The point of an engine swap is to put a different engine into the car than the original, otherwise it’s an engine replacement. That’s stating the obvious, and of course, not all engine swaps are equal. With all that in mind, we aren’t sure there’s a more unequal engine swap than what you see here. Yes, that’s a Ferrari V8 shoved into the back of a Porsche 911.
This is going to rile some brand purists for sure. But for the rest of us, Jimmy Oakes’ YouTube project sponsored by ENEOS is a wild blend of Italian engine performance, German chassis engineering, and a smattering of Japanese motorsport heritage. It’s dubbed the Porrari, and it’s a 1978 Porsche 911 SC now powered by a Ferrari-built Maserati F136 V8. Here’s how it all came to life.
An Insane Amount Of Work To Make This Car Happen
JIimmy Oakes & ENEOS Ferrari Engined Porsche 911 PorrariJIimmy Oakes/ENEOS
The Porrari is on display at the first Formula Drift round held at Stafford Motor Speedway in Connecticut, and it absolutely looks the part in drift spec with its missing bumpers, RAYS VRX-10 wheels, a straightforward Porsche Guards Red paint job, and specially fabricated widebody fenders. However, while it looks like a car destined to be a drift rat, the 911’s entire chassis was stripped and restored, the roof replaced with a carbon fiber roof skin, and a custom wiring harness fitted before work even started on the engine.
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A 996 Porsche 911 transmission is mated to the F136 V8 and fitted with a custom clutch and flywheel. The engine is then modified with individual throttle bodies from a BMW M3 S65 engine using 3D-printed custom adapters and trumpets. However, the 1978 Porsche 911 was air-cooled, and had a smaller engine, so cascading solutions led to a fuel cell replacing the fuel tank in the front to create space for a radiator, then a removable tunnel was installed down the center of the chassis to allow direct routing for water cooling.
A V8 In A 911
JIimmy Oakes & ENEOS Ferrari Engined Porsche 911 PorrariJIimmy Oakes/ENEOS
This isn’t the first time someone has shoehorned a V8 into the back of a 911, so the additional bracing fitted to allow the torsion bars to be removed isn’t a surprise. In this case, the suspension is a set of custom Stance Suspension coilovers, and the brakes are based around four-piston Brembo calipers from the Porsche Boxster.
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“This build wasn’t about taking the easy route. It was about building something that makes people take notice and then showing them how we did it. In my opinion, it’s projects like this that keep car culture exciting.”
– Jimmy Oakes, engineer and YouTuber
Looking past the Ferrari engine, one of the coolest aspects of the build are the custom headers and exhaust system, fabricated by James “Bopper” Moran. The interior is stripped out with a racing wheel and seats fitted along with a serious roll cage. For getting power to the ground and actually controlling it, the Porrari rides on 17×9.5-inch front and 17×10.5-inch rear wheels, fitted with 235/40 R17 and 255/40 R17 Accelera 651 Sport tires.
CarBuzz Insight – Why This Matters:
JIimmy Oakes & ENEOS Ferrari Engined Porsche 911 PorrariJIimmy Oakes/ENEOS
While capitalism and corporations push us to believe that we all need the latest and greatest technology, or we’ll be left behind, projects like this show us that some recycling and human skill-based fabrication can lead to epic creations. In this case, that skill created a now-widebody 1978 Porsche 911 powered by a Ferrari V8 pulled from a Maserati that revs out to 8,000 rpm. AI can’t build this, software is unnecessary, it’s not a ludicrously priced restomod, and it looks far cooler while oozing more passion than a $650,000 Ferrari.
