Gemballa Extremo Bi-Turbo: The 600-HP RUF-Powered 911
The air-cooled Porsche 911 is one of the most modified sports cars in the world. From restorations to one-off garage builds and even high-end restomods from companies like Singer, Guntherwerks, and Tuthill. There is no end to how unique you can make your Porsche 911. But long before this current restomod boom took over, legacy tuning companies like RUF were making Porsches fast before anyone else ever did. But in the late 90s, an unlikely three-way collaboration brought about one of the craziest Porsche 911s ever made that no one could buy, unless you were a Saudi Sheikh.
Gemballa Was Obsessed With Making Porsches Unique And Fast
If you followed Porsche closely in the 90s either through TV or magazines, you must have heard about Gemballa. It is a German tuning company founded in 1981 by its eccentric owner, Uwe Gemballa. The company quickly became legendary and controversial for its crazy designs and modifications. Their focus was on the Porsche 911, and purists hated the cars they made, but wealthy buyers were lining up to have their cars modified.
One of the early cars that got a lot of people talking was the Gemballa Avalanche, a radical slant-nosed widebody based on the Porsche 930 Turbo, with side strakes that mimicked those of the Ferrari Testarossa. They also had the Gemballa Cyrrus, which was essentially a convertible version of the Avalanche, but Gemballa didn’t stop with Porsches. They also worked with Mercedes, BMW, and even Ferrari. Love them or hate them, Gemballas were very fast and unique. Back then, if you pulled up in a Gemballa, nobody had to ask if you had money; all they were thinking about was how much money you had just spent on your car.
The Porsche 993 Is The Pinnacle Of The Air-Cooled 911
By the mid-1990s, Porsche was making a significant change with the introduction of a new 911. Porsche introduced the 993 911 in 1994, which would ultimately become the final chapter of the factory air-cooled era. In today’s world, among collectors and drivers alike, the 993 is the absolute peak of the classic 911 design. Today, the 993 serves as the holy grail for high-end boutique restomods.
They don’t just hack them up but meticulously build them again from the ground up with exotic materials like carbon fiber, titanium, high-end leather and gauge clusters made by high-end watchmakers. The engines are also not left untouched, built to perfection with some of the best sound ever produced by an air-cooled flat-six. But back in the mid-1990s, the 993 was just a new car and Gemballa was modifying one.
A Tire Company Wanted A Show Car, But Gemballa Had Other Plans
This build began not because a customer wanted a unique 911, but because a company wanted a suitable car for marketing. Fulda was a famous German tire manufacturer at the time and was preparing for the launch of its ultra-high-performance tire named the “Extremo”. To attract people’s attention and show the tires’ capability, they picked the 911. Now, a regular 911 wouldn’t do. Fulda wanted a car so radical that no one would take their eyes off it. So they commissioned Gemballa to build a one-of-one prototype car capable of putting their new tire to the test. Gemballa delivered a completely black re-bodied 911 with over 500 hp. It was low, menacing, and served its purpose perfectly.
It Was A Porsche You Couldn’t Buy
Fulda shipped the black car all the way to Dubai for a high-profile promotional event and the car did not disappoint. The car did exactly what it was designed to do, and it was the start of the entire show. Everyone, from journalists to wealthy middle eastern car collectors all wanted to take a look at this mad vehicle. Among the admirers was a Sheikh Abdul Mohsin of Saudi Arabia, a man who was used to getting whatever car he wanted.
The Sheikh wanted this car and made an offer on the spot to buy the black car immediately. However, Fulda refused. This car was their corporate promotional vehicle, and it was not for sale. But he had considerable resources and wasn’t going to take no for an answer, so he went straight to Gemballa.
The Gemballa Extremo Bi-Turbo Was Built For A Saudi Sheikh
Sheikh Abdul Mohsin gave Gemballa a blank check to build his very own Gemballa Extremo Bi-Turbo. But Uwe Gemballa didn’t just reproduce the same car they built for Fulda, he added some extra sauce to this one. For starters, the show car was black, but this one was bright yellow, known as “Shock Yellow” (Schock Gelb), and could be seen from a mile away. When the car was fully built and delivered in 1997, it was said to have cost a whopping $2 million. But what made this Extremo special wasn’t just the wild paint and finer interior details, but what was under the hood. It was an engine from another legendary German tuner, RUF.
