With the air-cooled 911 market backing off a bit, especially for classic 911s of the late-70s and ’80s, the hope, or at least my hope, is that this will help return the 912 to its typical place as an inexpensive alternative. After all, if the 912 is commanding high dollars then it’s tough to rationalize one as a driver when a little effort almost surely could turn up a decent 911. One caveat is that the original long-hood 912 produced from 1965-1969 may remain a more expensive option. We haven’t seen the long-hood 911s come down in value much (though they aren’t really going up in value either) and I suspect the 912 will follow suit. That leaves us with the one-year-only 1976 Porsche 912E that we see here. Like the 911 of its era the 912E is most distinguished from its predecessor by its impact bumpers, but it also featured a larger 2.0 liter flat-4 replacing the 1.6 liter of the original 912. Unfortunately, that increased displacement did not bring with it additional power as the 912E actually offered fewer horses on tap than when equipped with the 1.6. It’s also heavier. This wasn’t an atypical problem for Porsches of the time as the mid-year 911 suffered a similar fate and these points help explain why they remain some of the lower priced options on the air-cooled market.
