9m11rs: the 964 Q-car
The big-arched backdates are a well-told story in the ‘reimagined’ 964 game, but what if your mythical, air-cooled 911 took on more of a Q-car look? Ninemeister has the answer…
Bored of Singer-style backdates? Porsche specialists Ninemeister have instead built a 964 inspired by the subtle RS Touring
The deep, deep gloss of Porsche 964 Piano black paintwork is utterly blemish free under the bright florescent lighting of Ninemeister’s build area. Polished to a mirror finish, there’s not the slightest imperfection anywhere. You can look as hard as you wish. Colin Belton already knows that, because for the past several hundred man hours, that’s what his dedicated Cloud 9m team have been doing. It’s utterly beautiful and I am almost scared to touch it. My fingerprints would be the only mark on the car.
I open the driver’s door by carefully pinching the trigger on the handle between my fingers. The door opens with that distinctive Porsche 964 metallic snap and an aroma of brand-new leather rises from within.
Ever so carefully, I slide into the driver’s seat, careful not to catch my feet on the blemish-free tread plates, resting my shoes on the paper mat in the footwell. My hands rest on the Prototipo steering wheel and I look around me. A thought comes into my head. “This is the absolute business.”
The orange leather colour sample is taken from the Bentley range, though you would never know. It’s impeccably stitched and finished in exactly the same style and design as the original Porsche fitment of the period. The top roll of the instrument panel is clad in charcoal hide, hand stitched.
I rest my hands on the Prototipo again. It feels familiar, yet different. In fact, that feeling sums up every area of this car. There are lots of familiar things you will have seen before if you’ve sat in a 964. Yet they are different.
Because this is what Ninemeister designates a 9m11rs. Created by hand by the small team of skilled craftsmen to each owner’s individual specification. And yet, there is no standard 9m11rs. Each one is different, created to the owner’s wishes.
The fact that you’re reading this means you have a passion for the 911. That means you will understand what I’m going to describe next. At some point, you will have done a similar mental exercise to me. I find it relaxing and therapeutic, and it goes like this.
Take a glass of something you enjoy. I’ll admit to a nice deep red Rioja. Sit back, open your mind and build yourself your perfect, fantasy 911. I’m not talking about a simple cosmetic backdate here, or a trackready GT3. I mean, just imagine if you had to choose just one car to drive for the rest of your days and someone was going to build it for you, what would you put into it? A seriously ‘unicorn’ 911.
Base car? Has to be 964. That’s my open, unashamed bias. It’s probably the model that is as modern as you can get while still retaining the classic 911 outline. For sure, the 993 is a better, more dynamic drive. However, these things can be taken care of.
And in my view, the 964 has the best exhaust note. That gruffness that sounds like it’s been smoking 60 Marlboro a day all its life, combined with the snappy throttle response. Perfect. Then simply sit back, relax and imagine some more…
Back in the real world, I release my grip on the Momo. I step out of the black 964 into the harsh lights of the Ninemeister build shop and take a look at the car from the side profile. Again the sense that it’s familiar. Yet different.
The stance and ride height are very RS looking, yet the Cup alloys seem to fill the arches a little more. The car looks just a little wider with the ride height not set at full-on ’track day’ pose, yet different to the average 964. Open the engine lid and there’s a brand-new flat six sitting there. Except that this one says ‘Varioram’ on the intake. Close the lid, carefully. The gold designation of the 9m11rs badge floats as if suspended in the deep black paint.
So what exactly is this car? And what on earth is a 9m11rs? Belton, we need to talk…
“A 9m11rs 964 can be anything you wish it to be. The whole point of the Cloud 9m programme is to encourage clients to think big and trust that we can guide them through the process,” he says.
All of the Ninemeister cars start the same way initially. The source car, generally provided by the owner, is completely stripped to the bare bones. RS specification seam welding is added, together with some specific bodyshell stiffening that Ninemeister devised themselves. Many hours in the Ninemeister paint shop follow as that deep paintwork is built up and the shell is ready to be built into the client’s car.
That’s the point at which things become very personal. Take this black car as a case study. It’s left-hand drive, destined for North America in a few days. The source cars all start the same way, then segway off into the client’s particular ideas on their perfect 911. The owner moves frequently around the continent, so as well as heated seats, electric air conditioning is fitted. Why electric A/C? It’s smaller, more efficient and sits in the nose of the car. Fewer components and drive belts in the engine bay.
The owner did not wish for a highly strung, Sports Purpose track car. He wanted a daily driver, yet with RS underpinnings so that, when the mood takes him, he can dive off the freeway down one of his favourite canyon roads and indulge in a little oneto-one time with his Porsche.
And this is the Ninemeister promise. Belton encourages you to dream. Expand your thoughts.
Create your Unicorn Porsche. It’s then his job to be the interface between your dreams and the decades of engineering experience to interpret your ambitions into a final product that feels, sounds, drives and looks exactly as you had imagined.
A sneak peek under the lid of Belton’s laptop reveals spreadsheet after spreadsheet of 9m build specifications. Some are ideas that don’t come to life, as clients often have flashes of inspiration mid build. Others are examples of works in progress, such as the Rubystone and Maritime blue bodyshells in the background of our photography.
