Meet Precision Motorwerks
It's raining outside on a Friday afternoon in Southern California, not a particularly good time to go for a drive. But in spite of the snarled traffic and delays, I'm excited. Why? I'm going to meet the legendary Greg Brown, Owner of Precision Motorwerks the Premier Porsche Wrench.
I arrive at the shop, located in an unassuming industrial complex. Well, unassuming if you ignore the pedigrees of the cars parked around the building which included a GT3, late 911 variants and more 928's than one sees in a year all surrounding the building. That alone told me folks with means and choices knew something, because this isn't the kind of place one finds cars with pedigrees like that just hanging out around SoCal unless there's an expensive restaurant around.
As I approached the shop, I can't help but notice the dyno room with a 928 GTS being tuned with a JDS Sharktuner. "These guys mean business!", I thought as I approached the main shop entrance. Inside it looked like a mainstream exotic car dealer's maintenance facility, but filled with vintage Porsches to custom built GT3 spec race cars.
Inside the front office I'm greeted by Mary Brown, the administrative muscle and Jerry the cocker spaniel who won't get off the couch unless you bring in a roast beef sandwich. The walls are covered in autographed photos of custom built 911 racer variants.
Comfortably having lunch on the floor are Greg and his two mechanics. A visiting customer sitting on the couch almost seems out of place on the couch in the midst of the lunch bunch.
One of the mechanics makes a comment about his modified 65 bug.
You can see the glow on her face like a schoolgirl when Mary chimes in that when Greg started dating her, he had one too.
Greg: That was a long time ago. I was working at Alpha Beta and had built an 11.3sec 104 1/4 mile bug.
Mary: My mom would let me know when he was 6 blocks away to pick me up.
Greg: It was fine up to about 80mph, but at 100mph the CG was 2 feet in front of the front axle. When I let off I had to ease in the clutch, let it coast down to about 80 before easing gently into the drum brakes... back in 1965 the saying, "a Porsche is just like a VW" was born, but the Porsche has evolved substantially.
And Greg "Downtown" Brown has been there finding ways to improve every variation since then.
Today, Precision Motorwerks has such a global reputation that customers as far away as Belgium have sent their cars just to have Brown perform the requested work.
The next hour flew by as I tried to keep from drooling on all the fabrication, tuning and handiwork I witnessed. This is not an ordinary shop, but Porsches and their owners are not either.
If you want the most out of your Porsche, this is the place.
References
- Mark Anderson, President 928 International - "Greg has more 928 experience than anyone I know, and has been building my motors for years. There's no one else I'd trust"
- more here