OK, here's all I know about this whole thing:
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This engine is definitely the one that surfaced at "OPC Nottingham" last summer. The truth of the matter was that it belonged to Porsche Cars in Reading and they were trying to get rid. Either Nottingham were trying to make a lot on it or Porsche Cars got more desperate because Adrian managed to secure it at a price that meant he could retail it for (as I recall) £1,595+VAT exchange.
Adrian called me as he had a buyer (Simon) lined up, but he had got Simon's mobile number wrong and couldn't reach him. At that point he had not yet bought the engine, so I persuaded him to secure it as I would be able to place it for him I was sure. I spent a small but not insignificant amount of time locating an email address for Simon as I believed I was helping out a fellow lister who had had a major engine failure on the way home from Silverstone a few weeks previously and he needed the lump for his own car.
A few weeks after that Andy (my indie) called me to say Adrian had the engine up his backside sideways as Simon wasn't coming up with his end of the deal (and I wasn't oerly pleased at that point as I had said "yeah, buy it, someone will have it in no time"), so I then spent some time trying to place it (at least one regular on here knows that). I make no apology, Andrew, for not posting in in open forum as I thought you might snap it up and take profit on it also, and I wanted the full benefit to to go a regular 944 punter. I thought I might have it placed only to get back and find that Adrian had "given an ultimatum" to get Simon to take it. Next thing I see it's on eBay and the forum and Titanic being used to try to instigate a bidding war while supposedly it's being offered as some sort of deal to listers.
I don't want anything for the part I played. I accept Simon might not know that I did anything to grease the wheels of him getting it and I was quite happy for him never to know when I believed the engine would be in his car, but I am not happy now.
I could have bought the engine and tried to make profit on it (I nearly did buy it, just to keep it), but I didn't.
Adrian is a good bloke, a friend of mine and someone who I believe does all of us with older cars a service in selling us genuine parts at pretty much the lowest markup he can. He also sticks his neck out on occasion and buys up all the remaining stock of 944 bits because I convince him he can sell them when they could end up stuck on his shelves. He does that when things are cheap and he passes on the saving. He has done so with castor mounts, 968 M030 ARBs and Koni rear shocks to name 3 items from the top of my head. I do not know if he knows the engine is on eBay, but I can guess he won't be happy if he does - he could have bought the engine and stuck it on there himself, but he chose to take a small profit for his OPC and pass it on to an enthusiast making nothing personally. I strongly
suspect that Simon (who's local OPC is Chapelgate) went to Adrian specifically as he thought he could get an engine in the OPC network as cheaply as possible there, which to me is shitting on Adrian to be blunt. I don't
think he will be annoyed enough to stop trying to get us maximum discount, but I can't say I blame him if he does. Speaking personally I might think twice about going out of my way to help members of the 944 community I don't know too well in future.
Unfortunately marco I don't know of any more new engines, I think the point was that this was the last one and Porsche Cars GB didn't think they'd ever sell it.
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