RK Motors to restore 1966 Le Mans-winning GT40

20-month restoration culminates at Pebble Beach 2016

    Ford introduced its new GT supercar at the Detroit auto show earlier this month, and hinted that it would run at the 24 Hours of Le Mans for the 50th anniversary of the company’s 1-2-3 finish in 1966. Seemed like as good a time as any to pick up one of those famous Le Mans veterans, which is just what RK Motors Charlotte did.

   The North Carolina-based company purchased the winning No. 2 car, chassis P/1046 and is prepping for a 20-month restoration on the legendary machine. The restoration is planned to culminate at the 2016 Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance in Monterey, Calif.

    After P/1046’s victory in France, it was bought by the Holman-Moody race team, which gave it a new interior and shorter tail section before running the 24 Hours of Daytona in 1967. In that race, a gearbox failure led to a race-ending crash.

   Since then, the car has been though several private owners, making appearances at a handful of vintage events.

    RK Motors will record the restoration process in video and pictures, and will periodically post them online at rkmotorscharlotte.com so fans can keep up with the repairs.

    “We’re thrilled to add this historic GT40 to the RK Motors stable of collector cars,” said RK Motors marketing director Jeff Spiegel. “Given the international notoriety of this race car, we feel it’s important to share online updates throughout the course of the 20-month restoration, allowing a worldwide audience access to this process.”

    We’ll keep an eye on this project throughout the next year, and we'll be on the ground for the reveal at the Pebble Beach Concours in 2016.