car and consultancy arm of Williams F1. Virtually every single component has been changed or modified in the pursuit of creating what Maz calls the ‘ultimate analogue
driving experience’. Just 75 cars will be restored at Williams’ Grove facility in Oxfordshire, in a space once earmarked for the stillborn Jaguar C-X75 hypercar.
But before the first commission is delivered this autumn there’s a whole raft of tests and further development work to be carried out. Which is why we’ve come to the mountains above Barcelona to join Singer and Williams as they work through the set-up.
‘We drove this a few months back and were in love with it,’ says Maz over a deafening cacophony of transmission chatter and induction roar as we climb through a series of curves en route to meet the test team. The car feels tight and incredibly light on its feet. When Maz leans into the throttle the car leaps forward with the kind of response that’d make a Tesla look sleepy. But Maz isn’t happy.
‘Now it feels like we’ve lost a little something because we made some changes, so now we’re dialling it back up.’
Those noises from the bespoke Hewland gearbox and a trick intake system that draws air in from each rear side window will be calmed a little. But today Maz is more focused on getting the ride and handling sorted. Joining him from the Singer side are three test-drive consultants: racer Marino Franchitti, journalist and presenter Chris Harris, and Harris’s long-time friend Richard Tuthill of Tuthill Porsche. In terms of design, the DLS-honed cars are very much the creation of Singer’s founder, Dickinson, but these are the guys who will shape how it feels.
There’s a huge mutual respect among Singer staff and their consultants; Maz recalls driving with Tuthill on some Rally of Great Britain stages in an old air-cooled 911: ‘It was wet, freezing and frightening but the single greatest driving experience ever. I could not believe the abuse they take. And it’s the first time I’ve properly jumped a car. Top of fourth gear…’
Listening to their feedback and making changes to the car are the half dozen bodies from Williams, plus representatives from other suppliers, the list of which reads like a who’s-who of top-drawer component brands.
‘Honestly, we couldn’t have afforded to pay the bills for those guys,’ says quietly spoken Maz, now 44, who forged his career creating software that ⊲
The DLS commissions will cost $1.8m. That’s six times as expensive as the priciest 911 you can buy from Porsche
‘We could have gone for a multi-link rear,’ says Maz. ‘But we wanted to preserve the way the older cars feel’
matched properties with the best estate agents, before joining Singer, where he now heads up the DLS programme.
‘I mean, BBS created a forged magnesium centre-lock wheel just for us. Brembo: we called them up expecting to buy an off-the-shelf kit and they made us an entire carbon brake system. And then there’s the traction-control system from Bosch. We went into this thinking no one will understand what we’re trying to do but what surprised us is how many nutty car guys we found; and they’ve all bent over backwards to help.’
While Harris and Tuthill take turns at flinging the car down a twisty road then reporting back to the rest of the crew, I ask Williams project manager Jonathan Dean about the contrast between this programme and Williams’ more usual projects.
‘We’re working with enthusiasts rather than an OEM, and that has its challenges,’ he explains. ‘When you’re working with an OEM they put a lot of their own processes in place. We have more freedom here: that’s been refreshing. We’ve had more opportunity than normal to steer the process but sometimes you’re not sure you’re talking the same language, so it has taken longer.’
When Harris arrives back at our layby he claims the rear end is doing too much steering and suggests stiffening the dampers. The Williams technicians spring into action, hoisting the car into the air with a portable battery-operated lift to make the changes before sending it out again. And 10 minutes later they’ll do it all again. By the time we get a visit from the police, curious to see where the almighty shriek is coming from, the team feel like they’re getting somewhere.
From road to track, and from cold to perishing. After beers, pasta and a night’s rest we relocate to the Castelloli circuit, where the temperature of the tarmac is currently better suited to winter tyres than the fat semi-slick Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2 rubber the development cars are wearing.
We’re joined by an early blue mule that looks like it’s escaped from the local crusher. But it’s the scuttle of the much prettier orange car on which Maz precariously yet casually balances his cardboard cup of steaming coffee. Not his preferred Peet’s Coffee, admittedly, but the Bay Area roaster hasn’t yet landed in rural Spain.
This is our first chance to really pore over the exterior details – and, honestly, it’s hard to know where to start. Some of the trick bits aren’t immediately obvious: the modern flush-fit windscreen and door windows, the bespoke door handles. Some aren’t even visible, like the double-wishbone front end that replaces the standard car’s flawed struts, or Williams’ re-engineered aluminium trailing arms.
‘We could have gone for a multi-link rear,’ admits Maz, ‘but we like the way the older cars feel and we wanted to preserve it, while improving it.’
Like Singer’s classic restorations, the DLS features carbon bodywork, including the doors. The addition of a rollcage of 40mm tubing concealed within the shell helps increase chassis stiffness by 80 per cent compared with a stock 964, and Williams aero expertise means it’s vastly more ecient.
