Kalmar's 9X9 Is the 959 993 911 That Porsche Never Made

• What was the greatest 911 ever made? Opinions vary, but Kalmar Automotive has taken the best of all worlds and made the 9X9. It may settle the arguments.

• Based on a 993 911, the 9X9 comes in three models with three drivetrains.

• Pricing starts at around $2 million and they're only making four or five a year.

When you ask Jan Kalmar why he is building the Kalmar 9X9, the magnificent reimagining of a 993 Porsche 911, there is a long, long pause. So long that you wonder if maybe the connection between LA and Turin, Italy, may have gone bad.

But it hasn’t. Kalmar is just so busy getting the 9X9 ready for its debut at The Quail during Monterey car week, and he hasn’t slept in gawd-knows how many days, so after a long pause that becomes a little embarrassing, I just asked him something else.

“How about an easier question, what size are the tires?”

“335,” he says without hesitation.

It’s possible Kalmar is more of a technical design soul and less of a philosopher. Or maybe he’s just tired. The 3D-printed titanium brake calipers, for instance, had just arrived in the space in Turin from a shop almost 200 miles away, “still warm,” he said, and they were putting those on the car in the next room as we spoke.

He moved the laptop out through the door of the office in which he was sitting to show us. There was a car out there that looked like it had recently been a 911, with several workers scurrying around it.

“Hey, it’s not vaporware,” I said.

“No, no, no,” Kalmar said. “Definitely not.”

It is, as you can see in the accompanying photos, a cool-looking contrivance, an evolution, or more properly, a reimagining of a Porsche 993, with an all-new body, new suspension, new interior, and your choice of three models with three powertrains:

• The 9X9, “The Comfort Model,” based on the 993 911 Turbo, with an MA1 992 Turbo S 3.8 flat six making 930 hp sending power to all four wheels through a PDK 2 transmission. The “target weight” for that one is 3,025 pounds.

• The 9X9 Sport, “The Sporty Model,” based on the 991 GTS 4, with an MA1 992 GTS 4 3.0 Turbo making 650 hp driving all four wheels through a seven-speed manual with a target weight of 2,860 pounds.

• The 9x9 Leichtbau, “The Lightweight Model,” is based on the 911 GT3 Touring, with a naturally aspirated MA1 992 GT3 4.0 making 530 hp with rear-wheel drive, a six-speed manual, and a target weight of 2,750 pounds.

One of those should be right for you—if you have two million euros.

Wait a second, who is this Kalmar and how is this outfit different from the 800 or so other companies reimagining old 993s?

Kalmar is Jan Kalmar, owner and founder, an obsessive compulsive designer/fabricator/mechanic who can’t leave well-enough alone. The company, located inside a racetrack in the Danish countryside, has made several different sports cars but was best known for its offroad 964s and 993s. He counts among customers nine-time Le Mans winner Tom Kristensen, who likes the company so much he owns 40% of it.

“Kalmar Automotive is a modern-day coachbuilder that creates bespoke vehicles tailored to exact specifications,” the company website says. “Their portfolio includes classic sports cars, grand tourers, and all-purpose explorers, each a unique piece of automotive haute couture: designed to be driven, engineered to be enjoyed, and a lot of fun.”

In order to make this 9X9 993 911 for the street, the Danish company has expanded, enlisting shops all over Europe, from Danisi Engineering, the Turin firm where the car that will be shown at The Quail was being made, to a facility in Modena, where series production will begin.

The 9X9 rides on a double-wishbone pushrod-front-axle designed by Danisi, with main subframes from the 992.

“The front axle is a fully bespoke pushrod unit allowing both rear and all-wheel-drive setups,” Kalmar says.

The shocks get adaptive valving with a speed-dependent third shock absorber element for adaptive spring rate control. The tractive shock absorber lengths are adaptive, so the car will always be at the optimum ride height. And there’s a front axle lift system so you can get in and out of your driveway.

The braking system is from Carbobrake. It uses those 3D-printed, lightweight titanium brake calipers for “maximum stopping power and super low un-sprung mass,” paired with ceramic brake discs. The system retains OEM driving aids like stability management, traction control, and ABS.

The carbon-fiber body is slightly larger than the stock body, with air flow optimization performed by Danish fluid dynamics specialists Aerotak. The shape makes 345 pounds of downforce at just 80 mph and over 3,000 pounds of downforce (!) “at peak,” according to Aerotak. Kalmar lists top speeds at 211 mph for the 9x9 and 9X9 Sport, and 193 mph for the Leicthbau.

Pricing ranges from $2.14 million to $2.36 million at current exchange rates. Kalmar says handover of the first cars will start in 2025, and they’ll make four to six cars per year over the next four to five years. That’s what you call exclusivity.

The idea wasn’t to replicate a 959, though that certainly looks like what they’ve done.

“No, it’s more of daring to be proud of being nerds that drives this,” said Kalmar. “Let the others be posh and smart. It’s a matter of we trying to be the technical nerds. And for me, the 959 was the peak of Porsche engineering.”

Kalmar was also inspired by the 930 Turbo Slantnose.

“For me a 930 Turbo was a supercar because it was supercar performance. And then this (the 959) was the next level and that’s why we dare to call this a new class of cars which is ‘retro hyper cars.’ Which I stand by and if somebody wants to argue with me, they can.”

And don’t think about buying one and flipping it, either.

“Absolutely not. I say ‘no’ to more customers than I used to. Because they want to buy them and flip them, and I tell them to @#$% off because we build cars for customers not for somebody who is a car trader.”

Take a look at the car at The Quail, then maybe talk to Jan Kalmar, and convince him you’re not going to flip the car.

Does this stand out among all the 993 tuners out there? Let us know in the comments.