We have featured quite a few Devins here, but finding a factory built one is a rare occasion. Most were sold as kits, but a few did leave the factory as complete cars. The seller makes a lot of claims here though, so you will want to do your homework before jumping into the auction. They have been told that it could have originally had a Porsche engine out back. A VW flat-four currently resides in the engine room though. They have records going back to eighties, so perhaps you could track down the previous owners and piece together the history. The handsome fiberglass body is wearing most of its original paint and there isn’t any evidence of past repairs. I wouldn’t compare one of these to a Porsche 550 Spyder as the seller does, but I wouldn’t mind having one either. The car is located in Bridgewater, New Jersey and is listed here on eBay with no reserve.
Cute car and bidding is over $20,000. Is it really worth that much?
That original to the car, six character, blue with yellow letters and numbers, California license plate is either not the car’s original license or the car was not titled and registered until sometime in the mid ’70s. The California blue plates were first put into use sometime in mid 1969 (I know, my bought-new, ’69 340 Cuda fastback got one of the last black plates, ending in “YZP”) and California went to seven characters, one number followed by three letters then three more numbers, sometime in 1980 (my purchased new in early 1980, BMW 320i had one of the last blue six character plate, with the alpha sequence ending in “ZLH”).
If the seller is this vague and inaccurate about the licensing, makes me wonder what else may be, shall we say, embellished.
In the listing he has as make “Porsche” , model “other” It has a VW engine. Can’t see where he gets the Porsche for make as he states they are ‘similar’ to the 550.
Secondly – Mechanics – ‘transmission shifts nicely but third gear syncro is poor’. Can’t have it both ways.
Never heard of a D with a tube chassis. SS yes D, I’m a little suspect. Especially since there are no pics showing it. I had a Devin a few years ago. Bought it because it had a original 356 Speedster gas tank, windshield and frame. Kept the tank and frame let the Devin go away. Bodies are nice quality, but the build quality is all over the place as are most kit cars. When Rich Taylor was selling his original SS a few years ago, I so wanted it, but didn’t have $150k walk around in my pocket. Think I got $4k for mine with a VW chassis and 40hp lump.Original Devin seats? That’s a new one to me, but Devin’s aren’t my area of expertise. Big number on this one, but I understand Devin’s are in demand. D body style is aquired taste for me.
I can’t say this description does much for me. The seller seems taken with Porsches, but this isn’t one. It might have had a Porsche 356 engine in it at one time, but it doesn’t now and there’s no evidence it ever did. If it did, so what? Maybe that makes it more important in his mind, but not mine. It’s not a ‘Porsche Other’ or any other ‘Other’. It’s a VW-powered Devin in what looks like nice condition. Sell it and move on.
Forgive any memory failures — this was a LONG time ago! — but Devin Ds used VW floorpans, not tube chassis. As noted above, most were kit cars assembled by owners…Bill Devin’s people put very few together. Some had Porsche engines (I remember seeing one in Sports Car Graphic magazine) but those were rare and, even back then, costly.
Devin did provide seats. I think everything but the bare, unpainted body shell was optional on top of the low initial price. A friend’s father had a “D” shell in the rafters of his garage back in the early/mid-1960s but, like so many others, never got around to mating it up with the pieces needed to make it a real car.
What I’d love to have is a Devin “C.” The “C’, of course, stood for “Corvair.” It was essentially a D, but had significantly more oomph!
Some race car! No tach!
It meant that he also has a 550 and a 911 for sale in separate EBAY ads kenzo
Thanks Charles.
FOR THOSE OF YOU THAT ARE NOT SURE IF A DEVIN D WAS BUILT ON A SPECIAL FRAME FROM BILL DEVIN ——WELL THE DEVIN—IT WAS AND ALL DEVIN Ds HAD TUBE FRAMES —Ds–SS —Cs –ALL HAD BILLS FRAMES UNDER THEM —THIS IS NOT A VW CHASSIS CAR AND THEY SELL FOR AS HIGH AS 1000,000 A COUPLE OF YEARS AGO BUT AVERAGE BETWEEN 35,000 TO 45,000—THEY ARE WELL BUILT AND FUN –FAST –LIGHT –AND ONLY WEIGH 1200LBS —-GOOD LUCK WITH THE AUCTION —IF I HAD THE FUNDS RIGHT NOW IT WOULD BE MINE —–RODSO
The ‘Porsche Purpose’ here was only to get the word ‘Porsche’ into the title — to get more hits from viewers searching for Porsche…
Just to clarify the registration(pictured) for this car does match license plate! This Devin D has its original factory tubular frame. This Devins fiberglass actually wrap around the tube fame to insure stiffness and rigidity. These were amazing race cars in their day and were feared when they showed up on race day. Just think they were running same power as a 356 with just about 1/2 the weight. This Devin is still eligible for any vintage racing venue.
This car is back on ebay. Did some research and tracked down the original owner/builder who was an ederly gentleman more than happy to talk about the car. This car was not factory built by Bill Devin himself nor ever had any Porsche parts. It has always been VW. The original owner just sold it last year. Not much later it started popping up for sale, with a 1000% markup over the last sale price mind you. Furthermore, there no doubt in my mind that the original owner gave the buyer the true history of the car after speaking to him. If anybody is interested in it and wants the true story, not the outright BS uttered by the seller, I have the original owner’s phone number.