Californians Rejoice! GT3 With a Manual Tranny Is Up For Grabs After All
Porsche reaches an agreement with the state of California. Buyers in all 50 states now able to order a manual transmission GT3.
Whew! That was close. Very recently we had reported that due to some bureaucratic red tape Porsche buyers in the state of California would not be able to order a manual transmission GT3. Thankfully for GT3 fans that live there, the situation appears to have been rectified. It is not like being forced to drive a PDK-equipped 992 GT3 would be a burden. It is still one of the best sports cars you can buy. However, the ability to row your own gears in a visceral sports car like the GT3 is an integral part of the experience. An experience that it seemed folks in only 49 states would get to enjoy.
News of the inability for California resides to order a manual transmission GT3 spread far and wide. It was not a good look for the state. Porsche and their fans were frustrated. Action had to be taken. It appears that was the pressure that needed to be applied in order to get things to move. Porsche has recently released a statement regarding the whole manual transmission fiasco and the steps taken to resolve it.
The full statement from Porsche:
“Following consultations with California authorities, Porsche Cars North America (PCNA) is pleased to confirm that its dealers will be able to sell the new 911 GT3 with a six-speed manual gearbox – meaning that, when the first cars arrive in the fall, they can be legally registered and driven in all 50 states. The work in the past week by the California DMV and California Highway Patrol to find a solution has been appreciated and helped to identify an appropriate regulatory path forward.
On June 11, Porsche Cars North America received a notification from California Highway Patrol outlining that their existing test procedure (SAE J1470, from March 1992) was obsolete, but it could not identify a procedural process to allow Porsche to test the new 911 GT3 equipped with a manual transmission through the modern test procedure (SAE J2805, from May 2020).
Discussions with the regulators continued but without visibility to a solution we took the difficult decision to inform dealers that the manual option would no longer be available in California, since there would be no way to legally register the cars in the state. We communicated this on June 15th, coinciding with the planned announcement of the 911 GT3 Touring package.
PCNA thanks California DMV and California Highway for their responsiveness and helping quickly to identify the appropriate regulatory path forward. The 911 GT3 arrives in the US in the fall, and will join 16 other model variants in the Porsche range that can be specified with three pedals.”
Hopefully, no Californians immediately put their house up for sale when they thought they could not buy the car they wanted. It may have been a tense week for those that ordered a GT3 manual transmission car in California. They may have been already contacted by their dealers saying they could only get PDK.
Now, they may be hearing from the dealer again to let them know they can shift their own gears after all. All’s well that ends well, but this was still an uncomfortable situation. It makes us wonder how future regulations are going to impact car buying. A number of states have already announced they want to phase out gasoline powered cars within the next several years. How smoothly is that going to go?
We can speculate about the future all we want. But at least we know now that California will be getting the manual transmission GT3. The only hurdle left is getting an allocation from your local dealer. As sad as it may be, that might actually be more difficult than navigating California Highway Patrol regulations.
Photos: Porsche
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