‘You know those old pictures of the ’73 2.7 RS in the wind tunnel with all those little bits of tape flapping about the ducktail?’ asks Maz before waving his hand in a ‘baloney’ gesture. ‘Turns out that spoiler does almost nothing. The air goes right over the top. It’s why cars like the GT3 RS have such huge wings – they need to get ’em up high into the airflow.’ ⊲
But Singer really wanted to use the ducktail, so Williams suggested lowering the centre section of the roof and creating a small floating panel at the trailing edge to channel air down to the wing. It’s a beautiful solution: there’s no meaningful loss of headroom – handy if you need to wear a helmet inside – and no dilution of the classic 911 silhouette.
It’s beneath that spoiler, though, that the DLS’s star feature lurks: a 500bhp 4.0-litre flat six capable of registering over 9000rpm on an overly vintage-looking, but no doubt hugely expensive, revcounter that interior guru Imogen Howarth says is her favourite part of the cabin. The key to creating that power is a pair of four-valve heads that open up the breathing bottleneck in the standard 12-valve motor.
‘We consulted with [legendary Porsche engine designer] Hans Mezger and he told us they’d started developing four-valve heads back in the early ’70s,’ explains Maz. ‘But then turbocharging came along and it offered huge power relatively easily – though at the expense of throttle response and sound.’ Sound familiar? Maz has just neatly summed up the problem with too many modern performance cars; the DLS-informed Singer restorations are the antidote.
He notes: ‘I’m blown away by the technology on modern supercars but I find them boring at normal speeds. Even at a track they’re a bit too easy. I can’t be emotional about them. I’m not dying to have one, to look at one, to drive one. A lot of customers come to us with that same sentiment.’
When the Williams technicians have finished their checks, I buckle into the passenger seat for another shotgun ride with Maz. The clutch judders as he pulls out onto the pit straight and there’s that gear chatter again, but the riot of induction noise as we soar past 9000rpm rings out loud and clear, the exact opposite of a modern bassy turbo grumble. Singer hasn’t released any ocial performance figures – but with 500bhp and around 1100kg, expect a 0-62mph time of less than 4.0sec if you can get the tyres hooked up.
While rally driver Tuthill is flamboyantly sideways everywhere, Maz prefers neat and focused, punching through the gears fiercely, but keeping the car tidy at all times.
‘I don’t have a background in engineering or developing cars, but I have intuition for it,’ he says. ‘ I know where I want to end up, and I know how to look for talent. And then I let them do their thing.’ And there’s the genius…
There may still be some dynamic tuning but already the car feels hugely stable. There’s no sawing at the wheel to keep the line together, no sliding from either end. But you can see from the focused look on Maz’s face that he’s fully immersed. This is no point-and-shoot machine.
Everyone here knows they’re among friends, so they don’t hold back. Harris dislikes the modern shoulder wings on the handsome bucket seats, championing the tombstone design of classic 911 chairs that prioritise kidney support but don’t restrict upper body movement; Howarth knows that Dickinson will demand they stay. Harris would prefer a slightly slower rack. Maz has no problem with the ratio but is happy if Harris is happy. Ever-smiling Franchitti just seems happy to be involved in what everyone knows is one of the most special projects in the car world.
‘The next generation of prototypes, the EP3 cars, are nearly ready,’ says Maz of the machines that will bridge the gap between the current test cars and the customer cars upon which work will start in the summer. But even those will be guinea pigs of sorts.
‘I imagine the first client cars won’t be completely finished,’ he concedes. ‘The first five cars or so – you’re going to learn things as they go out into the world. But the first few clients are old clients. They know us well. They like being involved.’
They are also obscenely wealthy. These are the kinds of people who don’t bat an eyelid at paying $50m for an old Ferrari, who are so rich that they can order three Singer DLS-informed restorations in one go from the 75-unit run. ‘It’s hard to say no to these people,’ admits Maz.
But it’s this flush fanbase that gives Singer, a brand now firmly embedded in the minds of enthusiasts the world over and being taken seriously by gold-standard suppliers, the opportunity to expand far beyond hot-rodding old 911s.
Yes, there’ll be more 911-based stuff; maybe something more all-terrain, even more competition focused. But beyond that, who says a Singer has to be based on a 911, or even a Porsche, or a car?
‘I’m always talking with Rob about what kind of cars we might work on next,’ says Maz. ‘And they don’t have to be German. We might spot an old Land Rover drive past and that’ll get us talking about how we could apply the Singer philosophy to that. For us Singer isn’t a car, it’s a philosophy,’ he says. ‘It’s an execution. It’s about extraordinary execution.’
There’s no sawing at the wheel – Maz is neat and focused. But you can see from the look on his face that he’s fully immersed