24 hours of goosebumps, 24 hours of nerve-wracking excitement, the 24 Hours of Le Mans - the endurance race on the Sarthe celebrates its 100th anniversary in 2023. The Technik Museum Sinsheim is dedicating the special exhibition "One hundred years of the 24 Hours of Le Mans" to this special occasion from April 1, 2023. Around 30 racing cars from the early days to the present day will form the core of the exhibition until January 2024. Since June 2023, three exciting racing cars from Gebhardt Motorsport have complemented the current special exhibition in Sinsheim.
Porsche, Ferrari, Ford - in the exciting history of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, well-known automobile brands have competed and continue to compete against each other. At the "Grand Prix d ́Endurance", careers began or were extinguished. Here, destinies were taken in hand, promising start-ups were destroyed and little-known racing teams became world-famous overnight.
Gebhardt, a racing car designer based in Kraichgau, also took part in this superbowl of motorsport from 1982 in the then newly founded Group C with its own designs. After a successful period, the racing cars were sold to customer teams. In 2019, Fritz Gebhardt set about collecting and restoring his Group C cars, which were scattered around the world. He and his team personally brought three of them to the museum. "The fact that a racing team from the region also took part in the 24-hour race at Le Mans is a great thing. I am delighted that Gebhardt Motorsport has loaned three historically valuable cars for our special exhibition," said Museum President Hermann Layher.
The following vehicles are now on display in the special exhibition:
Gebhardt JC 843-Ford, built in 1984:
The Gebhardt JC 843 Ford is a further development of the Gebhardt JC sports car series, which was built in Sinsheim from 1983. The vehicle was used in the World Sports Car Championship, the Interseries, the German Racing Championship and in the American IMSA series. Many international successes were achieved with the Gebhardt JC 843, including the group victory at Le Mans in 1986. The Ford Cosworth engine has a displacement of 3.3 liters and produces 500 hp. The first race after the restoration was last year at the KW Group C Supercup of the Bosch Hockenheim Historic.
Gebhardt JC 853-Ford, built in 1984:
This racer is also a further development of the Gebhardt JC sports car series with a Ford Cosworth engine with a displacement of 3.3 liters and over 500 hp. It achieved many international successes, including victory in Monza in 1986. This design also competed at Le Mans.
Gebhardt C88, year of construction 1987, chassis 872/1:
The Gebhardt C88 is fitted with a 2.1 liter five-cylinder Audi turbo engine, which produces just under 500 hp, depending on the boost pressure. It only has a two-valve system and has a rather unfavorable weight distribution: the intake tract and exhaust system including turbocharger are installed on one side - an atypical racing engine. Similar to other models for these years of construction, the KKK turbocharger still has a rather large "turbo lag" when accelerating. Its inventor, Fritz Gebhardt, rescued the car from an auction and brought it back to its "birth workshop", where he had it completely overhauled. In 2019, the car with the MOMO livery competed in historic racing again for the first time. At the Gulf Historic Dubai GP Revival, the Gebhardt C88 was driven by three-time Le Mans winner Marco Werner.
