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Porsche Killer
by Vujade, Photos supplied by Jak Rizzo
2002-10-02 I’m sure every last one of you has thought about racing your Volkswagen at one time or another, be it drag racing or around the track. Well that’s exactly what Jak Rizzo from the Central Coast of New South Wales, Australia has been doing for the last 3 years. He currently races in the Super Sprint series with mostly Porsches. This is Jaks first car. He has owned it for the last 9 years now and believe it or not, this car is used daily! Despite what the pictures show, it is not a race car. Jak says he prefers the old Porsche philosophy “You can drive it from the garage to the track and back to work on Monday without touching it.” Jak actually puts a baby seat for his 2 year old when he is not racing this car. The basis for this Porsche Killer is a 1971 1302 Super Beetle painted Metallic Quartz Purple. Jaks car in full street trim weighs in at 890 Kilograms (that’s 1958 lbs for you metric impaired), mainly because the body is all steel except for the huge rear wing made by V-Force of Sydney, Australia. Jak says it has made a huge improvement of stability and the cooling. It force feeds air into the carbs and the fan, creating a nice pressurized effect in the engine compartment. Jak rolls on 16x6 and 16x7 polished Fuchs, front and rear respectively. These are mounted on Falken ST115 205/50/16 Tires.This was accomplished by using cross drilled ‘Powertune’ Disks with Type 4 Calipers in the front, drilled in the Porsche 5x130 pattern. The rear disks were adapted from Australian Ford Falcon and were also cross drilled for ventilation. Front suspension consists of 4” shortened struts with shorter KYB inserts from a VW Golf. They feature fully adjustable lower spring platforms with smaller diameter springs that allow the Porsche wheels to fit completely under the stock fenders. An adjustable strut tower brace and Whiteline swaybar complete the front end suspension package. The heads are modified 040 castings that have been fitted with 40 x 35.5 valves and Berg heavy duty single springs. The valves have a 3 angle valve job and the heads have been match ported to the tall Weber manifolds. Feeding this beast are 45mm Dellortos. All of the exhaust gasses are extracted thru a 1.5” merged header with 2.5” turbo muffler which exits thru a central exhaust outlet similar to a Boxter. Ignition duties are handled by a Bosch 009 distributor with a Pertronix Ignitor Module installed. A motor like this would certainly produce more heat then a stock 1600cc, so cooling comes from the type 4 doghouse cooler and a Mazda RX7 oil cooler bolted to the underside of the parcel tray above the tranny. Future improvements in the works for Jaks motor are 1.4 rockers for some more lift and 94mm pistons, that will increase the displacement to 2026cc! This will definitely give his car a little more pull coming out of the corners. A car of this magnitude definitely has to have an upgraded interior to complete the whole package. When it comes to seats, you cant do any better the worlds premier sports car manufacturer; so Jak installed Porsche 911 seats and 4 point harnesses to hold him tight when going around those corners. To make sure everything is working properly, whether going to the grocery store or going around the track, Jak has a complete set of instruments to tell him whats going on at all times, these include a Porsche 914 Tach and 150 Speedo, Autometer Fuel, Oil Temp, Oil Pressure, and also a Cylinder Head Temperature Gauge. There is also Autometer Pro Light for the Oil Pressure to let him know if anything should go wrong. So now that you know everything about Jak Rizzo’s VW, you are probably asking yourself right about now, “So what can it do at the track?” Why don’t I just let Jak tell us himself, “I compete with this car in the Porsche Clubs Sprint Days with lap times better then 3.2L Carreras. My biggest compliment yet, was a 911 driver telling me that it was the highlight of his day trying to catch a Volkswagen while watching me lift the inside wheel on 140kph corners in third gear. Puts a smile on your dial! Last year I finished 5th out of my class of 16 Porsches.” Not too bad for this modest little VW. Jak would also like to thank his sponsor Richard Holzl from V-Force of Sydney, Australia for all that they have done from him and his car. V-Force can be contacted at www.beetleracing.com. The rear suspension features Type 3 torsion bars with KYB heavy duty offroad shocks, polyureathane bushings and a Whiteline rear swaybar. All of this adds up to one great handling Volkswagen! Motivation for this German Looker from Down Under comes from a 1880cc Type 1 motor that was assembled by Jak. Speaking of the tranny, it was transplanted from a later model 1303 Super Beetle because of the taller gearing and higher final drive. Shifting is taken care of by a quick shift and a custom made gear shift knob that is taller so that Jaks hand is always closer to the steering wheel while racing. The motor consists of a 73mm hand welded crank, with chevy rods and ARP rod bolts. Malhe 90.5mm “B” pistons, Berg chromoly pushrods, AutoCraft 1.25 rockers, and an Engle K-8 cam round out the package. Jak says that the power output of this motor was 92hp at the wheels prior to installation of the K-8 cam, He has noticed a sizable drop in his 1/8 mile time from 10.4 to 9.8 seconds. Not bad at all.
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