Alan Smithee

There is a big difference between a tiny startup car company building a $1m state of the art hypercar, and the most profitable automaker on the planet slapping a dash plaque on a parts-bin special and calling it 'limited'.

unotaz

Exactly, big diffference, the demand are vastly different. Porsche is the bigger company with bigger demand. Regardless of how the R was just a parts bin exercise, it is still a truly limited production car, with 991 cars produced period. If people feel butt hurt about not getting a R, make it simple for Porsche, don't buy their GT cars. Less demand equals more readily available supply, like buying a Mclaren. You can specify anything you want from Aston Martin and Mclaren alike.

Same thing happened to me with Ferrari. I didn't think their cars are that good to worth all that effort to play the game, so I don't buy any Ferrari period. I love Porsche and their cars, so I play the game to the best of my ability. I become friends with key people within Porsche and I spend a lot of time with them. They reward me with PTS on the R and etc. Very simple.

CAlexio

Would everyone feel less upset that they didn't get an R, if they realized that it was just an overpriced test-run for Porsche to test the market for a manual GT-car? Everyone will get their chance with the 991.2 gt3.. 2-3 months and we get to see just how close us plebes will get to an R minus the carbon and magnesium bits.. but still 98% there. .. and for about $40k less (that little limited tag on the dash costs a lot of dough)..

Just chill out already.. it's coming. They didn't become the most profitable car company in the world by leaving $ on the table. They will take all the dollars you can give them.. they just know that if they make you wait you'll donate more lavishly.

Alan Smithee

^ Except that there is no reason to believe Porsche is done playing games, whether at the dealer level or PAG. All the dealers I have relationships with have said, frankly, they will sell GT-cars to the highest bidders over MSRP.

So, yes, while it would be nice if the 991.2 w/manual has all of the 911R's character, I am certainly not getting my hopes up to buy one.

ScottKelly911

Unotaz, I don't think anyone thinks they can just "waltz into a dealer showroom and get an R". The guy was told he was first on the list. I know that you know the VIP program much better than I or most others here do, so maybe you can shed some light onto this aspect of it. As I understand it, the 918 VIP program cars DO NOT count as dealership allocations. So if Pfaff got 6 cars and 5 cars went to 918 buyers, only 1 would have been considered an allocation. That leads me to think that one or more of the following happened:
-All 5 918 VIP member's cars came through Pfaff and they exercised their purchase of an R and Pfaff ended up not getting even one single actual R allocation. This is entirely possible considering how many dealerships there are in the world and not enough cars to give every dealership an actual allocation. However it's probably unlikely considering that Pfaff is the largest Porsche dealership in Canada.
-5 R's all went to 918 owners even though not all 5 were part of the VIP program. Example, perhaps 3 went to VIP program buyers and another 2 may have purchased 918's "used" and those 2 918 owners insisted that even though they're not part of the VIP program, that they be given similar courtesy (possibly written into the purchase contract when they bought the 918's). So if that's the case, the 3 VIP wouldn't count as allocations, they'd have 2 official allocations from Porsche but the 918 owners skipped to the front of the line rendering those 2 allocations not open, so unofficially, zero allocations.
-Lastly, it's possible, they just straight out lied to him and sold their allocations out from under him. I hope this isn't what happened. But would it surprise anyone if it is?

As an aside, wasn't the Pfaff owner one of the two people for whom Porsche made the special "Gulf" 918's?

Coincident

The e gear was dramatically improved after 2009. As an automatic, it still does not compare to any PDK. I owned a 2011 Turbo S Cab and 2016 Boxster S, both PDK. And I have driven 991.1 GT 3. As an automatic, all 3 are dramatically superior to the e gear in automatic mode. But once you use the e gear in sport or track, where you must paddle shift, I would still say the PDK is a tad quicker and smoother, but the difference is subtle and does not detract in anyway from the enjoyment of driving the Lambo.

Coincident

First of all I did not simply waltz in and believe I could get an R. I have dealt with PFaff for over a decade with multiple purchases during that time. I contacted my salesman months in advance of the R being simply a rumour. The deposit was made fully 3 months prior to anyone else and they advised that the first allocation after 918 owners would be mine. Their attitude and that of Porsche Canada subsequent to not getting an allocation was one of very little concern. My point revolves around the logic of Porsche producing limited production models that should be readily available since they are priced pursuant to their regular models. What purpose is served by limiting the availability of a car like the R when they could sell many times the number they have and in the process not angering Porsche owners.

Guest89

You're whining like a teenaged girl. What would you have had Porsche Cars Canada do, conjure up car #992 especially for you? Direct your vitriol at PAG, not Pfaff.

unotaz

This is exactly what happened in Canada and pretty much in the US. In Canada, all of the Rs went to 918 owners. In the US, there were a dozen or so Rs that went to "non-918" VIP customers (ie. people who have bought many Porsches in the past). Like I said before, for the R, it's not the dealer's fault because they had no say in who gets a R. Porsche Canada allocated the cars based on the 918 owners request. Pfaff couldn't do anything about it.

unotaz

What is the purpose of producing a 918 918 Spyder? How about 375 P1? Both cars could have sold in higher numbers if they didn't limit the number of cars produced. What is your point?

The amount of moaning from people not being able to get a R is so funny in my view. I don't ever recall people complaining when they released the 997.2 GT3RS 4.0 and made only 600 cars worldwide. And to answer your question, people do buy multiple cars in a year. A lot of the 918 owners buys more than 4-5 cars every single year.

<3mph

Does anyone have info about how many 911R will go to Canada ultimately? We'd heard rumours of 20s to 50. If the former, it's quite possible virtually all Rs were taken by 918 customers, who benefited from a "VIP-like" arrangement which appears to have been quite fair (cars allocated by purchase sequence of buying a 918), even though there was no formal VIP program in Canada (and I even heard some 918 customers were not likely to get a car but perhaps they had already sold their 918). If the latter, there should be more than enough to get a real allocation to Pfaff. FWIW, I know of at least one non-918 R customer in Canada (not Pfaff). This makes me wonder if Pfaff may also have gotten a real allocation then. But chances are it went to an even bigger fish with even deeper pockets with an even bigger history with the dealership than Coincident's impressive resume. Just wondering since I was told I had spot #2 at Pfaff... I assumed this was a very very very long shot for me.

C.J. Ichiban

Correct.

Funny enough, there are plenty of cars that have the "experience" of the R but are available on the open market, and in either reduced numbers or wackier schemes, anyone can sell a few of their cars and go buy a fantastic 997 4.0RS or a 3.8RS (for half the price) and get what is likely to be, a more collectable car.

The main issue we all have is with the dubious "pre-sale" of the 911R, whereby dealers and customers conspire to fleece n00bs into paying 200-300k over sticker for the car.

Yes there are a few dealers that own the 918 themselves, of course, you need to be super rich to get a porsche dealership so kudos to them for playing the game.

BUT- my issue is that we have too many guys that are trying to violate the VIP program by 'selling' the car but not actually transferring the titles etc for a few months so they keep their VIP status. This is BS to me.

fivetwozero

Mine is #928

C.J. Ichiban

Congrats! Napier?

fivetwozero

Yes, Napier Green