TOporschefan

Not a pro driver but I am with GrantG on this one!

lovetoturn

I drove like I was on a country road at the track. Even had my flashers on the first day, I was so slow. A few people wondered why they were passing me. Told them it wasn't broken in yet. It was the quickest way to get miles on the car to and from the track and 3-4 sessions while I was there. There was no WOT until I had my 1000 miles on the car. Always smooth easy partial throttle with constantly changing revs, which is perfect for the break-in vs constant rpm at highway speeds. The temptation was great, but I followed my break-in schedule to the tee, just like AP recommends, and I did not cheat. If I didn't take those leisurely 210 mile jaunted out to the track, it would've taken forever to break it in on my schedule. Two oil changes now at 2800 miles and not one drop of oil burned to date.

DrainsWalletsFast

Already feel that way (in bold) about my regular GT4 vs the older cars. I thought the car rode really well in general until I got on some rougher concrete roads we have just the other day. Putting the shocks in Sport made it laughable how much I was tossed around. Would love to try my buddy's 4RS on that same road. I told him it honestly felt like it rode better than my GT4, but that may just be down to him having PCCBs and Mags vs my iron rotor car. That was a very smooth road, though. Mostly chiming in to say that I have to imagine you have a high tolerance for ride or have some pretty smooth roads where you are if you don't mind running sport shocks on the street. I almost never turn those on unless it's on a very smooth canyon road. Really appreciating reading some of this feedback compared to other cars. I am quite interested in trying a McLaren and Emira someday soon.

Manifold

Probably true. We haven't owned any 'luxury' car in many years, everything we have is 'sporty'. Drove my 2010 E93 M3 convertible to work today and it felt plush to me in the stiffest of the three damping modes.

mrd_spy

I'll stick to real life data myself. Arguing black is white when I have the data is daft who ever Grant is :-)

If he can show me a 4RS is faster going to 9k vs 8.5k on a time vs distance graph then that's upto him to back up his claim but atm he is wrong and I am right ;-)

While Porsche say max BHP is 8450rpm a lot of dyno's have it as circa 8100rpm in real life, and the graphs fall off a cliff after that. changing at 8500rpm is still way past peak bhp in real life and drops you back in a better sweet spot.

only reason to hold to 9k is if you can stop the car changing a gear for a fraction of a second at the end of a straight, some times is best to goto 8.8k vs fitting in another gear change. Then that is classed as a performance advantage, but it's the odd bend and not on all tracks, you just have that option to hold a gear if needed.

Look at a few dyno's posted (I looked at 3 just now) you loose cira 80bhp going to 9k and 80lbs/ft torque the drop off after 8100 rpm is massive.

I wonder if Grant realises on the 991.1 RS the cars max rpm is 8400 in one of the gears and still lower than 9k in the others. yes the engine blows up in 991.1's ;-p but 8400rpms in the famous RS models I bet is not published or talked about much.

GrantG

Yes, I am aware that the 991.1 RS had a redline of 8,800 rpm and may have had an electronic rev limit lower than this in the taller gears (and the 911R with the same engine had a redline of 8,500 rpm). However, this was done, as you alluded, to reliability issues with the valvetrain at high engine speeds and was not a performance decision.

BTW, it is clear from spy shots of the early mules of the 991.1 RS that Porsche had every intention of offering it with a 9k rpm redline, but lowered it in light of the valvetrain difficulties up there.

Also, you may remember that the power peak of the 991 GT3 and RS was lower at 8,250 rpm (rather than the current 8,500 rpm in the newest 3RS and S/T). I'm also interested that you are seeing independent testing results showing that GT4 RS has a power peak at only 8,100 rpm (with a steep decline thereafter). If this is so, why have you not chosen to shift at 8,100 rpm (given your expressed shifting rationale)?

mrd_spy

As you say you have to shift just above above peak power, but the Cup engine GT models are not like normal cars.
Going to 9k is slower as peak power is 900rpm less than this so changing at 9k you loose 80 BHP. Are you coming round to the idea yet ?
As you own one of the the newer engines cars with the higher 6750 peak torque ? you must realise the cars are dead after 8.5k revs and you owning a manual you will never see 9k revs anyway. (I also had a manual 991.2 GT3 for 4 years and no way you changing at dead on 9k)
why you arguing black is white ? you don't even own a 4RS or a PDK GT3 for that matter.

As I own a PDK 4RS plus timing equipment and you don;t ! I'll try 8k revs just to get a 3rd time 100-200 it still might even beat the 9k changes. Something I can do and you cannot it seems ;-) , i see the times recorded in real life on a 992 GT3 100-200 is 7.46 seconds so a bit slower than my 7.2 manual changes in my 4rS and slower even than a PDK driven in auto also.
Cannot beat hard data.

ipse dixit

Ever consider that you don't know how to properly drive a PDK-S?

GrantG

Thank you for saying that it's best to shift above the power peak - that was the main point I was trying to stress. So, yes I think we are both coming around to the same idea.

I guess the only disagreement remains the margin by which one should exceed the power peak rpm when shifting. You keep stressing the reduced power by shifting beyond the peak, but you have yet to address one of my key points that one must consider when choosing a shift point (where on the power curve you arrive after an upshift into the next higher gear, depends entirely on one's shift point in the prior gear and has enormous influence on overall performance). Perhaps your testing protocol does not allow for a long enough run, where you can make several shifts of this sort and run all the way through the tach more than once.

Although shifting beyond the power peak means you will have less than peak power before shifting, this is almost always a net advantage because you will improve acceleration after the shift (because you will be closer to the power peak in the next higher gear). You have to offset the small reduction in thrust in the original gear by the improvement in thrust in the higher gear if you land at a higher rpm, resulting from a shift closer to redline.

And, I will say that I see 9k rpm (or nearly 9k) quite often in my manual (confirmed by occasionally bumping the limiter on upshifts, unintentionally). I will concede that the manual has wider spaced ratios in its individual gear stack, compared to PDK (the revs fall more after an upshift due to having 6 ratios, rather than 7). So, it is even more beneficial to approach 9k rpm in the manual (no, my car doesn't feel dead as it approaches redline).

Manifold

We don't know that mrd_spy is driving the car optimally, to the limit, in manual or auto mode, so his comparison of lap time doesn't really tell us much.

What I know is that it's a lot more fun for me to use the paddles, and I don't really care whether manual or auto is slightly faster, if there's any difference at all. Track days aren't racing.

Mr. Adair

Understood. I think for me if I am trying to learn a track with an instructor as a newbie I can see where Auto would help. That said, nothing feels better than controlling your own machine..

Manifold

Many students have learned track driving in manual cars (I was one of them), and using paddles is easier and safer than manual cars. But it's fine either way, using paddles or auto mode, and you can try it both ways.

Dizzy1127

Speaking of manuals, i tried the gear shifter to manually shift instead of the paddles. Having recently driving my mnaual car, the gear shifter felt very gimmicky. Thought id be ok with it or enjoy it because i loved playing arcade racing games as a kid with the same setup. Also of note i dont think it makes sense on track as paddles are faster for manual control.

RDCR

One bounce off the rev limiter and you can throw that lap out the window. I get it, learn how to drive. Well to each his own.

Manifold

Same for me, I don't like using the shifter to change gears. Maybe I'm just not used to it, and more used to the paddles. And I think that, subconsciously, using the shifter may make me concerned that I might inadvertently put the car in neutral or reverse, since it doesn't take much force and movement to knock it back into auto mode.