Marvia 911 Carrera

Weird Car of the Day #490: Marvia 911 Carrera – Call 112

Marvia 911 Carrera illustration

In the early 1990s at the seeming height of its analog engineering and sporting successes, Porsche was struggling badly.

It adopted a host of interventions and machinations, from hiring ex-Toyota production line experts to dreaming up economy cars for China, and built 75 911s in Mexico, from knock-down kits.

Porsches, from a box, the ultimate DoorDash order.

The worst part of all this, I'll just say it: we've all seen worse-looking real Porsches.

Porsche was selling cars in new markets because, well, it had to make money somehow and the demand was (briefly) there. The overall story of how and even when it entered the Indonesian market is cloudy at best. A few great stories already exist that cover this period of Porsche's history, and I recommend Stef Schrader's 2023 article for PCA for a fuller picture of what went down (linked below).

I also read through the source material, and my tl;dr: the reason you don't see more Marvia 911s isn't one reason, it's 911 reasons.

Advertisement for the Marvia 911 Carrera • original source unknown

Porsche was reportedly exploring producing 911s in markets such as Indonesia. The German automaker had an agreement—and possible production test—with an existing, well-respected local auto manufacturer.

Then, parts of the Indonesian company did shady stuff, resulting in both Porsche and Mazda suing it. Honestly, kind of impressive.

Not sure if the factory burned down before or after its legal troubles, but the catastrophic loss of an entire production facility, and then a regime change, is a surprisingly effective defence strategy.

You're here for the shady stuff, and this is arguably an unforgivable crime against German cars: underneath, the Marvia 911 Carrera is closely related to the Mazda Great Little Car (GLC) / MR90 (Mobil Rakyat 1990 or '1990 People's Car' or Mister Ninety, depending on who you ask) / 323 / Familia of hatchbacks.

Mazda MR90, built and sold in Indonedia by P.T. National Motors Co. • source unknown

Marvia 911s were constructed on a custom chassis, sure, but their mechanical parts remained front-drive Mazda hatchbacks.

And the reason they look so damn convincing, as if I'm lying to you, is that their fibreglass bodies were reverse-engineered from actual Porsche 911s, using actual Porsche parts wherever possible, because the kit car manufacturer Marvia was (drumroll please) a subsidiary of Indomobil, the company Porsche had hoped to do business with.

The Marvia Rolls Royces kit car, built using which donor car(s) I don't know and am scared to ask about • source unknown

Porsche sued because, obviously; Mazda sued because its engines were being sold, without permission, in non-Mazda products, and shortly thereafter protestors sent a fiery message to about-to-be-overthrown President Suharto by lighting up the entire Marvia factory.

No more 1.4-litre, ~70bhp, carbureted, 5-speed manual transmission'd Porsche 911s for us!

Of the 50 or so that were made, few survive today.

My favourite Marvia? The one that's being given a rotary engine up front for a truly insane high-effort not-Porsche project car.