Belton’s philosophy in these builds sounds simple and yet can get incredibly complex. At the core is his own engineering philosophy. “Each time you change one area of a car, you have an impact in other areas. Unless you have already been there before, it can be difficult to foresee what will happen in advance. So when you are building a car from scratch to fulfil a client’s wishes, there are no end of factors we need to consider. And that’s why people come to us.” Taking his decades of Porsche 911 experience, a large slice of empathy for a customer’s ambitions, a vast arsenal of genuine Porsche Classic parts, specialist component suppliers plus Ninemeister’s own in-house developed items and an obsessive attention to detail, and you begin to realise that this isn’t a fast or cheap process. Once the specification is locked down to a degree, Belton then has the massive task of taking those wishes, that vast spreadsheet of works, and conveying it to his team of craftsmen and guiding them through each build. “The guys have a great deal of autonomy and often come up with interesting solutions to objectives.” Engines are built in the bespoke engine build room. Belton’s engine build specialist has probably forgotten more about building flat six engines than I will ever learn in my lifetime.
Back to the black American car. The prepared source car shell has been built up into the final car you see today. Exactly what were the objectives and how did Ninemeister meet them?
The objective was a car that was smooth and quiet. Definitely not a track car, yet with RS underpinnings and the capability to deliver the most tactile and immersive drive, should the owner wish. Then revert back to easy, daily driver afterwards.
So the body shell has significant amounts of sound deadening added for those freeway journeys. A powerful Alpine stereo system is there, with everything hidden away as if it were a factory
“The objective was a car that was smooth and quiet… with RS underpinnings and the capability to deliver the most tactile and immersive drive”
install, still fitting into the small slot that was available way back in the early 90s for music.
And that steering wheel. It’s a new Momo Prototipo, taken and rebuilt with additional thickness to the rim. I always thought that the Prototipo was a lovely design, yet a little too thin. Belton echoes my views almost word for word. “It’s the most important part of the car. It’s the interface between you, the car and the road.” So that’s why I had that strange sensation when I first held the wheel. Something tactile. Familiar, yet different.
The theme echoes right through the car. At its heart is a bespoke Ninemeister 3.8-litre. Starting with a 964 crank case, the rest of the engine is a hybrid of 993 RS and bespoke Ninemeister parts. Bored out to 3.8-litre, the engine also has a Ninemeister modified version of the 993 Varioram. It’s similar, but not quite the same. 9m conrods, RS pistons and 993 RS cams all play a part to come together to create an engine with a high torque output for USA city streets and freeways, yet still free spinning and happy to rev down those canyon roads.
The exhaust is standard, with the catalysts removed. “They will be shipped with the car and can be easily refitted. The owner moves around America, so right now we aren’t sure what USA state it will be registered in.” Again, a case of anticipating issues before they become apparent and solving them even before the owner has thought that far ahead. The engine is conservatively mapped for lower-quality fuel, just in case. However, it’s still developing around 325bhp and a lovely 400Nm of torque.
Creating the tactile drive as you hold that steering wheel involves some careful suspension choices too. “Everyone accepts that the 993 has better turn in and corner entry feel. Yet many people like the rear end feel of the 964 too. Well, if that’s the experience drivers want, then why not deliver that?”
So the front end of this car is all 993. Everything in the geometry is 993 or 993 RS based, with Bilstein PSS10S doing the damping work. This gives a great range of caster and camber adjustment to dial in the client’s preferences. On the shelves are suspension components ready for install. They look like any other Porsche alloy component, yet a little different. Workshop team leader Rob Wright explains, “We paint all of the arms and castings with a special truck-grade chassis paint, in exactly the same colour as the alloy.”
This means that wherever in the world the car goes, no matter what the climate, the suspension will always be pristine and protected from corrosion. The same, yet different.
“Ideally, we like all of our clients to actually visit us and drive the car before delivery. It makes any final adjustments to preferences very easy to make before the car is packed ready for shipping,” Wright says.
Indeed, delivery of a 9m11rs is a significant logistical exercise. With clients in North America spreading the word and more enquiries each week, it isn’t simply a case of handing over some keys. In the workshop, Wright is close to readying the black car for its trans-atlantic crossing. “We work with the same shipping agent each time. I personally load and check the security of the car into the container and make sure that it will arrive perfectly. Nothing is left to chance.”
The black car’s owner will be unable to visit Ninemeister before the car is shipped. Though he has visited mid-build, the first time he sees it will be when the container doors open. That should be quite an occasion.
It’s kind of difficult to find the words to describe the attention to detail on the Ninemeister cars. Imagine if the 964 never went out of production. Imagine that Porsche, as well as moving on to liquidcooled cars, also continued to build the 964 as part of some kind of clandestine, underground ‘special wishes’ programme. Only they weren’t built and painted by robots. They were built carefully by hand. Then imagine moving that tiny production facility from Germany to Warrington in Lancashire, UK.
The modern incarnation of Porsche 911 is a truly remarkable feat of engineering. And looking forwards, who knows what lies in store for the new 911? However, if you are one of a small niche of people who misses the truly analogue, tactile feel of the Porsche 911 and finds modern ‘digital’ sports cars lacking that indefinable something, perhaps you may wish to re-allocate that new car budget towards something that is what you really desire. Something truly tactile.
As for me? I am already wishing I could find that affordable wide-body 964 Anniversary and deliver it to Ninemeister. Just imagine how deep and wonderful that Viola-coloured paintwork would look? I’d probably keep the four-wheel drive and get Belton to dial out that slight understeer. Oh yes, and that
Momo Prototipo will have to have a spacer fitted to move it closer and accommodate my giraffe-like frame. It would need to be a left-hand drive, of course. Perfect for those fast, early morning European Alpine passes, and with a pair of Recaro Pole Positions or similar too. And as for the engine… Belton, are you writing all this down?