This is the Runge Frankfurt Flyer 003, it’s a hand-built sports car by Rünge Cars, a classic coachbuilding company based out of a workshop in Minnesota, run by Christopher Runge.
The unique cars built by Chris Runge have been celebrated around the world, they’ve been featured on the Jay Leno’s Garage TV series, and they’re considered both highly collectible, and desirable as competitive vintage race cars.
Fast Facts – The Runge Frankfurt Flyer 003
- The Runge Frankfurt Flyer 003 is a hand-built sports car created by Christopher Runge of Rünge Cars, a classic coachbuilding company based in Minnesota. Runge, a former professional snowboarder, started building unique, Porsche-inspired vehicles after discovering a barn filled with vintage automotive body tooling equipment.
- His cars are not replicas, they draw inspiration from mid-century Porsche and Glöckler sports cars, and have gained worldwide recognition, including features on Jay Leno’s Garage among others.
- The Frankfurt Flyer 003 was specifically built for SCCA racing in the early 2010s. It features a Beck chassis with custom suspension, and a mid-mounted, highly-modified 1,378cc Volkswagen flat-four engine built by land-speed racer Tom Bruch. The car’s design incorporates elements reminiscent of early Porsche Glockler specials, with power transmitted through a four-speed manual transaxle to the rear wheels, and period-correct Volkswagen drum brakes at all corners.
- Runge hand-formed the car’s beautiful aluminum alloy bodywork over a wooden body buck. The vehicle showcases various classic design elements, including dual Lexan windscreens, Porsche 356-style headlights, beehive taillights, a louvered decklid with air intakes, and Runge badging throughout.
- The Frankfurt Flyer 003 is part of a limited series of nine cars built between 2014 and 2019. Rünge Cars has become famous for producing bespoke vehicles that typically cost a minimum of $250,000 each. These cars rarely come up for sale, as they’re built for specific clients who tend to keep them. This particular model is one of only two Runge cars seen on the market in recent years.
Who Is Christopher Runge?
Christopher Runge, founder of Rünge Cars, has risen to become one of the best-known of the modern American coachbuilders – turning out classically-styled cars with decidedly German air-cooled DNA. Runge’s history starts not in a garage but on North America’s snowcapped mountain peaks – he was a professional snowboarder before turning his hand to designing and building his own cars.
The car was built for racing in SCCA competition, and it’s now being offered for sale out of South Lake Tahoe, California.
Fortuitously, he discovered vintage automotive body tooling equipment in a South Dakota barn, and set about learning how to use it. The equipment had been sitting for years, and Runge only found it as he happened to be visiting the farm with a view to buying a 1967 Porsche 912 that they had for sale on Craigslist.
He would buy the entire lot, but there was one crucial stipulation, he promised he would use the tools himself, and not resell them. He stayed true to his word, and the first thing he did was shape an aluminum car seat from a single sheet of alloy.
He built his first aluminum-bodied special in 2011, the Runge FF001, with significant influence from Porsche and Glöckler sports cars from the post-WWII period, the 1950s in particular.
It’s important to note that Runge cars are not replicas, they’re completely unique designs that have never existed before, though the engineering and styling that goes into them would be immediately recognizable as a competitive contemporary by mid-century Porsche engineers.
At a Cars & Coffee event in 2012 someone approached Runge asking to have a car built for them, in the same style as the Runge FF001. Up until this point Chris hadn’t planned on producing cars for clients, but he agreed to the request and built Runge FF002 – it would be the first of over a dozen cars he would build by hand over the next decade.
Rünge Cars is now a world famous firm, taking orders for handbuilt cars that typically cost a minimum of $250,000 apiece, and all are made by Chris, with occasional help from his skilled teenage son who is rapidly following in his father’s footsteps.
The interior of the car was built with a focus on safety and low weight, with full racing harnesses, integrated side-impact protection, and a roll hoop.
The Runge Frankfurt Flyer 003
The car you see here is the Runge Frankfurt Flyer 003, it was built in the early-2010s specifically to be used as an SCCA racer. It’s built around a Beck chassis, a powder-coated full tube steel frame with lateral support and a fully-boxed center tunnel, with integrated and reinforced frame horns.
This chassis rides on independent tubular double A-arm front suspension, with an independent trailing arm set up in the rear. This chassis, suspension, and drivetrain was co-developed for this car by Chris Runge working with Chuck Beck and Thomas Birch, to create a unique vehicle similar to the early Porsche Glockler specials.
Power is provided by a highly-modified, mid-mounted Volkswagen flat-four built to 1,378cc by land-speed racer Tom Bruch using a Porsche 912 crankshaft, modified main bearings, Wolfsburg West dual port cylinder heads, an ISKY 2J camshaft, and dual carburetors.
Power is sent back through a four-speed manual transaxle to the rear wheels, and the car rides on silver 15″ wide-five steel wheels shod with 195/65 tires. Period-correct Volkswagen four-wheel drum brakes are used at all four corners.
The vehicle has beautiful aluminum alloy bodywork that was hand-formed over a wooden body buck by Runge. It has dual side mirrors, twin Lexan windscreens, Porsche 356-style headlights, beehive taillights, a louvered decklid with air intakes, an aluminum tonneau cover, fender skirts, and Runge badging throughout.
Under the engine bay you’ll find a Volkswagen flat-four built to 1,378cc by land-speed racer Tom Bruch using a Porsche 912 crankshaft, modified main bearings, Wolfsburg West dual port cylinder heads, an ISKY 2J camshaft, and dual carburetors.
This car is one of just nine examples of the Frankfurt Flyer, Runge built the cars as a limited series numbered 001 through 009 between 2014 and 2019. Runge built cars very rarely come up for sale, as each is made for a specific client and they tend to be reticent to let them go – this car is one of only two we’ve seen for sale in the past few years.
If you’d like to read more about the Runge Frankfurt Flyer 003 you can visit the listing on Bring a Trailer here. It’s being offered for sale out of South Lake Tahoe, California with a Certificate of Origin, a race suit, a helmet, and a clean California title in the name of the seller’s trust describing it as a 1960 Volkswagen.
Images courtesy of Bring a Trailer and Runge Cars
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