Dr. G

I was reading Leffingwell's book "Porsche 911" and learned that the original inside door handles were crafted of solid aluminum. Crash testing revealed that the front hinged aluminum handles would swing forward on impact, causing the door to open. Porsche then changed them to composite to look like aluminum.

The book also explained how the cab was Porsche's first priority in designing the 997. It's a good behind the scenes historical read.

mdrums

Interesting. I have a Cabriolet and it is a very solid car with not much body flex.

YA911Fan

My theory iis the handles were changed to plastic for cost reduction. Never had a problem with them in any Porsche until my 996 in which the "metal" started to peel. It was quite a shock!

When did this "safety improvement" supposedly occur?

Dr. G

It was during the development of the 997. According to the book Porsche could have alleviated the problem by adding a counterweight, but instead decided to use the aluminum finished composite material.

YA911Fan

Well, "composite" or not, the 996's handles were definitely not metal. Parts which pretend to be metal are not what I expect in a Porsche.

Dr. G

I'm not saying that the 996 had handles that were pretending to be metal. I think what the book was only trying to say was that they planned on using aluminum for the 997 handle.

YA911Fan

I find the argument offered in the book hard to believe. I'm sure they could design a suitable aluminum handle if they really wanted to.

imo, the cost accountants have more sway than the engineers at Porsche these days which accounts for a lot of the changes we've been seeing...

Fahrer

In my opionion, there is way too much silver paint used in auto interiors. And, generally, it looks like hell after it begins to wear off. I know the paint on the "aluminum look" parts in porsches is more substantial than I have seen in other cars but still..... even my wife's 2001.5 Passat has real wood and real aluminum and chrome plated metal for the interior. Bye the way, composite sounds fancy but, in reality, I am sure that the interior door release for the 997 is a low cost, glass reinforced, engineering thermoplastic typically used for these applications and then post finished with a special coating.

Vitamin_J

This may sound silly but don't composites weigh subtantially less than the metals that would have been used? Could that be the rationale? Or one of them.

Dr. G

Actually, yes. The book went on to explain that the levering effect on the handle could have been remedied with counterweights, but Porsche ultimately went with the composite over that solution to save weight.

SrfCity

This could be true. According to the tour guide at the factory they had a real battle using the newer style exterior door handles vs. the older 996 ones. The bean counters lost

texas911

I don't see how making it metal causes it to accidentally open. They should have designed it smaller if that were the case. Its just cost cutting. But my 993 has black plastic handles too, so I don't see this as something new for Porsche. I think only Mercedes Benz still uses real metal door handles now. And you can feel it.

YA911Fan

Black plastic handles are fine -- they look like plastic and that's what they are. What irks me is when Porsche uses faux metallic parts.

On the 360/430, everything which looks like metal is metal. Actually, the aluminum center console in the 360 looks like plastic because of the aluminum-looking paint over the aluminum, but that's another story...

Riad

I don't care who you are, that's funny.

draxa

+1 !