brake dust

Am still struggling with the idea that the new 991 RSR will be racing with a Mezger engine this year (and 2014?). Starting to think more and more that the new 991 GT3 engine may see the race track - but only in one marque sprints series. Staring to believe the new Porsche 960 will be campaigned in the premiere endurance racing (LeMans, Spa 24, etc...) Porsche has indicated that they want a car at the price point of the F458. Mclaren has indicated that they will be building a car at the 911 price point. Think the next couple of years will be interesting and exciting for GT/sports cars.

TRAKCAR

Am I wrong?
Is it the regular 991 that's not?
Hard to distinguish nowadays with all not marketing mumbo jumbo about stuff not being raced....

delanobe

Macca had some initial inspiration from my old 993 and took it afterwards to another level

aussie jimmy

i agree.
i'm not talking about us guys here on this forum.
porsche are not marketing this car to us.

MM3.9GT3

I drive a 996.1 GT3 (Ruf RGT), I know the 996.1 GT3, the 996.1 GT3 is a friend of mine. 991 GT3, you are no 996.1 GT3.

To quote John (911SLOW), the 996.1 GT3 will always be THE ONE.

Carrera GT

That's pretty funny (though I dislike quoting or paraphrasing politicians simply because it suggests they have ever said anything valuable.)

As for the 996".1" GT3 so to say, it's a great machine. Arguably still a great car that – give or take the Ford-esque oval shapes in the cabin and the flubbery slab-sided featureless body – could still sell as a new 911 today. But it had the flaw of still being a tad heavy, with cheap suspension components (especially the dampers) and an engine that, while willing to give its all, its all wasn't all that very much. So I think the brief "point and squirt" drive I took in the Sharkwerks 3.9 in the 996.1 showed how that car, with a few suspension bits, really came up to its potential.

That said, the product "direction" for GT3 is to give more and more stopwatch performance to lesser and lesser driver participation (and skill or practice or even caring.)

If I want a fun day and less worries about money at risk, I'll put a cage in a 996 GT3 and boom.

If I want "faster than four oh" lap times, huge apex speeds, worry-free oversteer on demand (what's the point?!) and turbo spanking launch control hole shots or simply curbside coffee shop cachet, the 991 GT3 will surely perform as promised.

Carrera GT

I'm not aware of any definition of "dry sump" other than to have an engine design that replaces the oil holding job of the sump pan, with a flat pan that does not hold oil. I imagine you full well understand the design difference is to have an engine sit lower to the ground and the advantage is to have regulated oil pressure, less prone to foaming, surging, starvation and things like the big end of the pistons contacting the oil. A separate reservoir can help with filtration, temperature regulation and allow simply a vastly increased quantity of oil to be located inside the wheelbase and safely away from causing unwanted weight and balance issues or impacting handling or risking damage as well as to service more work like piston and bearing squirters.

From what little I've read, they've taken the Carrera engine case and machined it for the GT3, building it as a race-ready dry-sump configuration.

One of the "why didn't they?" questions I had about the 9A1 PDK configuration is why they have a flywheel at all. Without it, the engine could sit lower (because the flywheel diameter dictates the lowest point in the drive train) and the starter motor could be almost anywhere (forward of the rear axle and integral to the PDK box.) This seems like the logical step towards improving the polar moment and weight distribution as well as paving the way to the inevitable hybrid turbo which will presumably have a stop-start off the electric traction motor as part of the transmission. This is something we were discussing here circa 2005, so it's hardly futuristic thinking, which is one reason why I consider the 918 Spyder and I presume the 991 Turbo in a subsequent hybrid version are both obsolescent before they've even sold car number one.

TRAKCAR

I was wrong, thanks.

Macca

Delanobe. Hi there - good to see you here. of course you are correct. I wonder how your old 993 is going now? How is your new GT3? 997.1?

I think a number of people have me confused when I say the 991 GT3 is the new 996.1 GT3.

In 1999 we were talking about a new platform and a new performance moniker (GT3) which everyone looked at skeptically after the air cooled "RS" generation. Furthermore the 996.1 GT3 had a number of similarities to the new 991 GT3 launch in that it was heavier than the out gong model etc

I was talking specific details I was just saying the 991 GT3 heralds in a new generation and platform of uber performance car just like the 996 GT3 did in 1999. I for one think the rules are being re written and this is the start of a new chapter juts like the first water-cooled GT3 was....

I understand the RSR will be raced in 2013 as 997 spec Mezger engine. I believe form what Ive read a new engine will be announced for 2014 at the end of the season. Watch this space!

For the 991 Cup we know the Mezger engine also continues for 2013. Again factory engineers have been heard saying there will a new engine announcement at the end of the year.

We know around 2000 Mezger engines were kept for the Motorsport race projects back in 2012 hen the line was effectively closed down. I would imagine between the 991 Cup, RSR spares and legacy units these will be enough to cover 2013 with ease but not 2014 also....

triode

By now, everyone here is on record either as loving the 991 "GT3" potential and specs - or otherwise (like me) being absolutely sickened by the lack of transmission choice, which definitively rules the car out for us and feels like Porsche has abandoned its most dedicated, passionate customers. To each his own.

What I cannot fathom, though, is how anyone could see the 991 "GT3" as a modern-day iteration of the 996.1 GT3 - the former has an automatic transmission* (only) and every possible gee-whiz electronic doo-dad, to the point that acronym fatigue is setting in - whereas the latter had zero driver aids and was as raw and analog as a street car (which met all safety laws) could be in its time. To my mind, the two cars could not possibly be farther apart in spirit or intention.

* Yes, I know, it doesn't have a torque converter but rather dual wet clutches, yadda yadda...but it still has a "drive" setting and automatically shifts itself when so selected. That is the very definition of an automatic transmission.

Macca

.....Triode....You are looking at this literally. Transmission type aside the launch of this car we are saying is akin or has some similarities to the paradigm shift when the 996.1 GT3 was launched int 1999 which many of us followed live at that time (and subsequently ended up owning outside of USA).

If you dont get it thats no big deal.

You are driving a 2010 GT3 with CL, PASM. PCM (probably) etc. You are already driving a acronym layden number game GT3 compared to the 996.1 GT3 as it was compared to the 964/993 RS before it...

TRAKCAR

Yeah, but our nannies don't make the car faster, well maybe Pasm and DEM do, but it bothers me that I need to leave PTV on so I assume SC and sport mode PDK to go faster. Our cars are faster with SC off.

Mike in CA

The new car has "off" buttons for SC (PSM) and TC, just like your car. PTV is not a nanny; it improves turn in at low-medium speeds. The "stability" part of its function works the same way that a mechanical LSD works, except that it regulates the diff electronically and it's effect is infinitely variable, not the fixed locking effect of the current POC mechanical LSD.

cello

^ You are not accurately describing the Porsche PTV system.

You are describing a system developed by the Japanese. Porsche uses braking in PTV. Any person tracking their car will tell you why that is less than optimal....

See here: http://torque-vectoring.belisso.com/

Mike in CA

I know how PTV/PTV+ works and I have it on my Cayenne S. It's true that it uses the inside rear brake to help rotate the car at low to medium speeds. I suspect it may be one reason why Porsche increased the size of the rear rotors on the GT3 to 380mm, although at high track speeds it's unlikely to be invoked very often.

In addition, it also uses a mechanical LSD on MT cars (irrelevant to GT3) and an electronic locking diff, with infinitely variable locking on PDK cars. There are two main functions associated with PTV+, and the brakes are only used part of the time for one of them.

http://www.porsche.com/usa/models/91...hassis-ptvplus