It Was Even More Powerful Than The Show Car
The Sheikh wanted a car with supercar-beating performance, and Gemballa delivered. The already powerful 3.6-liter twin turbo flat six in the black Extremo made 500 horsepower. But for the yellow car, they had a completely new drivetrain from RUF. It was a heavily modified 3.6-liter twin-turbo flat-six from RUF’s legendary BTR III program and was pushing 600 horsepower. All that power was sent to all four wheels via a six-speed manual transmission.
In 1997, 600 horsepower in a road car was almost unheard of except for cars like the McLaren F1 and Bugatti EB110 Super Sport. This was 600 hp in a car that weighed around 2,500 lbs, similar to the weight of an ND Miata. The Extremo was very fast and could hit 60 mph in roughly 3.6 seconds and hit top speed in excess of 215 mph. Only the fastest supercars at the time would stand a chance against this.
It Was More Than Just A Modified 911
A lot was done to make the Extremo look so radical. Gemballa completely redesigned the exterior with lightweight full carbon-fiber body panels. The front had a slant nose design, with clear glass in the headlights that looked like the supercar design of that time, especially cars like the Ferrari F50.
It had a removable hardtop roof, and when that was off, it had this low-slung, speedster shape with the double bubble rear deck and the huge wing at the back. The side profile has lower side skirts and massive side scoops that feed cool air into the engine. Inside, the cabin was completely re-trimmed in black leather with custom yellow accents, a full yellow instrument cluster, and carbon accents. This was no longer just a modified 911; it was a bespoke, hand-built supercar that the best German tuners could make.
It Was Left To Rot For Decades
Now, it is no secret that some of these wealthy guys have a lot of money, and they buy cars that just sit and almost never get driven. Despite the massive financial investment in this car, no one had heard about it again for decades. Years later, painful photos began circulating on car forums and social media. The million-dollar, one-of-one Shock Yellow Extremo was sitting outside in the Middle East, looking completely abandoned, caked in desert dust, and left to rot.
But later, some people came out to dispute the claim that the car was still in that condition. The story goes that the car has since been rescued and quietly shipped back to Europe, where the car went through a major restoration process in Germany around 2008. The same car was believed to have exchanged hands in 2023 at an auction.
Only Two Gemballa Extremos Were Made
On the 2nd of February 2023, the Shock Yellow car crossed the auction block at Bonhams in Paris, selling for €379,500 (around $417,000 USD), which was a fraction of what it originally cost to build. Shortly thereafter, the car surfaced at We Are Curated, a famous Miami-based vintage supercar dealership run by John Temerian. But there seems to be a plot twist to this story.
Everyone claims that only two Gemballa Extremo Bi-Turbos were ever built, the black car and the shock yellow car. But during his drive in the yellow car, John Temerian claims that he tried to buy the Dubai car, but the owner wouldn’t sell it to him. He even goes on to show the certificate for the car he was driving, which shows the VIN number and, most importantly, shows that it only has the 500 horsepower upgrade.
Now, there have been reports of replicas being made of the Extremo, but Temerian says, from all the photos and documents he received, that car seems to be the real deal and not a replica. Many say there are two cars, but according to John, there might be three. However, this doesn’t change the fact that the Gemballa Bi-Turbo Extremo is truly a special car, and with the current prices of historic 911s, the Extremo is sure to fetch an extraordinary price if it ever goes on sale again.
This Is a Symbol Of Gemballa’s Excess
The 1997 Gemballa Extremo Bi-Turbo was one of those cars that really captures the craziness of the 90s. A car that was only built because someone had a boatload of cash and wanted it by all means. What started as a tire company’s PR stunt accidentally gave birth to a carbon-bodied, 600-horsepower monster carrying the DNA of both Gemballa and RUF. Many modern restomod companies have pushed the boundaries and even made cars that are far faster, more sophisticated, and better-looking than the Extremo. But it still remains one of the most intriguing and valuable pieces of Porsche tuner culture.
Sources: Gemballa, Bonhams, Porsche.
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