I'm going to go out on a limb and say I think Porsche is going to do a good job with this car. Recentish moves by them (the sound of the 991.1, the stick-shift GT4) have shown that they do know what people like us want and that, SUVs etc aside (man gotta eat, right?), they will remain a 'proper' sports car manufacturer.

They've always known the 911 Turbo was a different, and not simply a better, 911, and they'll want these models to stay differentiated from the 991.2 turbos when they come out, which I bet will be by a more linear feel and better sound. Sure, this will be cleverly engineered in some way, and open to accusations of being 'fake', but I have faith that it won't *feel* fake. These people might just be the best at what they do on the planet. They've never released a disappointing engine before (I raise my hand here and say I've lever driven an air-cooled 911 so I wasn't part of any disappointment that might have followed the change from those), and I don't think they're about to now.

And I know the emissions cycle is stupid and easy to game, but I am of the position that government regulation of emissions is a broadly laudable thing. I'd rather our kids had to drive electric cars, but still had a planet to do it on.

I do have a GTS and so would feel somewhat smug if the new engines were laggy, revless, silent buckets of slop, but I'm just registering my suspicion that they won't be.

 

For now, it's probably illustrative to compare 991.1 vs contemplated 991.2 in terms of base price. Options will hopefully be similarly expensive.

991.2 GT3 will hopefully be ~$10k more base for base vs 991.1. My 991.1 GT3 was well specced at ~$145. Base was $130. 997.1 to 997.2 jump was circa $6k base IIRC.

 

Are you just young or did you leave the solar system between 1997 and 2008?

 

Like it or not, there will be some turbo lag. If Porsche had figured out a way to have a lag-less turbo, it would have first been on their flagship street car the (wait for it...) Turbo.

I believe these cars will be very technically good and maintain the numbers required to be compared favorably in the inevitable magazine show-downs. What remains to be seen is whether or not the cars have that intangible quality we like. Even if they don't, there is a new generation of drivers every year, and eventually they'll outnumber those of us whose first 911 wasn't a 991.2 or later car, and Porsche will have successfully transitioned into a modern platform that can be carried on for years to come.

In 1999, Porsche pissed off 90% or more of the 911 crowd by going to water cooling. I remember guys pointing to their 993s and saying they would never own another new 911 and that Porsche had lost the plot. Time has proven these people wrong and Porsche correct. Many have eventually come back to the fold but others have not. One thing is certain, Porsche's profit per 911 is higher now than ever, and they continue to sell as many or more 911 than they did in the aircooled heyday. So from a business standpoint they were fully vindicated.

 

http://www.roadandtrack.com/car-cult...turbocharging/

Great article on turbos.

The reality of the fact, Porsche is concerned about tomorrow's sales and wherever they come from. They'll do whatever they can to increase sales quarter over quarter to whoever they can appeal to. They realize they'll obviously **** of some people with every change, but if new buyers outnumber the pissed ones, who gives a rats ***? They figure that's what collectors, PCNA, and cars shows are for which actually still help market the new cars.

One good thing for buyers, it's our checkbook, and we have the ultimate choice and voting power. I have too many older NA engine cars I'd like to own someday which I can look forward too. Plus the GT Porsche's will remain NA for the near future as they've stated. They will offer NA in limited numbers to appeal to that crowd.

Keep an eye out for "Hot for Sale NA pick of the week"

 

That may have been my two-wheeled decade. Were 911s no good then?

 

If you want a little light reading, you might do a search on "Porsche 996 Intermediate Shaft Bearing Failures". Or "rear main seal failures". Not good.

Plus the interiors were kind of a Porsche low point.

And then there's the headlight design for the early cars, in which it seems like a good idea to share a bad design with both the Boxster and Carrera.

You'll also see that the Metzger engine in the Turbo and GT2 / 3 versions of the 996 weren't plagued by these problems. Well,m it by the engine problems anyway they still had fried egg headlights.

And that pretty much everything was put right with the advent of the DFI engine in the 997.2. Which, someone correct me if I'm wrong, are proving to be kind of bulletproof again.

On the evolutionary scale, think of that period as the first pancake with respect to the water cooled engine. You know, the one that's never quite right but necessary in order to get the next one right.

 

They kinda did that already. Unless you're caught in the wrong gear, the Turbo has oodles of torque pretty much throughout the useful rev range, and I can't find any hit of lag (I've tried).

 

Yup...there is a reason non Meztger engined 986, 987.1, 996, 997.1 models have resale values in the relative dumpster and the buying market knows it , Porsche finally acknowledged it via the winning class action and the prices now and forever as these models get older will always reflect it because it has a designed- in no warning blow up engine time bomb flaw ( even if some owners chose to expensively temporarily preventatively " fix " it with a replacement time/ mileage limited " could wear out again " part ) and cannot be fixed permanently , ever.
It can happen at 10k or 100k miles or never !

 

+1 The only thing that lags in a 991 Turbo or Turbo S, if you nail it, is your breathing as you attempt to catch you breath. The only problem is that there are so places where it is safe to really drive them.

 

By way of comparison, in 1974 with the advent of the 2.7 and thermal reactors Porsche had another dud design on it's hands. With that being said, they learned from their mistakes and made the revered 3.0L 911SC which became the 3.2L Carrera, both of which are considered fairly bullet-proof. The IMS issues were resolved in the DFI motors as mentioned above, so what are the chances that the 991.2 turbos will have their fair share of teething problems? It is possible, which is why I make it a point of avoiding clean sheet designs until they have revealed their flaws. Buying one of these new cars makes you a company beta tester. If you don't think it can still happen in this day and age, ask anyone who bought the first 991 GT3s...

 

All internal combustion engines have "lag" to a degree. The amount of time it takes for NA engine to get high enough in the rev range or "on the cam" as they used to say - would be considered "lag" by some. Isn't an electric engine that has 100% of its power from the press of the "on" switch the only way to really overcome this? Thus the Tesla being so fast from 0-60?

Also is this really an all new clean sheet design or is it the current engine going down in displacement, adding turbos, etc? I'm asking because I don't know, not to be argumentative or a smartass.

 

Thanks for the info. I consider myself corrected! Thought the article on turbos was very well written. Re the most recent discussion, I guess what is meant by lag is not the delay until maximum torque is reached but the apparent disconnect between pedal input and engine response. When I drove the 991 turbo S there just felt like there was a tiny bit of vagueness at low revs which my GTS doesn't have (the Turbo S made up for it pretty quickly after that though...!)

 

More often than not, the 'lag' you feel in an NA car is related to gearing and the time it takes to get to a downshift, often exacerbated in recent years by the software employed to meet fuel efficiency standards that have us in 5th gear at 30mph. A well tuned NA car driven properly will not have the dreaded turbo type of lag, though designers have done a fantastic job reducing turbo lag to an almost unnoticeable level. The funny thing about all this is, in the real world, I'll bet these turbo cars don't get much of any better mileage, particularly given the fact that they're gonna be easier to chip up for even more power (and more fuel use).

 

This!
The response of the 911 Turbo engine is a lot like the NA one, except the torque kicks in *way* earlier. I don't have to downshift to first to get power if I'm in 3rd. Step on it and it goes. People who say turbos have lag are thinking about the old ones that kicked in suddenly at ~4500 RPM. No such issues with the Turbo engine, or even for that matter then M3/M4 engine. Frankly, the Turbo engine feels quite a bit more responsive than the NA one.