991 GT3 Sportauto Supertest - DISAPPOINTMENT!
11-03-2013, 04:14 AM
#211
If RWS turns out to be a one-model blip it will be a bit like the PASM in the 997.1.
Frankly though I do expect after market tuners to delete it, drop the weight, and throw in a LW battery and maybe achieve more aggressive setup and totally mitigate the advantage of the system.
Porsche themselves said that RWS was equivalent to a 40hp bump. Which is nice.
But I challenge the relevance of that assessment. 40hP is worth a second or two, tops. Most of the serious track rats upon acquiring their gt3's proceed to make modifications (alignment, setup, weight, tires, improvements etc) that wind up making the car 2-3s faster than it was from the factory floor, and in some cases more. Certainly my 997.1gt3 with LWFW, Trofeo R, kW suspension, solid control arms, mounts, SW exhaust, LW battery, 3 degrees camber all around is a lot faster than the car I drove off the dealer's lot back way when.
Which brings me to another point - a racing point. Race cars are by design evolutionary, always improving, always going faster. So what owners do to their cars is an implicit nod in that same vein. RWS just strikes me as a gizmo, a trick, a ruse, that has no place on this car. So, I hope it dies, quietly and without fuss.
Frankly though I do expect after market tuners to delete it, drop the weight, and throw in a LW battery and maybe achieve more aggressive setup and totally mitigate the advantage of the system.
Porsche themselves said that RWS was equivalent to a 40hp bump. Which is nice.
But I challenge the relevance of that assessment. 40hP is worth a second or two, tops. Most of the serious track rats upon acquiring their gt3's proceed to make modifications (alignment, setup, weight, tires, improvements etc) that wind up making the car 2-3s faster than it was from the factory floor, and in some cases more. Certainly my 997.1gt3 with LWFW, Trofeo R, kW suspension, solid control arms, mounts, SW exhaust, LW battery, 3 degrees camber all around is a lot faster than the car I drove off the dealer's lot back way when.
Which brings me to another point - a racing point. Race cars are by design evolutionary, always improving, always going faster. So what owners do to their cars is an implicit nod in that same vein. RWS just strikes me as a gizmo, a trick, a ruse, that has no place on this car. So, I hope it dies, quietly and without fuss.
11-03-2013, 04:51 AM
#212
To me, however, it's fairly obvious this system will make the car faster, particularly when the tuners figure out how to tune it. Any serious racer knows the value of an asymmetrical setup on some tracks. Not just ovals, where it's required, but places like Laguna that have the majority of critical turns in one direction. When the turns are not symmetric you'll rarely find a higher level pro car set up that way.
What RWS simply allows is the benefit of a highly asymmetric setup in both directions. This, more than the fact that your GT3 already uses significant passive rear (and front!) wheel steering and Porsche have been evolving and improving that to the limit over the last three decades, convinces me that once people figure RWS out your main assumption will prove incorrect, and that it's here to stay.
If I want it on my car or not is a different question. I generally prefer simplicity, but I'll wait to drive one before deciding that.
